Very easy and quick read (for me). The writing is extremely conversational (which makes for a nice change).
It does occasionally feels a bit here and there, rather than centred, but I kept reminding myself that the book started as a one woman stand up, so it's understandable.
None the less, the book is littered with (genuinely) laugh out loud moments (took me a good few minutes to stop laughing at the hearing-aid anecdote), and beautiful insights as well as kind words for those (of us) with mental illness.
16 Highlights
I find that I don't have what could be considered a conventional sense of reality. (Not that I've ever had much use for reality—having spent much of what I laughingly refer to as my adult life attempting to escape it with the assistance of a variety of drugs.)
"Oh my God! I thought about you every day from when I was twelve to when I was twenty-two." And instead of asking what happened at twenty-two, I said, "Every day?" He shrugged and said, "Well, four times a day." Welcome to the land of too much information.
The coolest being that I'm the mother of this amazing daughter named Billie. She's my most extraordinary creation.
I find that I frequently feel better about myself when I discover that we're not alone,
I didn't necessarily feel like dying—but I'd been feeling a lot like not being alive.
Another favorite question is, "Were you naked?" I haven't been naked in fifteen years! I haven't even gone sleeveless in twenty!
Marie MacDonald was a real romantic, an optimistic woman—and I say that because she married a grand total of nine times, which is a record for the board.
George comes up to me the first day of filming and he takes one look at the dress and says, "You can't wear a bra under that dress." So, I say, "Okay, I'll bite. Why?" And he says, "Because . . . there's no underwear in space."
it's not what you're given, it's how you take it.
a problem derails your life and an inconvenience is not being able to get a nice seat on the un-derailed train.
an interviewer asked me if I was happy, and I said, "Among other things." Happy is one of the many things I'm likely to be over the course of a day and certainly over the course of a lifetime. But I think if you have the expectation that you're going to be happy throughout your life—more to the point, if you have a need to be comfortable all the time—well, among other things, you have the makings of a classic drug addict or alcoholic.
So maybe this was another example of nothing ever being just one thing. No motive is pure. No one is good or bad—but a hearty mix of both. And sometimes life actually gives to you by taking away.
you get movies that are rated PG or PG-13, but it's not a system that accurately indicates just how sophisticated or explicit these films are.
"Resentment is like drinking a poison and waiting for the other person to die."
"Cry all you want, you'll pee less!" (I don't know if that is true though.)
At times, being bipolar can be an all-consuming challenge, requiring a lot of stamina and even more courage, so if you're living with this illness and functioning at all, it's something to be proud of, not ashamed of.