Once, in Lisbon, I tried my best to work the phone book in a way that would assuage a longing [Alice and I] had for certain Chinese dishes . . . .

I never eat in a restaurant that's over a hundred feet off the ground and won't stand still.

Many Texas barbecue fanatics have a strong belief in the beneficial properties of accumulated grease.

The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.

The shelf life of the average trade book is somewhere between milk and yogurt.

As far as I'm concerned, 'whom' is a word that was invented to make everyone sound like a butler.

Perhaps we've time to have a look at the Number Thirty-One bus queue before we turn in.

I'm in favor of liberalizing immigration because of the effect it would have on restaurants. I'd let just about everybody in except the English.

Every good idea sooner or later degenerates into hard work.

Did you know that five out of three people have trouble with fractions.

I never did very well in math - I could never seem to persuade the teacher that I hadn't meant my answers literally.

Transform from being a fault-finder and blamer to a happiness-finder and appreciator. Positive emotions will increase in your life.

The immoral man always sees the moral man as immoral, just a way for him to justify his immorality.

The hard fact is that writing is available to readers because of market factors as much as particular writing talent.

You’re gonna be like Aquaman?” she asked. “Get the fish to fight for you?”“Thanks, ” Percy said. “I haven’t heard enough Aquaman jokes for one lifetime.

Regardless of how distant your dreams may seem, every second counts.

I'm not changing to the point where suddenly I wear floor-length skirts and start playing the violin; I'm just growing up a little bit, I guess.

Keep unscathed the good name; keep out of peril the honor without which even your battered old soldier who is hobbling into his grave on half-pay and a wooden leg would not change with Achilles.

Yes, hell exists. It is not a fairy tale. One indeed burns there. This hell is not at the end of life. It is here. At the beginning. Hell is what the infant must experience before he gets to us.

The verb "Garland" should be created. It would mean to unfairly put a stinking albatross around someone's neck, to make him unemployable.

I'm just as normal as anybody else. I'm just probably in the same place as many people in their mid to late twenties are.