I mean, the Constitution of this country was written 200 years ago. The house I was living in in Madrid is 350 years old! America is still a project, and you guys are working on it and bringing new things to it every day. That is beautiful to watch.
There are 10,000 local governments in the state of New York. Ten thousand! Town, village, lighting district, water district, sewer district, a special district to count the other districts in case you missed a district.
The New York Times editorial page is like a Ouija board that has only three answers, no matter what the question. The answers are: higher taxes, more restrictions on political speech and stricter gun control.
When I brought 'El Topo' to New York, no one understood the picture. But John Lennon understood. John and Yoko Ono, they presented 'El Topo' in the United States; they introduced it.
I don't have to listen to the Gospel on Sunday to know the stories of the New Testament. They inform so much of what I write that they're practically like a news scrim that goes through my brain 24/7.
When I was little, I got to pick my hair ribbon from my mother's collection that hung over her dressing-table mirror. I have an entire room of ribbons in my New York apartment.
In New York, you are competing with Times Square lights and all of that, so you've got to be 300 pounds and crazy to get anyone's attention. Then, you can refine yourself. I always knew under those 300 pounds and tracksuits was a refined, slim, digni...
That is all that we want, what people want, what people want in New York, in Washington, in Pittsburgh, in any other place in the United States or in Europe. People want to live peacefully. That's what we want.
Give me the new thing and give it to me now. I don't want that old thing - I've seen it, heard it, bought it, slept with it, loved it, but now I'm bored with the old thing and I'm gagging for the new stuff.
It is a confession of the weakness of our own faith in the righteousness of our cause when we attempt to suppress by law those who do not agree with us." Alfred E. Smith, governor of New York after WWI
When I was in New York it was like a maze, a rat maze, going from one little box to another little box and passing through passageways to get from one safe haven to another.
It's not that I'm universally loved. We know I'm not in New Jersey. But what they do say in New Jersey is, 'We like him, and we think he's telling us the truth.' I think we need to have that type of politics on the national level.
It's been a concern of mine for years that the mainstream media coverage of culture and politics takes place in two nodes, Washington and New York, and yet all the voting goes on somewhere else.
I knew I was destined to be a rock star. I just knew it, like I've always had the power of foresight. I feel right now exactly the way I felt after I finished mixing my first solo album 'New York Groove'.
I grew up in Harlem, a block away from what was then the most crowded block in New York City, according to the 1950 census. Something like ten thousand people lived in one city block.
I don't live in New York or California. I'm in the grocery store, at the park with my kids, and I'm a normal person. I'm feeding my chickens and agonizing about my next book!
There's always someone out there training for your spot. For my scholarship at the University of Florida, for my job with the Denver Broncos, for my position with the New York Jets. And that's the reason to get up earlier or stay up later.
When I first got to New York, all I did was musicals. After a few years I had to make a conscious choice to close the door on musicals, because I was getting pigeon-holed as a musical theater performer.
I'd like to encourage people to please keep reading-and most importantly, to please keep trying new writers. The only way we can bring fresh new material into the field is if people go out and buy it.
I was in New York doing musicals in the theater and on Broadway before 'Orange,' so people always ask, 'Are you ever going to get to sing? Does she even sing?' But people who know me know I actually do sing.
I don't want to write a novel per year. I know that I need a break of one or two years. So maybe I invent some new, urgent activity so I don't fall into the trap of starting a new novel.