I'm a very conservative businessman. I don't work on credit. My father was the guy who taught me how to think straight, not to delude myself and think I was larger than I was.

So many people get involved with carrying grudges and having these moral battles with people, where they cast themselves as the righteous and the other guy is the dirtbag. They waste tons of energy on it, create all kinds of darkness around themselves and the other person. It gets you nothing.

That's how I taught myself how to draw - tracing the ads and petting new clothes on the models.

My father was a veteran and my mother a schoolteacher. They taught me the value of a good job and an honest day's work.

I flunked three grades before I got out of high school.

I never waited for my Irish Cream coffee to be the right temperature, with a storm happening outside and my fireplace crackling... I wrote every day, at home, in the office, whether I felt like it or not. I just did it.