When I was growing up, my house was filled with books. My mother was an educator, and my father was a history buff, so our home was a virtual library, covering every author from Beverly Cleary to James Michener.

Many of Judy Blume's books - which I devoured when I was growing up and where I found characters that were believable because they were a lot like me - caused considerable consternation when they were first published, but now they're widely accepted as an essential part of the children's literary canon.

I write for kids because I think the most interesting (and most humorous) stories come from people's childhoods. When I was writing 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid,' I had a blast talking on the phone to my younger brother, Patrick, remembering all of the things that happened to our family when we were growing up.

I feel, as an adult, I'm very similar to how I was as a pre-teen. Maybe it's a case of arrested development, but I feel like it's easy to slip back into those shoes, and I feel like if we were all magically transported back to our middle school years, we'd all act like we did in middle school.

I have always been an outstanding football player, I have always had uncanny abilities, great arm strength, an immense ability to play the game from a quarterback standpoint. The problem was that I wasn't given the liberty to do certain things when I was young.

I had an American boyfriend, went to football games, tennis tournaments, and to my prom. I was so serious about my American boyfriend that I brought him back to Germany with me to visit my parents. They were horrified.

Growing up in Minnesota, I had a lot of freedom to run around, and we had go-carts and four-wheelers and all that stuff. I like that adrenalin-rush stuff. I did a little bit of dance, but mostly sports.

Arkansas is very intriguing to me because it is the only show in the state. Obviously, without a professional team and to have the only Division I football team playing at the level that it's at, it kind of draws unified support throughout the whole state. When you've got that, it's something special.