Sometimes I think I might not have written 'The Age of Miracles' if I hadn't grown up in California if I hadn't been exposed to its very particular blend of beauty and disaster of danger and denial.

Unless action is taken soon - unless we can display the same vision of that earlier period - we will lose the treasure of California's open space and environmental beauty.

I basically left Texas with no money. I was making $3.50 working in some mall so I didn't have a lot of cash. I took $1 000 and headed to California. Along the way I stopped in Vegas because I had always wanted to see Caesar's Palace. So I stopped there and won $2 500 on a slot machine! It was amazing.

Southern California they have been amazing. They're totally with us.

I've been through the process qualifying for the World Cup which is an amazing two-year process. It was an honor to represent the U.S. and to represent the city of Los Angeles and California.

Californians invented the concept of life-style. This alone warrants their doom.

There's one Baldessari work I genuinely love and would like to own maybe because of my Midwestern roots and love of driving alone. 'The backs of all the trucks passed while driving from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara California Sunday 20 January 1963' consists of a grid of 32 small color photographs depicting just what the title says.