When we first met, I was probably six layers down in the military structure, but General McChrystal at that time was a soldier's leader, and he was part of the task force. So everyone developed close relationships.
If you think of the Apollo capsule coming into Earth with a parachute, the Mars atmosphere is just so thin, you've got to find some way of slowing yourself down really rapidly.
I sit there pouring out my woes year after year, coming up with one enormity after another about my mother and the way she let me down; but it doesn't make me any the less fearful.
I'd love to drive a Lamborghini, but I think it's hard when the pedals are way down in there, and you sit real low, but I've come up with some pedal extensions. I actually sit in a kids' car seat that my old boss put this beautiful leather wrap around, and it looks just like a Corvette seat that sits on top of my leather Corvette seat.
And out of all the movies, I don't know what it is, I'll always sit down and watch our 'Footloose'. I cry, I get excited, I cheer, my heart pounds. I really enjoy it.
I am a survivor and not a victim. Life isn't perfect. When you get a knock, you have to get up, dust yourself down and get on with it.
I had this moment in church, which I think really turned me off. I was 7 or 8 years old and I was sitting at church, and we happened to be playing with the sunlight that was coming down from the stained glass window, and the monsignor came down to the pew and grabbed us by our neck collars and said, 'I'll deal with you.'
The whole thing of clothes is insane. You can spend a dollar on a jacket in a thrift store. And you can spend a thousand dollars on a jacket in a shop. And if you saw those two jackets walking down the street, you probably wouldn't know which was which.
The first book I sat down to write was an historical romance. It was really bad and thankfully no one ever saw it.
My theory has always been, if you take care of your business today, take care of the job you have at hand, whatever else comes down the road will be there for you.
As an actor, I'm familiar with having bursts of energy, where you're giving things a try, and then you have down time.
Not all films are going to go down in history.
There has been nothing more impactful on my life and meaningful to me than the introduction of Christ. That, hands down, blows away every joke I've ever written.
Of course, nobody's tearing my door down. If you're successful you're going to intimidate and scare off the people you'd like to spend time with. They're not going to approach you. And the ones who do are often there because you are a celebrity.
I grew up as a child living 'Red Dawn.' I was leaping out of spider holes, mowing down Russkies at the age of eight.
I used to skip out of high school and go flying. It was just one of those things, I thought it was kind of a cool thing to do. I never thought about doing that as a profession, but I started checking things out and I found out there was a flight school down in Daytona Beach, called Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.
Black people comprehend the South. We understand its weight. It has rested on our backs... I knew that my heart would break if ever I put my foot down on that soil, moist, still, with old hurts. I had to face the fear/loathing at its source or it would consume me whole.
I'm trying to cut down a little on eating, on sodium, keep my blood pressure down, which is tough. Because I love food! I do, but it's unfair how everything that's bad for you tastes so good, and all the good stuff, veggies and green things, doesn't match up.
I don't know that anybody has walked up to me in the street or in a store or in the grocery and said to me, 'I hope you bomb Assad.' Certainly plenty have said, 'No; thumbs down, thumbs down, thumbs down.'
You put three girls in a house, and all of a sudden before you know it, you're talking about boys and drinking whiskey, and things go down and you get deep real quick.
My father had slowed down playing a little... I was 'round 10 or 12 years old. Every time he put his guitar down, I pick it up.
Golfers who play a lot of courses often encounter short ledges or retaining walls, and I always had fun hopping down from them. I could jump off something six feet high and land like a cat, no problem. Well, today I can't jump off anything higher than two feet without it just killing me.
Look at Inuit clothing. Their stuff still works better than Cabela's. I've made my own parkas, mukluks, footgear, and it is good to 60 degrees below zero. All I did was copy the patterns that came down from the Inuits.
I just kind of feel like it's my choice to do what I want to do. And my agent, he's totally with it. He tells me, 'You can turn down any audition you don't want to.'
My momma didn't clean up floors so I could be a thug... so I could wear my pants down.
Think about back in the day when we had Archie Bunker, 'The Jeffersons.' We had stuff to sit down and share and laugh at. The Internet has made it so we don't have to sit together anymore. It's so self-absorbed. No one has to talk to each other anymore, and people don't realize that that is killing us.
Staring down the barrel of a gun is the scariest thing you could ever experience. It's not funny. It's not for the movies.
Watch the walls come down, whether it's in the South or on Wall Street. When the walls come down, what do we find? More markets, more talent, more capital and growth. Which means that the race and sex discrimination stunt economic growth. It's not good for capitalism. It's not good for America's growth. And it's not morally right.
The clothes are different: pre-dog, I used to be very finicky and self-conscious about how I looked; now I schlep around in the worst clothing - big heavy boots, baggy old sweaters, a hooded down parka from L.L. Bean that makes me look like an astronaut.
So I go to my first book signing, and these two girls came up and gave me a piece of paper: '10 reasons you should date our dad. He climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. He's a lawyer.' He didn't know what was going on. He didn't even know me. They called him, and he came down and asked me out that day. Now I'm dating their dad!
My mother-in-law fell down a wishing well. I was amazed; I never knew they worked.
Kids think you just sit down and start writing. I always tell them you never do that.
A lot of the time when people get married in the infatuation, it will go down. That is inevitable. The infatuation stage will not last forever.
'Writing' always means 'not writing' to me because I will do anything to put it off. I think this is mainly because writing anything down and then handing it over to a third party - especially in comedy - is such an exposing act that you naturally want to delay the process.
On the PBS recording of 'The Light in the Piazza' backstage, you get to see me doing some sweet lunges down the hallway of the Vivian Beaumont.
You've got to take the hems down, especially past 50. I don't care how good your legs are.
