If you say you've had a nervous breakdown or things aren't right mentally, people run away from you. They think you're from 'One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest,' you know.
I think my grandmother saw my potential first. When I was young, I told her, 'I think I should get a job.' She said, 'No, just keep boxing.'
When they put me on ESPN and they talk about negative things, or when they put me on TMZ and they talk about negative things, I'm just glad that I'm relevant; to have lasted this long being relevant.
It's just incredible how people come up to me and say, 'Gabby, you inspire me to do anything I can set my mind to.' It's truly an honor.
I wear makeup pretty much every day. For training, I usually do a lighter base, a lighter blush and I used the mascara and a little bit of the lip gloss.
Savage, despicable evil. That's what we were fighting in Iraq. That's why a lot of people, myself included, called the enemy 'savages.' There really was no other way to describe what we encountered there.
So, this is my plea to all Western editors and producers: Display the Muhammad cartoon daily, until the Islamists become accustomed to the fact that we turn sacred cows into hamburger.
I suspect that many corporations have begun to understand that they have an important role to play in the lives of their communities, and that allocating funds to support local groups helps them discharge that function and also burnish their image.
I realised a little bit to my astonishment that I can give a lecture for a thousand people, and there will be this tumultuous applause, so, you know, I have the feeling well, it can't be all that bad.
Doing everything with one arm, being well-known, and having a book and a movie, it's fairly abnormal. As far as just not having to worry about past experiences, I've healed very well.
Every fighter has a story that could break your heart. We lose, we get hurt and everything comes apart. That's when it's so difficult to stay on the straight and narrow.
I don't want to sound obnoxious, but I like to think I brought it another step. I was able to bring people who were casually interested in boxing together.
People think coming in under the radar is like being a fighter pilot and actually coming in under the radar. It's a completely ridiculous idea to come in under the radar. It's the Olympics; everyone is on the radar here.
You feel the Olympics and you get chills and nervous and a little scared. You go through the emotional roller coaster at what it's like to compete at the Olympic level and you let that run through your whole body.
It does matter that it's the Olympics. I just did it my way. I'm not a martyr, and I'm not a do-gooder. I just want to go out and rock. And man, I rocked here.
But there was no question in my mind that I was gonna still go for it. I was still going for the win. I wasn't skiing for second or third place today, and in the end I think that's probably what got me there.
We managed to get underway, and I don't know to this day why we didn't get struck or take a torpedo, but we didn't. We got outside of the exit of the harbor and we started dropping depth charges.
We got orders to strike the Marshall and Gilbert Islands. We had a task force with the Enterprise. We had two or three cruisers and probably eight or 10 destroyers.
They got word that the Japanese planes were coming back, so we sunk her ourselves so the Japanese wouldn't get it. We didn't want the Japanese to get it intact.
I have the worst ear for criticism; even when I have created a stage set I like, I always hear the woman in the back of the dress circle who says she doesn't like blue.
People wait in line to see me, saying there's plenty of living to be done even if you have an HIV diagnosis. People say they are 10- or 15-year survivors and still moving forward.
