“It may have been Gertrude Stein who wrote that to lead a life of any interest, one must first spend time in Paris. It is a place that defines and shapes like no other; its Aphroditic nature can overwhelm or inspire, but it can't leave you indifferent. Nearly twenty years after leaving, I still feel the deep rivulets Paris made in my heart and in my mind, and they flow on.”

“I've been like everywhere And we went to a bunch of different places and got really stoned Then we wnet to another place and got stones again ANd we met these other stoners and went somewhere else and ate tacos ANd I lost my keys and we couldn't go anywhere, so we just got stoned Then we ran out of weed, but I remembered my keys were in the other pocket, adn we went somewhere to score, and got stoned..."Colman..." "And more people came over, and we found a bog of marshmallows and made s'mores....”

“In a sense, the first (if not necessarily the prime) function of a novelist, of ANY artist, is to entertain. If the poem, painting, play or novel does not immediately engage one's surface interest then it has failed. Whatever else it may or may not be, art is also entertainment. Bad art fails to entertain. Good art does something in addition.”

“Nature's what it's all about, but our people have been brainwashed into thinking that life is a cell phone against your head and the TV on a beer commercial with hot chicks.”

“First, they set the hook with mind-bending kinky shit. Then a year later you're living in a Talking Heads song, dressed like Teddy Ruxpin, living with a strange woman in a big house full of frilly throw pillows, experiencing the frequency of sex that can only be charted by Halley's Comet. and you're wondering: How did I get here?”

“It means my luck sucks," she said. "It was nice dating a guy wo treated me like a friend instead of a blow-up doll.""You were the one trying to unzip my pants in the truck!""Yeah, well, I thought you weren't interested. I didn't realize that your divining rod just pointed into a different direction.""You're killing me," he said. But it sounded like he was smiling.”

“If you want me to fix your homework, you need to leave me alone.” Then he spotted her. “You’re back.”“Yeah.” She glanced between him and Gabriel. “You do his homework?”“Just the math. It’s a miracle he can count to ten.”“I can count to one.” Gabriel gave him the finger.”