You know what's funny? I don't ever feel the need to escape. I have a strong marriage. I like my life. You hear about these guys having midlife crises - I don't see that happening to me.

I think the pattern of my essays is A funny thing happened to me on my way through Finnegans Wake.

Life was a funny thing that happened to me on the way to the grave.

Funny things happen to you in movies for silly reasons.

A funny thing happens in real estate. When it comes back it comes back up like gangbusters.

Everything is funny as long as it's happening to somebody else.

California is a fine place to live - if you happen to be an orange.

I've got some great guy friends. They can start out as crushes. But when you realize something isn't going to happen you make a choice whether or not the friendship is worth it. And it usually is. Then you can laugh about the fact that you used to have a crush on him or he had one on you.

It may happen sometimes that a long debate becomes the cause of a longer friendship. Commonly those who dispute with one another at last agree.

A true friend never gets in your way unless you happen to be going down.

Most importantly nothing has happened to change my conviction that freedom and the love of liberty remain the essential defining attributes of our national character as a people.

I take life as it happens. And I give myself a lot of freedom.

That happens every time I get behind a guitar regardless of what I'm saying 'cause music is freedom and being free is the closest I've ever felt to being spiritual.

With Napster and the sharing of music of course there are going to be people who exploit it. Greed has no end. But there's a lot of good that could happen. We shouldn't let the economic concerns of the major labels infringe on our freedom to share music.

None of us had any idea of how successful Downton was going to be. I thought I was signing up for another period drama that had a slightly modern feel. It had a freedom about it because it was coming out of the head of Julian Fellowes. Anything could happen and generally did.

The nice thing about the Bible is it doesn't give you too many facts. Two an a half lines and it tells you the whole story and that leaves you a great deal of freedom to elaborate on how it might have happened.

Certain things happened in the early church. Women who had never had any freedom suddenly have the ability to stand up and speak and be treated as equals within the life of the church.

Today hundreds of millions dwell in freedom from the Baltic to the Adriatic from the Western Approaches to the Aegean. And while we must never take this for granted the first purpose of the European Union - to secure peace - has been achieved and we should pay tribute to all those in the EU alongside Nato who made that happen.

That freedom can never be attained by a nation without suffering and sacrifice has been amply borne out by the recent tragic happenings in this subcontinent.

Back a hundred years ago especially around Woodrow Wilson what happened in this country is we took freedom and we chopped it into pieces.

Friends can help each other. A true friend is someone who lets you have total freedom to be yourself - and especially to feel. Or not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at the moment is fine with them. That's what real love amounts to - letting a person be what he really is.

I learned a long time ago that some people would rather die than forgive. It's a strange truth but forgiveness is a painful and difficult process. It's not something that happens overnight. It's an evolution of the heart.

Forgiveness isn't about condoning what has happened to you or someone else's actions against you.

I like cast iron coated with enamel for longevity and forgiveness if I happen to take my eyes off the prize while pouring Chianti.