My parents are both scientists, and I was raised without god.

One good thing about being a woman is we haven't too many examples yet of what a genius looks like. It could be me.

We don't know the effects we have on each other, but we have them.

We tried not to smile, for smiling only encourages men to bore you and waste your time.

There was not an awareness of pop culture in the household. There was a lot of respect for working hard, and for intellectual and professional achievement.

Maybe that's good to not feel like you have to keep up when there's so much to keep up with right now. It's bottomless.

There's so much writing I could have done and so many ideas that I had and so many things I wanted to work on that I didn't. I like too much having things in my head rather than doing the work.

To go on and on about your soul is to miss the whole point of life. I could say that with more certainty if I knew the whole point of life.

You have to know where the funny is, and if you know where the funny is, you know everything.

Writing fiction is a good way to inhabit other minds, if not other lives.

I do feel it. And I've felt it my whole life, that the supernatural has a role in the world.

Keep your handkerchief neat, and then you can be trusted with a bigger clothe. If you can’t manage few minutes, you are likely to waste 24 hours no matter how many times it’s given to you!

Inspiration is an underexamined part of political life and presidential leadership.

In an IT lead world, incumbents generally win because they have the existing relationship with the IT organization.

We want everybody to have the best facilities in which to work, but we do not believe in posh and impressive private offices.

And I think it's true of any big organization... Bureaucracies and organizations make it hard to do the right thing sometimes.

I am perplexed at the stupidity of the ordinary religious being. In the most practical of all matters he will talk and speculate and try to feel, but he will not set himself to do.

The highest force in existence is consciousness, and you are that.

I was wholly invested in my friendships. I might have tested them sometimes, but only to reassure myself that they were permanent. A mistake, of course.

To be rude is as good as being clever.

That helped us nurture not only the game's traditions but to develop its mythology: America's Team, The Catch, The Frozen Tundra.