“If God had created celery, it would only have two stalks, because that's the most that almost any recipe ever calls for.”

“TV cookery is very like internet porn - the overwhelming majority of its audience will never ever get to act out what's happening on screen.”

“This book I'm reading says if you want to be as thin as a stalk of celery, then that's what you should be eating. I'm not sure I want to look like celery, but I know I don't want to look like a biscuit.”

“He tried to calm his thoughts, but everything came back to what he'd almost done. Because he hadn't done anything, for years or ever, he had almost done this. Because he had no stories of valor, he had almost done this. Because the efforts he'd made towards creating something like a legacy had failed, he had almost done this.”

“That's the thing about human life--there is no control group, no way to ever know how any of us would have turned out if any variables had been changed.”

“Belief sloshes around in the firmament like lumps of clay spiralling into a potter's wheel. That's how gods get created, for example. They clearly must be created by their own believers, because a brief resume of the lives of most gods suggests that their origins certainly couldn't be divine. They tend to do exactly the things people would do if only they could, especially when it comes to nymphs, golden showers, and the smiting of your enemies.”

“if god had intended us to follow recipes, He wouldn't have given us grandmothers.”