My longing to improve my looks via The Body Shop is being replaced by my longing to improve my looks via Photoshop.

Once we hit forty, women only have about four taste buds left: one for vodka, one for wine, one for cheese, and one for chocolate.

If you know you can do it - if you can already chart every day in your future - then why bother? Choose to do something you have more trouble imagining. Take a chance.

Birthdays are a reward for having shown up 365 days in a row. It's like getting a badge for attendance.

How about "diamonds are a girl's best friends"? Nope. It should be switched around and pointed out, instead, that your best friends are diamonds.

Think of the funniest story from your life. Chances are, it was something awful at the time.

Confessions are like tattoos in that 1) You convince yourself that the immediate pain of going through the process means it won't bother you later on; 2) They are permanent.

Envy is what makes you, when an acquaintance is lustily telling you that she's dating a Greek god of a guy, ask, 'Which one, Hades?'

Laughing together is as close as you can get to a hug without touching.

Truth is like nuclear waste: it needs to be dealt with carefully. Sometimes it needs to be buried way, way out of town. And sometimes it should never be uncovered at all.

We should remind ourselves that laughing together is as close as you can get to another person without touching, and sometimes it represents a closer tie than touching ever could.

The path to wisdom is paved with humility.

With self-acceptance, we have the ability to choose compassion and forgiveness over anger and self-hatred.

I came to architecture from building. Because my father was a builder, everybody was - and is - a builder in my family.

Hitting the kid with the ball might get you the ball, but it won't get you anyone to throw it to.

Culture is not usually one of the criterion for personhood, but it has been argued that culture is sort of a medium for a lot of these criteria, such as empathy, and so on.

I am not a public speaker and never will be.

Mary Jo Putney is a gifted writer with an intuitive understanding of what makes romances work. I loved Silk and Shadows, couldn't put it down, and don't think readers will, either.

People who come to Canada and have big dreams are really achieving something special from an entrepreneurial perspective.

Express who you are in a world where everyone is the same.

Winners quit all the time. They just quit the right stuff at the right time.