The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Civil War - when I really think about them, they all seem about as likely as the parting of the Red Sea.

I get younger people who watch Conan or The Daily Show, but before that it was mostly people who knew me from public radio. Those people are kind of old.

While I gave up God a long time ago, I never shook the habit of wanting to believe in something. So I replaced my creed of everlasting life with life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

In death, you get upgraded into a saint no matter how much people hated you in life.

Coming in, I had no idea basketball would be a career for me, but I grew 7 inches in college and was fortunate to have a great career in the NBA. The experience taught me about service, what our great country was built on, the sacrifices people have made, how to work together and trust the people around you to accomplish a great goal.

It's a strange failure of the literary world that Updike never quite received his due. Despite winning two Pulitzers and two National Book Awards and countless other awards and honours, he was denied the Nobel.

If you can measure success in this business based on happiness alone I feel like I've hit the lottery.

The vast majority of large scale change efforts fail. Which means that the probability that you have actually experienced a failure, and your people know that and are pessimistic, therefore, about trying something again, is very high.