At age 28, I had no retail experience, no consumer marketing experience and no real

Internet experience. But I decided I wanted to work for myself. I felt starting a company would enable me to get the responsibility I deserved and that I couldn't do that within the confines of a bigger company.
Mariam Naficy

I used to be a writer with superstitions worthy of a professional baseball player: I needed a certain desk chair and a certain armchair and a certain desk arrangement, and I could only get really useful work done between 8 P.M. and 3 A.M. Then I started to move, and I couldn't bring my chairs with me.
Elizabeth McCracken

One of the things I've been most excited by is U.S. television drama. For my money, it's some of the greatest narrative art of our time. Each series is like a 19th-century Russian novel: you need to do a lot of work in the first few episodes, just as you do in the first 50-60 pages of those books.
Kevin Barry

Theologically, the creation of chocolate demonstrates both the unity and the diversity of humanity. Wherever you taste it, in every country of the world, it is immediately recognizable. Other things, in every cuisine, are just food, but chocolate is chocolate.
David Augsburger

When I was 19, I joined a rock band, and that's when I began to say, 'Okay, this is something that I could take seriously.' When I came to Minneapolis, it just refined everything.
Lizzo

Seattle is a fantastic place to build a great technology-enabled consumer company.
Dan Levitan

When I was a child, I grew up speaking French, I mean, in a French public school. So my first contact with literature was in French, and that's the reason why I write in French.
J. M. G. Le Clezio

Honesty allows us to live with not knowing. We do not know the full story; we do not know where we are in the story. We do not know who, ultimately, is at fault or who will carry the blame in the end.
David Whyte

I had to audition as an actor, and I got so tired of doing the same monologues over and over, so I started writing my own, and then I started selling them to other actors.
Richard LaGravenese

I've found that using historical material and being rooted in historical material is liberating because I always think to myself, 'Well, this actually happened, and this is fantastic!' That's why I don't like fantasy, in a way. Because it's sort of in emptiness.
Michael Hirst

People who say they have a best friend at work are seven times as likely to be engaged in what they're doing. And if they don't have a best friend at work, the odds of being engaged are just 1 in 12.
Tom Rath

Gemeoss

My favorite pre-Ponzi schemer was known as '520 Percent Miller' because he promised 10 percent

returns a week, or 520 percent a year. Of course he was just using new investors' money to pay old investors, and soon he was on the lam. Mitchell Zuckoff In February of this year I returned to China to research my next book. The authorities know about the novels of mine that have been published in the west, including the latest one, Beijing Coma, about a student shot in Tiananmen Square, but so far have allowed me to return. Ma Jian In the meantime, we see there are charities that spend much of their scarce resources that should be going directly to the children to overcome this gulf that separates them from both the donors and the needy. Dana Rohrabacher I wear my Viking helmet because the horns define how sharp my brains are. If you try to rub me the wrong way, I will stick you with both of my horns. Flavor Flav Uniforms are intended to make the wearer look as strong as possible. Soldiers could fight in leotards, but that's never going to happen because leotards ...

I'm kind of a good girl - and I'm not. I'm a good girl because

I really believe in love, integrity, and respect. I'm a bad girl because I like to tease. I know that I have sex appeal in my deck of cards. But I like to get people thinking. That's what the stories in my music do. Katy Perry I love that my friends are sometimes even 20, 30 years older than me - that I can just sit and enjoy their company and their experiences. Kim Kardashian Sport is a universal language, building more bridges between people than anything else I can think of. Sebastian Coe As of today, the Postfix mail transport agent has almost 50,000 lines of code, comments not included. Wietse Venema I guess, first and foremost, I'd like to thank my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Tim Tebow Follow your passion, be prepared to work hard and sacrifice, and, above all, don't let anyone limit your dreams. Donovan Bailey All forms of human happiness contain within themselves the seeds of their own decomposition. Theodore Dalrymple You should put time...

I kind of had my life planned out for me. I'd be married at some

point, have, you know, 1.5 children, and be a principal possibly one day. But I think that that was kind of my problem. I allowed myself to plan out my life and didn't let provident direction guide my life. Clay Aiken I actually had an experience where I thought somebody was breaking into my house. That's got to be the most terrified I've ever been in my life. I don't know if that's saying much. The fear, especially as a female in a house by yourself, was horrible. Hayden Panettiere Human vocabulary is still not capable, and probably never will be, of knowing, recognizing, and communicating everything that can be humanly experienced and felt. Jose Saramago You know what? I never really factor Hollywood into anything. I'm a black actor, so I can't really control what Hollywood thinks. I gotta go do my thing, and my jokes have got to be funny. Whatever I do has got to be great. Jamie Foxx According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the...

