If it were better, it wouldn't be as good.

Parody is homage gone sour.

It is in the nature of the New Yorker to be as topical as possible, on a level that is often small in scale and playful in intention.

I will try to cram these paragraphs full of facts and give them a weight and shape no greater than that of a cloud of blue butterflies.

Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.

If it were better, it wouldn't be as good.

When I go away to do a movie, I bring the blanket I've had since I was a little girl. It helps me sleep. I also always bring my laptop so I can E-mail friends. And I bring my dog, Beauty, wherever I can.

My life has changed for the better. It's just amazing. I have to catch myself sometimes. It's like a dream. It's a great thing.

You need to be naive enough to do things differently. No big publishing house would have allowed us to co-create a fully designed, four color business book in landscape format - because it was contrary to the publishing industry logic. However, we thought of Business Model Generation as a product, not just a book - similar to Apple products.

If an idiot were to tell you the same story every day for a year, you would end by believing it.

The most valuable moments and experiences that life has to offer are found only along its most treacherous paths.

Happiness is speechless.

I work every weekend in my district.

Roller-skating and ice-skating are two different things - I found that out the hard way.

I played English football - soccer - instead of American football, because we couldn't afford the equipment.

Do you know how many athletes go broke three years after they stop playing? I want to help them hold on to their money. I mean, I know about budgets.

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.

I don't believe that the meek will inherit the earth; The meek get ignored and trampled.

Corned beef and cabbage - that's our favorite holiday meal when all the O' Haras gather around the table.

The other part of our proposal that gets the 'dittoheads' upset is our suggestion that the commercial radio station owners either play by the rules or pay. In other words, if they don't want to be subject to local criticism of how they are meeting their license obligations, they should pay to support public broadcasters who will operate on behalf of the local community.

I care about my quality of life and money.

When it comes to terrorism, governments seem to suffer from a collective amnesia. All of our historical experience tells us that there can be no purely military solution to a political problem, and yet every time we confront a new terrorist group, we begin by insisting we will never talk to them.

I get appalled when I see good drivers being left on the sidelines because they haven't come up with the half million to a million to put themselves in a competitive car.

I haven't spent years, like Alyse Nelson of Vital Voices, toiling for female economic empowerment on five continents.

I'm interested in stories and the dark side of peoples' minds.

Well, I think that if you sincerely try to imagine what life is like for another person - not in a mocking way, not in a satirical way, but in a sincere, compassionate way - I don't think that's exploitive.

I have an admiration for Mr. Eastwood that borders on the kind that I have for the Grand Canyon. Like it, he is craggy, worn, awesomely impressive and unique, a living four-star tourist attraction that, in the formulaic words of the Guide Michelin, 'vaut le voyage.'

Every time I've made a plan in my Hollywood acting career, something else has happened, so I've gotten out of the habit of trying to predict the future.

Acting allows me to explore new worlds, to discover characters by delving into their lives, and ultimately to become someone else entirely.

Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive - the risk to be alive and express what we really are.