When I was a kid, I loved a heavy metal band called Motley Crue. I was thirteen when they came to my city, and I called every hotel in the Yellow Pages asking for a room by the name of their manager in hopes of meeting the band. After two or three hours of calling hotels, I got through, and the manager's brother answered the phone.

There's definitely some parallels between me and Joaquin Phoenix, I think. The line gets so blurry. My rap career wasn't a hoax, but it was absolutely intended to be a joke. The problem was that I really was on a quest to somehow be a Caucasian Ol' Dirty Bastard.

The idea is to improve somebody's day. That's how I've always viewed my job. I'm a distraction therapist. I make people's problems go away for just a little bit.

I'm a proud vegan, whistle-blower, and animal rights activist.

Had I not gone to Japan in 1986, had I stayed home and majored in English literature as I'd intended to do, I might indeed have become an investment banker, an outcome that perhaps would have proved a more severe blow to the health of the U.S. economy than to the history of the novel.

One thing that I'm super fortunate of - I grew up in a house where it was all about health and fitness. My dad was a wrestler; he was a boxer. He's always been into working out, and so I was the only kid in the first grade that got carrot sticks at school instead of chips.

I can't get to the point where my brain is mush and I can barely talk, because my son's life depends on my health.

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.