I used to spend countless days in my teenage years keeping scorecards, playing cricket and just enjoying myself with friends and having the occasional shandy in the bar.
I always laugh to myself when I listen to some really big A-list star saying that they are just a normal person.
You know, I don't think of myself as anything like a 'global citizen' or anything of the sort. I am just a Nigerian who's comfortable in other places.
I am going to embarrass myself. I have accepted that fact, and that's just how it's going to be.
I get asked a lot if I'd want to get into live-action movies, and the answer, honestly, is 'no.' I'm an illustrator, and I think animation is an extension of that way of expressing myself. That's not to say I'd never make a live-action movie, but I don't strive for it.
I've never seen myself as a manager. As a manager, you have to put all your time into the job, and that would be difficult for me.
Before I leave the earth, I'll have released a bunch of albums and a bunch of movies. I'm going to do it all. It's just that I have to strategically position myself on how I do it so that the world receives it.
I don't take myself that seriously. I'm a pragmatist.
I can express myself.
I remember reminding myself that beauty is an opinion, not a fact. And it has always made me feel better.
Music is the reason I started talking to people. When I started singing in bars and trains, I began to learn the behaviour of people. Music was the bait that helped me get something from them and give myself to them.
Music is entirely subjective. I was thinking that for myself, for songwriting and what I like to listen to, to help motivate me as a songwriter, as a musician, there are certain things I lean towards and certain things I don't.
I came out of the mall one day, and a guy was standing there with a coat hanger in his window, and I couldn't stop myself. I asked the stupid question. 'You lock your keys in the car?' 'Nope, just washed it, gonna hang it up to dry.'
When I was first elected I was puzzled why they were holding events in my honor as a mere freshman. I asked myself, why is a federal entity so involved in political activity?
I felt like I had a really bad case of writer's block... Music is so therapeutic for me that if I can't get it out, I start feeling bad about myself - a lot of self-loathing.
I didn't like the way I looked in pictures - when I saw myself on a digital camera, I was like, 'Eesh.'
I never considered myself a movie star, and I didn't want to become a movie star, because as soon as you do, you throw away that possibility of playing character. You really do. All of a sudden you're just an entity, you know?
As a writer, I challenge myself not to tell the same story - to tackle different characters with different issues.
As a layperson, I consider myself fairly well-educated in terms of politics. My family always has been really interested in politics, and various members of my family have a hand in politics in upstate New York.
In terms of role modelling for younger kids, I never really censor myself.
Usually when I see myself in a film or on television, there's about a six-month period where I can't look at it because all I'll see are the mistakes. I'm just appalled by the person that I see.
I never felt happy with the idea that part of what I do is to be an object to be looked at. I thought of my public persona as an entity separate to myself.
Really, I do not know whether my paintings are surrealist or not, but I do know that they are the frankest expression of myself.
I look at myself more as a storyteller than a screenwriter, as pretentious as that may sound, but that's what really attracts me to TED Talks. For me, the really effective ones are being presented by expert storytellers.
I was very insecure approaching the idea of directing a feature film. I told myself I would not move until I felt I was moving in power rather than moving in desperation to make a movie.
I would have had an easier life if I were straight, but I would not be me. And I now like being myself better than the idea of being someone else, someone who, to be honest, I have neither the option of being nor the ability fully to imagine.
I'm free to see things objectively because I don't consider myself American, and I don't consider myself British or Indian. I'm kind of an amalgam or mongrel of a lot of different places and experiences. In a lot of ways it's been a good thing for me. It's enabled me to do what I do on 'The Daily Show.'
I live by myself. I come in the door, I can throw my stuff on the floor. I can leave the dishes.
Here in Seattle, I'm the most productive I've ever been. I don't allow myself personal distractions. I'm extremely disciplined here.
I fidget and change my outfit a lot. It's really a way of keeping myself comfortable.
Between the uprightness of my conscience and the hardness of my lot, I know not how either to show respect to my feelings or to the times. The bitterness of my mind urges me at all hazards to speak what I think, whereas the necessity of the times prompts me, however unbecomingly, to keep silence. Good God! Which way shall I turn myself?
I write while my son is at school. At about 7:45 A.M., I walk him there, with the dogs, then walk them for another forty minutes or so, go home and chain myself to the desk a little before 9 A.M., and try not to be distracted until I hear my son plunge through the front door at about 3 P.M.
I try to basically keep my opinions to myself when it comes to people who are charged with crimes that I don't know anything about.
Love is really my nemesis. I never really allowed myself to indulge in such basic things because I was so motivated and thought that if I did I wouldn't succeed.
I am extremely ecstatic about the presidency of Barack Obama. I think he is paving the way for young African-American men like myself. I have very high expectations for Obama, and I am extremely hopeful that he will bring great lasting change not just to America, but to the entire world.
As a massive fangirl myself, having people ship any of my characters is just beyond cool.
