I am constantly re-evaluating my goals and trying to strike items from my to-do list that aren't critical.

People challenge my nerd cred all the time. I just show them the photo of me winning my middle-school science fair, wearing my Casio calculator watch and eyeglasses so big they look like they can see the future.

I can't say that there's been some big change during my career where all of a sudden everything's totally colorblind.

I'd be plenty happy if I could keep playing scientists and cops for the rest of my career.

Education is that whole system of human training within and without the school house walls, which molds and develops men.

The two things I was positive about in life were that I was going to be a teacher at a boarding school or an operative with the CIA posted abroad. I could write a book about all the things I was sure about.

My first tic was to shake my head violently. I was in karate class, and I was shaking violently. All of a sudden, I just started to notice that the teacher was looking at me, and all the kids were wondering what I was doing. I suddenly felt really strange.

Pretty much every night of their lives, my 8-year-old sons have absorbed themselves entirely in books. As toddlers, they pointed out pictures, made conjectures; lately, we find them in their bunk beds embarked upon two-hour comic-reading benders.