Nora Ephron
As far as the men who are running for president are concerned, they aren't even people I would date.Collection: Dating
I have now been married to my third husband for more than 20 years. But when you've had children with someone you're divorced from, divorce defines everything; it's the lurking fact, a slice of anger in the pie of your brain.Collection: Anger
Directing movies is the best job there is, that's all. I can hardly say a word after that. It's just a great job.Collection: Movies
One good thing I'd like to say about divorce is that it sometimes makes it possible for you to be a much better wife to your next husband because you have a place for your anger - it's not directed at the person you're currently with.Collection: Anger
Death is a sniper. It strikes people you love, people you like, people you know - it's everywhere. You could be next. But then you turn out not to be. But then again, you could be.Collection: Death
The desire to get married, which - I regret to say, I believe is basic and primal in women - is followed almost immediately by an equally basic and primal urge - which is to be single again.Collection: Alone
I survived turning 60, I was not thrilled to turn 61, I was less thrilled to turn 62, I didn't much like being 63, I loathed being 64, and I will hate being 65. I don't let on about such things in person; in person, I am cheerful and Pollyanna-ish. But the honest truth is that it's sad to be over 60.Collection: Sad
I use those medical gloves that fit very tightly and are disposable for all chopping - peppers, onions, garlic, etc. Very Lady Macbeth, I think.Collection: Medical
Summer bachelors, like summer breezes, are never as cool as they pretend to be.Collection: Cool
With any child entering adolescence, one hunts for signs of health, is desperate for the smallest indication that the child's problems will never be important enough for a television movie.Collection: Health
I just want to go on making movies, and some of them will be completely meaningless, except, of course, to me.Collection: Movies
Everyone loves fried chicken, Don't ever make it. Ever. Buy it from a place that makes good fried chicken.
Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim.
The best divorce is the kind where there are no children. That was my first divorce. You walk out the door and you never look back.
Beware of men who cry. It's true that men who cry are sensitive to and in touch with feelings, but the only feelings they tend to be sensitive to and in touch with are their own.
I don't care who you are. When you sit down to write the first page of your screenplay, in your head, you're also writing your Oscar acceptance speech.
When you slip on a banana peel, people laugh at you; but when you tell people you slipped on a banana peel, it's your laugh. So you become the hero rather than the victim of the joke.
Insane people are always sure that they are fine. It is only the sane people who are willing to admit that they are crazy.
'Sleepless' was a script that had been written by three or four other writers before me, and it never really worked, but it had this amazing ending on the top of the Empire State Building that just worked, no matter what came before it.
The neck starts to go at 43, and that's that.
Oh, how I regret not having worn a bikini for the entire year I was 26. If anyone young is reading this, go, right this minute, put on a bikini, and don't take it off until you're 34.
Nothing like mashed potatoes when you're feeling blue. Nothing like getting into bed with a bowl of hot mashed potatoes already loaded with butter, and methodically adding a thin, cold slice of butter to every forkful.
When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.
I go through periods where I work a great deal at all hours of the day whenever I am around a typewriter, and then I go through spells where I don't do anything. I just sort of have lunch - all day. I never have been able to stick to a schedule. I work when there is something due or when I am really excited about a piece.
In my sex fantasy, nobody ever loves me for my mind.
At the age of 55, you will get a saggy roll just above your waist, even if you are painfully thin.
Everybody dies. There's no avoiding it, and I do not believe for one second that butter is the cause of anyone's death. Overeating may be, but not butter, please. I just feel bad for people who make that mistake.
You do get to a certain point in life where you have to realistically, I think, understand that the days are getting shorter, and you can't put things off thinking you'll get to them someday. If you really want to do them, you better do them. There are simply too many people getting sick, and sooner or later you will.
I just bring a black turtleneck sweater everywhere - it's the greatest purchase of my life. Period.
If only I had grown up worshipping Julia Child. I was already grown up - thank you very much - when Julia Child's book was published. When I moved to New York in 1962, you had to own it.
Writing is what I do. It's like breathing to me at a certain point, but if I couldn't write, I do like cooking.
The realization that I may have only a few good years remaining has hit me with real force, and I have done a lot of thinking as a result. I would like to have come up with something profound, but I haven't.
I don't think any day is worth living without thinking about what you're going to eat next at all times.
I have been forgetting things for years - at least since I was in my 30s. I know this because I wrote something about it at the time; I have proof. Of course I can't remember exactly where I wrote about it or when, but I could probably hunt it up if I had to.
E-mail is a whole new way of being friends with people: intimate but not, chatty but not, communicative but not; in short, friends but not. What a breakthrough. How did we ever live without it? I have more to say on this subject, but I have to answer an instant message from someone I almost know.
Here are some questions I am constantly fretting over: Do you splurge, or do you hoard? Do you live every day as if it's your last, or do you save your money on the chance you'll live 20 more years? Is life too short, or is it going to be too long?
What will happen to sex after liberation? Frankly, I don't know. It is a great mystery to all of us.
My mother wanted us to understand that the tragedies of your life one day have the potential to be comic stories the next.
I try to write parts for women that are as complicated and interesting as women actually are.
When we were working on 'Julie & Julia,' I went back to the Julia Child cookbook and made some things I haven't made in a while, one being beef bourguignon, which to me is a hilariously 1960s dish that everyone felt they had to serve at a dinner party or they weren't a grown-up.
The truth is that most marriages have food as a major player in them, and certainly mine does.
If pregnancy were a book they would cut the last two chapters.
Whenever I get married, I start buying Gourmet magazine.
My mother was a good recreational cook, but what she basically believed about cooking was that if you worked hard and prospered, someone else would do it for you.
What my mother believed about cooking is that if you worked hard and prospered, someone else would do it for you.
I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive.
Denial has been a way of life for me for many years. I actually believe in denial.
Every 10 years or so, there was a moment when I'd say, even subconsciously, 'Is that all there is?' You've got to find ways to keep it fresh for yourself.
I was always proud of being tough-minded, and I think I still am, but in my old age I've got a little softer in the head, and that's all right.
I think when you get older, things come along that you know are a test in some way of your ability to stay with it. And when e-mail came along, I was just going to fall in love with it. And I did. I can't believe it now - it's like one of those ex-husbands that you think, 'What was I thinking?'