Role Models

Being rich is not about how much money you have or how many homes you own; it's the freedom to buy any book you want without looking at the price and wondering if you can afford it.

You should never read just for "enjoyment." Read to make yourself smarter! Less judgmental. More apt to understand your friends' insane behavior, or better yet, your own. Pick "hard books." Ones you have to concentrate on while reading. And for god's sake, don't let me ever hear you say, "I can't read fiction. I only have time for the truth." Fiction is the truth, fool! Ever hear of "literature"? That means fiction, too, stupid.

I'm always amazed at friends who say they try to read at night in bed but always end up falling asleep. I have the opposite problem. If a book is good I can't go to sleep, and stay up way past my bedtime, hooked on the writing. Is anything better than waking up after a late-night read and diving right back into the plot before you even get out of bed to brush your teeth?

True success is figuring out your life and career so you never have to be around jerks.

The only insult I've ever received in my adult life was when someone asked me, "Do you have a hobby?" A HOBBY?! DO I LOOK LIKE A FUCKING DABBLER?!

You don’t need fashion designers when you are young. Have faith in your own bad taste. Buy the cheapest thing in your local thrift shop - the clothes that are freshly out of style with even the hippest people a few years older than you. Get on the fashion nerves of your peers, not your parents - that is the key to fashion leadership. Ill-fitting is always stylish. But be more creative - wear your clothes inside out, backward, upside down. Throw bleach in a load of colored laundry. Follow the exact opposite of the dry cleaning instructions inside the clothes that cost the most in your thrift shop. Don’t wear jewelry - stick Band-Aids on your wrists or make a necklace out of them. Wear Scotch tape on the side of your face like a bad face-lift attempt. Mismatch your shoes. Best yet, do as Mink Stole used to do: go to the thrift store the day after Halloween, when the children’s trick-or-treat costumes are on sale, buy one, and wear it as your uniform of defiance.

But feeling down can make you feel up if you’re the creative type. The emotional damage may have already been done to you, but stop whining. Use your insanity to get ahead.

Maybe there is no better novel in the world than Denton Welch's In Youth Is Pleasure. Just holding it in my hands, so precious, so beyond gay, so deliciously subversive, is enough to make illiteracy a worse social crime than hunger.

Do we secretly idolize our imagined opposites, yearning to become the role models for others we know we could never be for ourselves?

Our assholes will be clean but we must never wash our hands. Our immune systems will be strengthened by our being dirty. Not filthy. Just mildly grimy. Filthy fingernails have always been a favorite fashion accessory of mine. Especially when you place your hands in the prayer positions. Matter of fact, I urge all my followers to forgo nail polish permanently and replace it with expertly applied soot. The nonexistent gods above will ignore our prayers better this way.

I imagine Johnny Mathis hates Bin Laden as much as I do, but could Johnny agree Bin Laden had a better speechwriter than Bush? "Axis of Evil"? Come on. "A swimmer in the ocean does not fear the rain" is much more powerful propaganda. Poetic, even.

I mean, what is prison, really, except a good bar without the liquor?

I'd rather have a daughter in a whorehouse than a son in the police force,' Esther used to rage to anyone who would listen.

I love to read about anger. A "feel bad" book always makes me feel good. And no other novel in the history of literature is more depressing than Christina Stead's The Man Who Loved Children.

Get on the fashion nerves of your peers, not your parents - that is the key to fashion leadership.

He strapped a video camera to the hood of his car and we drove around while he filmed us smashing through piles of old dead Christmas trees that residents had left in the alleys and he would set on fire. I could never get Jake to “put out” but it still was a really romantic night for me, so I stayed in touch.

Read to make yourself smarter! Less judgmental. More apt to understand your friends' insane behavior, or better yet, your own.

All ideology can be embraced if the leader dresses well.

The nonexistent gods above will ignore our prayers better this way.

Never have a spontaneous moment in your life again. If you're going to have a hangover, it should be scheduled on your calendar months in advance. Rigid enjoyment of planning can get you high. Militant time management will enable you to ignore how maladjusted you would be if you had the time to notice it in the first place. Discipline is not anal compulsion; it's a lifestyle that breeds power. The only insult I've ever received in my adult life was when someone asked me, 'Do you have a hobby?' A HOBBY?! DO I LOOK LIKE A FUCKING DABBLER?!