Thoreau was an idiot.

I can't think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything.

There are only three things that can kill a farmer: lightning, rolling over in a tractor, and old age.

If you can imagine a man having a vasectomy without anesthetic to the sound of frantic sitar-playing, you will have some idea of what popular Turkish music is like.

That's the trouble with losing your mind; by the time it's gone, it's too late to get it back.

Hunters will tell you that a moose is a wily and ferocious forest creature. Nonsense. A moose is a cow drawn by a three-year-old.

Geologists are never at a loss for paperweights.

Of all the things I am not very good at, living in the real world is perhaps the most outstanding.

Physics is really nothing more than a search for ultimate simplicity, but so far all we have is a kind of elegant messiness.

Protons give an atom its identity, electrons its personality.

Why is it, I wondered, that old people are always so self-centered and excitable? But I just smiled benignly and stood back, comforted by the thought that soon they would be dead.

You can learn from mistakes only when you realize you made one.

The closed mind is a disease. You need to have an open mind

It has many forms, not all of which look like what you see in movies.

I'm, I guess you could say, the Chinese-speaking, banjo-picking girl.

The truth is deafening, no matter how softly it is spoken.

What little light was left inside me flickered out.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin is a place that I feel like it's undervalued. It's one of the most amazing cities I've been to. It has the most to offer.

The wisest prophets make sure of the event first.

Taxi drivers used to ask me what kind of music I did, and I'd say, 'Well, it's kind of jazz, soul, classical' - but that makes no sense to anyone.

I loved school, I loved putting on my uniform and doing homework every day. I was one of those good students that the teachers liked. I guess that's got to be a pretty nerdy, geeky part of me.