America to me is so varied and exciting. I always feel nostalgia for the place I'm not in, and then I get there and find myself in a traffic jam going into the Lincoln Tunnel, and I think, 'God, why was I romanticizing this part of the country?' I think it has to do with the romantic, unrealistic temperament.

Russian humor is to adapt or make some sense or nonsense out of the insanity of their lives.

People in Russia adapt to misery by a deep, deep humor.

I don't have a disregard for my reader in humor pieces.

I think what is important for things to be funny is if you the listener, or the reader, get a chance to supply the humor of it yourself.

With reporting, if you work hard, you can usually pull something out. But writing humor doesn't respond to working hard, necessarily. I mean, you could just sit there and look at the page all day and maybe something will come.

Writing humor for me is more like a watchful-ness. You have to watch. When you say something funny, or someone else does, it's more like you wait for the piece.