It is easy to go down into Hell night and day the gates of dark Death stand wide but to climb back again to retrace one's steps to the upper air - there's the rub the task.

I don't really talk about my personal life. It's a strange and funny and weird thing. Sometimes you have a conversation with someone and the paparazzi snaps a picture of you and people decide you're dating. If I try to answer everything people say I would be up all night.

I can't even explain to you how terrible that feels that I equate dating a woman with punishment shame guilt disappointment reproach reprimand persecution. It's a nightmare.

I have mostly been terrified of listening to scary stories around a campfire. We camp a lot as a family and at night my dad would try and tell us scary stories. This made eating s'mores difficult. The story would start with something like... 'and the old man who lived in these woods...' I would then run back into the camper terrified.

I'm an ambassador for the Make-A-Wish Foundation and one of the children his wish was to go to the Emmys so he's going to be my date along with my husband and my dad and his girlfriend. So we're going to have a really fun night and it's going to be really exciting. I'm really excited for him to experience that.

When I was a teenager my dad used to call me 'Hollywood' because I wore sunglasses all the time even at night. Cue song.

My dad had a movie theater so I was there every night.

We sat together as a family for dinner at night. And my mother had a job. My dad had a job. But there was always a meal on the table at 6:00 you know.

I finished high school moved to Nashville for college and set out to break into the music business. Every night when I called home with news of my experiences my mom and dad would encourage me to keep taking those small steps.

I grew up watching Monday Night Football with Howard Cosell and the other guys with my dad.

My dad was a carpenter and I would work with him during the summer and umpire on the nights I wasn't playing.

My mom and dad worked very hard to give me the best chance in - not just in golf but in life. You know I was an only child you know my dad worked three jobs at one stage. My mom worked night shifts in a factory.

I was into the Mets because my Dad worked at IBM where he got free Mets tickets so I was into the Mets... then I got to 'Saturday Night Live' where my boss has unbelievable N.Y. Yankees tickets so he invites us to the games. I'm going to all the games so I might as well root for the team I'm gonna go sit with.

Barack Obama knows that to create an economy built to last we need to focus on middle-class families. Families who stay up on Sunday nights pacing the floor like my dad did while their children tucked in bed dream big dreams. Families who aren't sure what Monday morning will bring but who believe our nation's best days are still ahead.

I couldn't walk down any street in Britain without being laughed at. It was a nightmare. My children were devastated because their dad was a figure of ridicule.

When I was little we had a Golden Book that had all these Disney characters in one portrait on the first page. My dad used to read from it every night. We'd play this game of find Pluto or find Donald Duck. He'd read us stories and do all the voices. Those are great memories.

I wanted to be a skinny little ballerina but I was a voluptuous little Italian girl whose dad had meatballs on the table every night.

I think that people need to have the courage of their convictions and not be trying to fool people into thinking that they've changed overnight.

The cool thing about writing is that there is really never a typical day. Sometimes I get a rhythm going and head off to work every morning and come home at night. Sometimes I'll write for two days straight and then be utterly blank for the next two.

A couple days ago I saw a lot of people tweeting 'Oh it's so cool 'Home' is being used in the Olympics!' We don't really get to watch much TV man with the concerts every night but I wish I could have seen it. I really just found out through Twitter and my management texting me. I thought it was really awesome.

I just saw the movie for the first time in its entirely last night. It's really cool when you're in with an audience that's so tuned in and plugged in to what's going on.

What we do every night is we change out the set list as much as we can to make sure that (fans can) go home and tell their friends they experienced something unique and cool.

I joined MySpace in September 2003. At that time no one was on there at all. I felt like a loser while all the cool kids were at some other school. So I mass e-mailed between 30 000 and 50 000 people and told them to come over. Everybody joined overnight.

You want hot days to get your fruit ripe but then you want it to cool off nicely at night so that the grapes stay on the vine longer and develop complexity.