“There’s one kind of writing that’s always easy: Picking out something obviously stupid and reiterating how stupid it obviously is. This is the lowest form of criticism, easily accomplished by anyone. And for most of my life, I have tried to avoid this. In fact, I’ve spend an inordinate amount of time searching for the underrated value in ostensibly stupid things. I understand Turtle’s motivation and I would have watched Medelin in the theater. I read Mary Worth every day for a decade. I’ve seen Korn in concert three times and liked them once. I went to The Day After Tomorrow on opening night. I own a very expensive robot that doesn’t do anything. I am open to the possibility that everyting has metaphorical merit, and I see no point in sardonically attacking the most predictable failures within any culture.”

“And if something is only itself, it doesn't particularly matter.”

“The practical reality is that any present-tense version of the world is unstable. What we currently consider to be true--both objectively and subjectively--is habitually provisional.”

“And the quality all these reasonable failures share is an inability to accept that the statue quo is temporary.”

“And I'm probably wrong. Maybe not completely, but partially. And maybe not today, but eventually.”

“It is impossible to examine questions we refuse to ask.”

“It's difficult to cope with the infinite variety of the past, and so we apply filters and settle on a few famous names.”

“The world happens as it happens, but we construct what we remember and what we forget. And people will eventually do that to us, too.”

“I honestly believe that people of my generation despise authenticity, mostly because they're all so envious of it.”

“If I knew I was going to die at a specific moment in the future, it would be nice to be able to control what song I was listening to; this is why I always bring my iPod on airplanes.”

“Sarcasm is when you tell someone the truth by lying on purpose.”