We played in Texas about a year ago at Emo's the famous country and western club in Austin. And I figured well if I'm finally gonna die onstage that's where it's going to be!

One of the pleasant duties of America's most famous announcers during the relatively short swing era of the big bands was to host late-night remotes from some of the most famous ballrooms throughout the country.

I keep saying I'm not at all famous in my own country because people do not think I have done anything for India.

It's very difficult today for girls to become supermodels. There is a lot more competition a lot of countries in the East have opened up so there are many more models than there were in the Nineties. Now they have to compete with famous actresses but also with say reality stars to be on the magazine covers.

Quite often I can be in a bookshop standing beneath a great big picture of myself and paying for a book with a credit card clearly marked John Grisham yet no one recognises me. I often say I'm a famous author in a country where no one reads.

I'm famous today. People like me today. Might not like me tomorrow. You can't count on it.

But I am Armenian and I understand what it is to lose a country and lose a family and have massacres and genocides and everything against my people.

I used to be a classic workaholic and after seeing how little work and career really mean when you reach the end of your life I put a new emphasis on things I believe count more. These things include: family friends being part of a community and appreciating the little joys of the average day.

Monarchists frequently declare that without the royal family Britain would be 'nothing.' What a woeful lack of love for one's country such statements express.

Family traditions counter alienation and confusion. They help us define who we are they provide something steady reliable and safe in a confusing world.

I want to deal with somebody who comes from another country to the United States and has a family that comes. I don't care if it's a black family from Jamaica or a Hispanic family from Mexico. These issues need to be dealt with but they need to be dealt with in the entertaining way.

The countries who do the best in international comparisons whether it's Finland or Japan Denmark or Singapore do well because they have professional teachers who are respected and they also have family and community which support learning.

Given my last position that I was the first U.S attorney post 9/11 in New Jersey I understand acutely the pain and sorrow and upset of the family members who lost loved ones that day at the hands of radical Muslim extremists. And their sensitivities and concerns have to be taken into account.

Well one of the most important things for Americans to be reminded of is that a lot of the exceptional nature of our country is founded in Judeo-Christian values that promotes individualism personal responsibility a strong work ethic and a commitment to family charity.

My mother was the first woman in the county in Indiana where we were born in Jay County to have a college degree. She was educated as a pianist and she wanted to concertize but when the war came she was married had a family so she started teaching.

One person may need (or want) more leisure another more work one more adventure another more security and so on. It is this diversity that makes a country indeed a state a city a church or a family healthy. 'One-size-fits-all ' and that size determined by the State has a name and that name is 'slavery.'

My encounters with racism are sort of second-hand situations where I might be standing around with a group of white friends and someone makes a comment that they wouldn't make at my family reunion.