I follow my instincts. Maybe I'd be more successful in my business and my private

life if I did things like everybody else. But I just feel like I'm different from everybody else.
Brenda Russell

When I'm in the city, I like to go to different events and get introduced to different people. That's what New York is all about. There is great diversity, and there are people from all over the world who have done amazing things. That's my favorite thing to do: meet new people.
Carl Hagelin

When my daughter was 3, she was eating Cheerios and spilled some on the table. So she swiped them onto the floor. I said, 'Darcy, what are you doing?' She said: 'Don't worry, Daddy, the robot will get it.' I didn't know whether to be horrified or proud. It was this idea that homes take care of themselves and robots are part of that.
Colin Angle

Who wants to get really granular with sabermetrics when you're going to see a two-and-a-half-hour Brad Pitt movie? You don't go to the cinema for a maths lesson.
Billy Beane

If you're having trouble finishing a book, it might be that you're trying to fix it as you go. Just finish the story, no matter how terrible you think that first draft is. Then let it cool off. In other words, don't look at it for a while. Then you can rewrite it.
Kimberly Willis Holt

In me soul, I'm gentle.
Joe Cocker

I live in a cottage and volunteer in the village shop.
Lisanne Falk

Many Americans do not understand that the officers of the government are simply the servants of the people.
Robert Green Ingersoll

I know that people everywhere listen to hip-hop, but especially being from the South, you really get that influence. You go out, you party, and it's just always there. Also, I grew up listening and loving reggae music, too.
Kat Dahlia

I don't consciously use my own life or experience at all.
Sadie Jones

Why do I write? From selfishness. Because this state of liquefied, complex concentration, however faintly and dimly I'm able to perceive it, is the greatest pleasure I know.
Francis Spufford

Gemeoss

Urban Outfitters - I love it. It's almost like Forever 21, but for, like, the

24- to 25-year-old girl, getting a little bit older. Keke Palmer I'm the kind of person that believes that I would like to be evaluated by my entire career and my entire life, not two words that I would misspeak and then later apologize for. Kirk Cameron I often feel a discomfort, a kind of embarrassment, when I explain elementary-particle physics to laypeople. It all seems so arbitrary - the ridiculous collection of fundamental particles, the lack of pattern to their masses. Leonard Susskind Around age 11 or 12, I started playing jazz bass. From there, I went to electric bass and then guitar, which I kept up for a long time. Joshua Roman Space X's Elon Musk wants to colonize Mars with modules where earthlings can live. My teleporting technology is the number one way those individuals will get new information, new treatments of diseases that will occur on the planet, and new food sources. Craig Venter Brain cells are normally not sensitive to light. So by introdu...

In the next couple of years, part of every film's process is going to be

to adjust the images. And it'll be to change the color of an actor's tie or change the little smirky thing he's doing with his mouth. Or you can put in more clouds or move the tree a little bit. Robert Zemeckis There's a high school in Camden, New Jersey, I call the Jill Scott School. It's the Camden Creative Arts High School. Those teachers and kids are so passionate about what they do, and 98 percent of the senior class went on to college. Jill Scott I spent a good deal of time going back over my childhood, my midlife, to try to understand who I was. We're supposed to be complete and whole, and you can't be whole if you're trying to be perfect. Doing a life review helped me get over the disease to please. Jane Fonda For over a year I continued to submit mss, and have them rejected - the last few with rejection letters indicated the story was pretty good, but I was American. Nora Roberts Well, you know I have an office, my film offices. So I...

Web searching and cellphone use both flourish in the wee hours. Before the dawn of

the web, I would stay up watching television. But there is something soporific about television: I would often nod off. Not so when I'm online. As technologies expand, these problems may only worsen. Sendhil Mullainathan To our critical eyes, the threads of which the past is woven are, by nature, endless and indivisible. Scientifically speaking, we cannot grasp the absolute beginning of anything: everything extends backwards to be prolonged by something else. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin I'm the kind of person who likes to create the environment and mindset - not because I do it deliberately, but because that's how I like to live - where, from catering to makeup to hair to wardrobe, electricians, camera department lighting, sound, you know, it's our movie; we're together, and we have that camaraderie and that closeness. Steven Rodney McQueen There are examples of fraternal dictatorships, or one, anyway: the passing of power from Fidel to Raul Castro. Elliott...

I'm not a detail guy. I depend on accountants and administrators to do my detail

stuff for me, but I do know the overall picture and I know that if you put business people together in a room, not just politicians, they could shrink the deficit tremendously by good business tactics. John Paul DeJoria My inspiration was my mom. She's a great cook, and she still cooks, and we still banter back and forth about cooking. Growing up in a mostly Portuguese community, food was important and the family table was extremely important. At a very young age I understood that. Emeril Lagasse If you felt that excitement when you voted for Barack Obama, shouldn't you feel that way now that he's President Obama? You know there's something wrong with the kind of job he's done as president when the best feeling you had was the day you voted for him. Mitt Romney Well I travelled quite a lot in the east, and one of the things that impressed me greatly was the buddhist notion of the continuity of things, the wheel of life which is what we're talking about,...