Of course, there will always be those who look only at technique, who ask 'how',

while others of a more curious nature will ask 'why'. Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information. Man Ray Sex is like washing your face - just something you do because you have to. Sex without love is absolutely ridiculous. Sex follows love, it never precedes it. Sophia Loren What we've gone through in the last several years has caused some people to question 'Can we trust Microsoft?' Steve Ballmer He who aspires to paradise should learn to deal with people with kindness. Abu Bakr There is too little courtship in the world. Vernon Lee The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil. Voltaire If a man has common sense, he has all the sense there is. Sam Rayburn

I ride my bike for transportation a great deal - occasionally I ride it for

fun. But I also have a generator bike that's hooked up to my solar battery pack, so if I ride 15 minutes hard on my bike, that's enough energy to toast toast, or power my computer. Ed Begley, Jr. I'm the complete opposite of every clean cut, decent-looking guy you could ever think of. Yet, I have the biggest heart in the world. A. J. McLean Art is for entertainment purposes, but it's also to reflect our dreams, our hopes, the present, the future the past - whether it's good or bad. Amber Valletta I don't think it's healthy to take yourself too seriously. Payne Stewart I'm a very bad baker. Eric Ripert How well he's read, to reason against reading! William Shakespeare I believe that interest in heroes is universal and eternal. Norman Spinrad The air is the only place free from prejudice. Bessie Coleman I've got 11 brothers and sisters. John Boehner As man now is, God once was; as God is now man may be. Lorenzo Snow

Genome design is going to be a key part of the future. That's why we

need fast, cheap, accurate DNA synthesis, so you can make a lot of iterations of something and test them. Craig Venter The second advantage claimed for naturalism is that it is equivalent to rationality, because it assumes a model of reality in which all events are in principle accessible to scientific investigation. Phillip E. Johnson It's like a jigsaw, there's a piece of the puzzle at the beginning and it's the only one and of course it had a lot to do with the way you look. And then you have to have the time to add pieces of the jigsaw. Carole Bouquet I even believe in helping an employer function more productively. For then, we will have a claim to higher wages, shorter hours, and greater participation in the benefits of running a smooth industrial machine. Sidney Hillman Every cliche about kids is true; they grow up so quickly, you blink and they're gone, and you have to spend the time with them now. But that's a joy. Liam Neeson For example, in...

I think I always resented the fact that people thought I was trying to entertain

them with my multifaceted, chameleonlike character changes. Although I liked doing that, I wasn't out to fool people and say 'Guess which one is me.' Cindy Sherman 'The Voice' has lots of singers who fit the 'Idol' mold of young, innocent ingenues with psycho stage moms. But it also has long-suffering adult pros, with a whiff of thirtysomething despair in their voices. That adds an edge of realness. Rob Sheffield Listen, I am such a nerd. I'm not one of those girls that goes, 'Ha, ha, hee, hee. I'm a nerd.' No, no, no - my brain mentality is the same as a 12-year-old little boy. The video games that I play, the things that I like to watch - I'm a Trekkie. Mila Kunis What is the biggest public forum in the United States? We were told it's the Super Bowl. The ad shows kids working at blue-collar jobs, and the final statement is just written text: Who's going to pay for the trillion dollar deficit? Joan Blades For us, as ...

The Cullens, they're an interesting group of vampires. They're all really good but kind of bad.

I mean, they are still vampires. Elizabeth Reaser The waves from all the different parts of a sphere would cancel each other out. You need motion that's nonspherical. Rainer Weiss Carlos Sosa, the saxophone player for Zac Brown Band, and I worked up two songs for 'When You're Feeling Sick.' They were a blast to work on. The songs are real upbeat and silly. Coy Bowles I've no apprehensions and inhibitions as an actor. Nithya Menen I want to help people to get to know my story and really tell them in detail what I've been through. James Arthur When you encounter some form of discrimination or maybe even worse, I urge you to alert others. Regardless of how small the incident is, it has to be brought to the attention of people like me and also the law enforcement agencies. Raja Krishnamoorthi Perhaps the best thing about biographies is that they enable us to slip the strictures of time and provide a bracing corrective to our tendency to see everything in the dark ...

I never really got on my own case about my own acting. I know a

lot of other people have, and probably very justifiably. But I don't worry about stuff like that too much. Troy Donahue I was made fun of in the Midwest - I was the only Asian in my graduating class of 200. Fortunately, I found my niche, and it was fine. But I wanted to be so white, you wouldn't believe it. I was like, 'I want to be white; I don't want to be this anymore.' But now I embrace it. Reggie Lee Developing a diet that is healthful, balanced, and appropriate for your particular caloric needs is easy enough and is absolutely critical to establishing a healthful lifestyle that incorporates proper nutrition, adequate fitness, and mental resilience. Daphne Oz As I have found out, recognition has its upside, its downside and - you may say - its backside. Pippa Middleton The radiation was worse by far. I had bandages all over my head. I looked like a mummy. On the side of my head and neck and down to my collarbone, I had second-degree burns. My skin b...

You know, since the reviews have come out and people have reacted to it, I've

realized that is in a sense what has happened. But as I was writing them, I didn't feel a part of any tradition. I think that would have been too overwhelming, in a sense. Jhumpa Lahiri Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim. Aristotle There is little doubt that the majority of Mr. Mill's supporters in 1865 did not know what his political opinions were, and that they voted for him simply on his reputation as a great thinker. Millicent Fawcett I got my degree. More importantly, I got a key to American opportunity. That's who we are - a nation that rewards ambition with opportunity. Where hard work can lead to success, no matter where you start. Eva Longoria I've always been a writer, and in high school, I was the editor of my school newspaper and I got a writing scholarship. It's always been a passion of mi...