Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza.
You cannot paint the exterior of your house. You have to take the paint chip down to show the paint-chip Nazis.
The major advantage of domestic travel is that, with a few exceptions such as Miami, most domestic locations are conveniently situated right here in the United States.
Another well-known Paris landmark is the Arc de Triomphe, a moving monument to the many brave women and men who have died trying to visit it.
We Americans live in a nation where the medical-care system is second to none in the world, unless you count maybe 25 or 30 little scuzzball countries like Scotland that we could vaporize in seconds if we felt like it.
I recently had my annual physical examination, which I get once every seven years, and when the nurse weighed me, I was shocked to discover how much stronger the Earth’s gravitational pull has become since 1990.
The best baby-sitters, of course, are the baby’s grandparents. You feel completely comfortable entrusting your baby to them for long periods, which is why most grandparents flee to Florida.
A sense of humor is a measurement of the extent to which we realize that we are trapped in a world almost totally devoid of reason. Laughter is how we express the anxiety we feel at this knowledge.
Americans who travel abroad for the first time are often shocked to discover that, despite all the progress that has been made in the last 30 years, many foreign people still speak in foreign languages.
I haven’t been able to slam-dunk the basketball for the past five years. Or, for the thirty-eight years before that, either.
It is better to be rich and healthy than poor and sick.
I report as a machine; I write as a person. That clear dichotomy softens the transition.
Hardware: where the people in your company’s software section will tell you the problem is. Software: where the people in your company’s hardware section will tell you the problem is.
Cats are independent, by which I mean smart.
I never start a section of the story without knowing how it will end. I also consciously try to shape the story as though it were a movie.
Panicky despair is an underrated element of writing.
I, alone, could never have produced this book. I say this mainly in case there are lawsuits.
A perfect parent is a person with excellent child-rearing theories and no actual children.
The old system of having a baby was much better than the new system, the old system being characterized by the fact that the man didn’t have to watch.
I really try to think cinematically, because that’s how people read. They create a theater in their minds.