IBM's long-standing mantra is 'Think.' What has always made IBM a fascinating and compelling place

for me, is the passion of the company, and its people, to apply technology and scientific thinking to major societal issues. Ginni Rometty I am going to get political on you. Because I am the most shallow person in the world, my mission is to see men's formal wear change a little bit. It is too rigid! Everybody looks like a penguin! Steven Cojocaru I was able to get operated on four days after I was diagnosed. It was just a matter of getting this baseball-sized tumor out of me. I reflect now on how lucky I was to be in the situation where I could get the best possible help and treatment. Eric Davis If it's time to party, it's time for hip hop. I love Drake, Jay-Z, Kanye. If I'm chilling at home though, I'm listening to Massive Attack, Thievery Corporation, Radiohead, DJ Shadow. I also listen to a lot of classical. Alexis Knapp Indulging in unrestrained and immoderate laughter is a sign of intemperance, of a want of control over one's emotions, and of...

Economics is uncertain because its fundamental subject matter is not money but human action. That's

why economics is not the dismal science, it's no science at all. Julian Baggini Gay marriage will be universally accepted in time. But if I may be so bold as to say to gays and lesbians, don't wait for that time to arrive. Just as my father and his generation did not 'wait' for their civil rights, nor should you. The toothpaste ain't going back in the tube. The tide has turned. John Ridley At the time of my second marriage, my husband was in his early 50s, I was in my mid-40s, and we each had two kids. We maintained our individual accounts and opened one for the house. We each kick the same percentage of our incomes into the house account and have a joint credit card. But we pay for our children separately. Jean Chatzky It sounds so negative of me to say, but I don't feel like there were many coming-of-age films when I was growing up. I think that when I was a teenager, I felt really misrepresented in the teenage roles that I was watching onscreen. Espe...

I just banged it a little bit on a helmet. And you know, if you

get your throwing motion and momentum going at a helmet it makes it hurt a little more and it freaks everybody out because it's your throwing shoulder, but honestly, it feels great. Mark Sanchez Life is a canvas of many strokes where shades from different palettes meet into a picture so concrete that some forget it is their own, so become framed themselves. Vanna Bonta It is time to end the western policy of malign neglect. It is in the interest of the whole world to help tackle the actual grievances in Palestine, Kashmir, and in central and southern Iraq, and to help the region out of its economic backwardness. James Buchan Phil has always been a fighter. He was getting in fights all the time. I told him that if he ever hit me then I would leave the band. He wanted to find out if I was telling him the truth. He hit me so I left and that is how UFO split up. Michael Schenker I just want to be with great teachers. If that means I'm in a horror film with good teachers...

The Western is as American as a film can get - there's the discovery of

a frontier, the element of a showdown, revenge, and determining the best gunman. There's a certain masculinity to the Western that really appealed to me, and I've always wanted to do a Western in Hollywood. Kim Jee-woon You have to captivate and entertain if you want your message to get across. Vince Staples They haven't given too many gamblers a second chances in the world of baseball. Pete Rose Although I don't examine myself in this respect, I would say, off the top of my head, that I've come to acknowledge my Czechness more as I get older. Tom Stoppard It's a heavy duty to try to do everything and please everybody. My job was to go out there and play the game of basketball as best I can and provide entertainment for everyone who wanted to watch basketball. Obviously, people may not agree with that; again, I can't live with what everyone's impression of what I should or what I shouldn't do. Michael Jordan Losing my daughter was a ve...

I think everyone starts in the mailroom at some point! It's a right of passage.

Your boss has to throw something at you and order you around for at least two years. Michael B. Jordan I wouldn't say my mother was my best friend, because that sounds odd, but we have a really tight bond and she is my friend on Facebook. Although she only goes on it to check up on me and sometimes we argue about it. Dionne Bromfield I like to get people talking. I am a provocateur, and I do like getting on Twitter and riling people up. You know what, after a while some sane dialogue and sane conclusions come of that kind of thing. Roseanne Barr They shaved my head, eyebrows. This is not a sci-fi picture. It's not a fantasy picture. You're dealing with something that's supposed to be in reality. But we had a genius makeup artist. Rick Yune So long as peace is not attained by law (so argue the advocates of armaments) the military protection of a country must not be undermined, and until such is the case disarmament is impossible. Ludwig Quidde I grew up, a...

There's nobody who loves being around actors working more than David Mamet, especially actors bringing

his tremendous dialogue to life. I've never seen a movie director who was happier to be directing a movie than Dave. Clark Gregg You could say I'm a character actress. Or maybe a character actress who does peculiar, interesting lead roles. Imelda Staunton Broadband gives small businesses the opportunity to broaden their customer base and reduce their overheads through e-commerce platforms. Hamadoun Toure True security is based on people's welfare - on a thriving economy, on strong public health and education programmes, and on fundamental respect for our common humanity. Development, peace, disarmament, reconciliation and justice are not separate from security; they help to underpin it. Ban Ki-moon We have a company, Geometric Software, which is into engineering services software. We have a company called Nature's Basket, which is into gourmet retailing. Both are specialized companies. Adi Godrej I've been reading a lot of books on history, and watchi...