If you're going to have a book published in China, that means that you're going to be subject to in-house censorship at the publisher, and then also, of course, the government has an apparatus that is in charge of making sure that ideas that are considered disruptive or overly critical, that those don't get onto bookstore shelves.

A good mother remembers to serve fruit at breakfast, is always cheerful and never yells, manages not to project her own neuroses and inadequacies onto her children, is an active and beloved community volunteer. She remembers to make play dates, her children's clothes fit, she does art projects with them and enjoys all their games.

Plating your salad with groupings of ingredients may seem fussy but in fact it's the opposite. All the prepped ingredients go directly onto the platter, so no need to dirty a separate mixing bowl for tossing. Another reason we like this plating strategy? It allows the picky eaters out there to choose only the parts they like best.

Regardless of what you want to call it, guys need some type of spirituality they can grab onto. If it's Christianity, which is a very structured approach, or if it's something that's a little more open-ended... like, Zen's something you can make yourself a part of. You can interpret it for yourself, like Taoism and stuff like that.

When I signed onto 'Superman,' editors Matt Idelson and Wil Moss gave me a rough outline that JMS had turned in for the remaining issues of the 'Grounded' arc, which amounted to a couple of sentences for each issue, spelling out in general terms where the issue would take place geographically, specific guest stars, things like that.

Medicare is a monopoly: a central-planning bureaucracy grafted onto American health care. It exercises a stranglehold on the health care of all Americans over 65, and on the medical practices of almost all physicians. Medicare decides what is legitimate and what is not: which prices may be charged and which services may be rendered.

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.

I thought Daredevil was kind of cool because he couldn't do anything. I mean, he's blind. It wasn't that he could fly. His major power was an impediment. So I was intrigued. When I took over he was kind of like Spider-Man-lite, but I was able to project a lot of my Catholic imagery onto it. And I'd always wanted to do a crime comic.

And as I stumbled onto Eastern philosophy and Buddhism, it was the first time I had ever read any sort of philosophy that really made a tremendous amount of sense. What I liked that was missing from my experience of Christianity growing up was a sort of acceptance, a sort of being OK with being imperfect and not focusing on the sin.

It seems women are expected to be so much more than men, which means we have to work that much harder. We're the ones under the microscope. We're expected to sound perfect. We're expected to look perfect all the time. We're expected to be style-setters, whereas the boys roll onto the stage in their jeans, T-shirts and baseball caps.

When I came home my parents were listening to Pakistani Qawwali music, like Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, they're listening to music from Mali, like Ali Farka Toure, they're listening to Brazilian songwriters, like Gilberto Gil, to opera, to Neil Young even, things you don't hear as a kid in Caracas. I love all the music they turned me onto.

Grunge was so self-consciously lowbrow and nonaspirational that it seemed, at first, impervious to the hype and glamour normally applied swiftly to any emerging trend. But sure enough, grunge anthems found their way onto the soundtracks of television commercials, and Dodge Neons were hawked by kids in flannel shirts saying, 'Whatever.'

Everyone's got something that they've held onto from their childhood or from a past relationship, someone who's told you what you are, and it's leaving all that behind and living a happy life and realizing that a lot of that is inside you - really uncovering that. The story - those themes - are heavy themes that everyone can connect to.

I'm not at the hoarder stage, but there are two or three storage units here and there. I have things that a lot of people put a lot of heart and soul into, a lot of mental energy. I'm good at keeping those things. When it comes to pop culture, as you move through this fast lane, you wonder where it all goes and how you can hold onto it.

I anticipated we would go to college, and then we would fade out - that was kind of what we wanted at the time - but social media hung onto my brother and I, and thankfully, fans hung onto my brother and I, and I think it's one of the reasons that this reemergence can come back with a little more strength, and I'm very thankful for that.

It has been difficult to hold onto many paintings but I have retained a few. Possibly the current favorite is titled 'Big Band' completed in 2005. It measures 13 feet x 9 feet. It has 18 nearly life size recognizable portraits of the biggest jazz stars that I knew and saw perform in the 1950s, '60s, '70s, '80s and includes Wynton Marsalis.

I mean, what is racism? Racism is a projection of our own fears onto another person. What is sexism? It's our own vulnerability about our potency and masculinity projected as our need to subjugate another person, you know? Fascism, the same thing: People are trying to untidy our state, so I legislate as a way of controlling my environment.

I still have sadness and complicated feelings about my divorce. But how beneficial is it to keep hanging onto those feelings? If someone lives through an accident, his aim is to become better and healthy. My aim is always to progress - to make better decisions and be a better father, a better boyfriend, a better husband if it happens again.

I do think that people get really emotionally involved in the TV shows that they love and I think that is fantastic. Of course they are going to have opinions. The other thing is that people project onto their television shows. They see a character and layer on many traits that are actually their own or their idea of what that character is.

I lived in Italy for quite a while and married an Italian woman. While there, I immersed myself in the complete culture: the music, art, literature, film, food, and history. It's easy to fall in love with. As a country, Italy does a good job of holding onto its rich traditions and culture. There's a real lack of embracing history in America.

I never write something and consciously embed political commentary or any other kind of commentary. I just try to get the characters into a room or out of a room, or onto the plane, or through the grocery store. The political stuff, the class stuff, the gender stuff, is in the air, it's in their interactions, because it's there for all of us.

The two championship contenders, Dario Franchitti and Will Power, are starting right next to each other in the middle of the grid. Honestly, if I can be fast enough early in the race to be able to get up there and latch onto those two, it will be pure entertainment. It's going to be a pack race, and you never know how that's going to turn out.

I was only in second grade when the Russian Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space. The night of his launch - April 12, 1961 - I went out onto the front porch and stared up at the stars, trying to see his capsule passing overhead. Like millions of others, I was enthralled by the idea of space exploration and have been ever since.

It is truly vital for the United States to assure that it is not attacked with weapons of mass destruction; to prevent wars in other countries from spreading onto American soil; and to maintain access to global sea lanes on which our economy depends. Beyond that, there is little or nothing in the world that should draw the United States to war.

The Flight 93 Memorial isn't that easy to get to. It isn't like the memorials in New York City or Washington, D.C., where you may go on a business trip or family vacation. No, in order to get to Shanksville, PA, you fly to Pittsburgh, make your way through the traffic and onto the highway that takes you through the beautiful wooded countryside.

I lost my dad two years ago to cancer, and before he died, I asked him to write 'Daddy's Little Girl' on a piece of paper for me. I told him it was for an album. He practiced and practiced and then sent it to me, and I had it tattooed onto my wrist and surprised him with it. He cried when he saw it, happy tears. This way I always carry him with me.

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