By keeping my hand in that, it's the way I keep learning. The main way you learn in medicine is by practicing and working with patients.

To be clear, I worry as much about the impact of the Internet as anyone else. I worry about shortening attention spans, the physical cost of sedentary 'surfing' and the potential for coarsening discourse as millions of web pages compete for attention by appealing to our base instincts.

Gardening is not trivial. If you believe that it is, closely examine why you feel that way. You may discover that this attitude has been forced upon you by mass media and the crass culture it creates and maintains. The fact is, gardening is just the opposite - it is, or should be, a central, basic expression of human life.

In the world at large, people are rewarded or punished in ways that are often utterly random. In the garden, cause and effect, labor and reward, are re-coupled. Gardening makes sense in a senseless world. By extension, then, the more gardens in the world, the more justice, the more sense is created.

I am confident that nobody... will accuse me of selfishness if I ask to spend time, while I am still in good health, with my family, my friends and also with myself.

AIDS today is not a death sentence. It can be treated as a chronic illness, or a chronic disease.

Seriously, who really cares how long the Nile river is, or who was the first to discover cheese? How is memorizing that ever going to help anyone? Instead, we need to give kids projects that allow them to exercise their minds and discover things for themselves.

Sometimes acting is really cool because it forces you to exercise certain muscles in your personality that you wouldn't normally be called upon in life.