It's not an accident that both my sister and I are writers. Our parents created an accidental Petri dish. My family has great storytellers and I grew up in a very funny conversational house and didn't have television. This small family farm was a bubble world that didn't have much to do with reality.

A retired teacher paid $62 000 towards her pension and nothing yes nothing for full family medical dental and vision coverage over her entire career. What will we pay her? $1.4 million in pension benefits and another $215 000 in health care benefit premiums over her lifetime.

When an action is once done it is right or wrong for ever no accidental failure of its good or evil fruits can possibly alter that.

One of the accidental joys of my writing life has been that I've had some lovely surprisingly good fortune with readers and I've brought readers to my dad's work. I can't tell you the joy that gives me. Because my father's work was masterful.

It is quite an illusion to imagine that one adjusts to reality essentially without the use of language and that language is merely an incidental means of solving specific problems of communication or reflection.

Canadians can easily 'pass for American' as long as we don't accidentally use metric measurements or apologize when hit by a car.