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" I'm drawn to the taboos that surround the human body. I find it fascinating that we are repelled by many of the acts and processes that keep us alive. "
Mary Roach
Alive
Human Body
Human
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" I have not eaten a lot of insects. I ate a termite in Africa, but it was on a bet. It was a soldier termite. It was alive, and I don't really recommend the live soldier termite as something you want to start with if you're going to start exploring eating insects. "
Mary Roach
Soldier
Live
You
" Editors are more concerned with the first chapters of a book; that's what everyone reads first in the bookstore or in the online sample. "
Mary Roach
Everyone
Book
Online
" In terms of sustainability and what we eat and what its footprint is on the environment and the consequences of eating one thing versus another, obviously it makes a lot of sense to be eating insects. They're incredibly plentiful. They've got a very short turnover rate. You could be eating termites. "
Mary Roach
You
Eat
Eating
" Mushy food is a form of sensory deprivation. In the same way that a dark, silent room will eventually drive you to hallucinate, the mind rebels against bland, single-texture foods, edibles that do not engage the oral device. "
Mary Roach
Mind
Dark
Food
" Bodily fluids and solids are universally the most disgusting things we as human beings can come upon, but as long as they are inside us, it's part of you. "
Mary Roach
Long
You
Us
" I make lists to keep my anxiety level down. If I write down 15 things to be done, I lose that vague, nagging sense that there are an overwhelming number of things to be done, all of which are on the brink of being forgotten. "
Mary Roach
Lose
Anxiety
Forgotten
" I used to do my best thinking while staring out airplane windows. The seat-back video system put a stop to that. Now I sit and watch old' Friends' and 'Everybody Loves Raymond' episodes. Walking is good, but here again, technology has interfered. I like to listen to iTunes while I walk home. I guess I don't think anymore. "
Mary Roach
Best
Walk
Technology
" Follow your instincts. Do the kind of writing you love to do and do best. 'Stiff' was an oddball book - I mean, a funny book about cadavers? - and I worried that it would be too unconventional. In the end, that's what has made it a success, I think. "
Mary Roach
Think
Best
Book
" To me, NASA is kind of the magical kingdom. I was sort of a geek, and you go there, and there are just these wondrously strange things and people. "
Mary Roach
Magical
Me
Kind
" I talk to a lot of people who, when you try to sum them up in a couple of sentences, seem like they must be insane. "
Mary Roach
Try
You
Up
" There are people who would love to spend their last ten years, or five years, or whatever it is, on the surface of Mars. "
Mary Roach
Love
Last
Surface
" Day by day, I'm kind of a bore. "
Mary Roach
Bore
Kind
Day
" To keep your he-man jaw muscles from smashing your precious teeth, the only set you have, the body evolved an automated braking system faster and more sophisticated than anything on a Lexus. The jaw knows its own strength. The faster and more recklessly you close your mouth, the less force the muscles are willing to apply. "
Mary Roach
Strength
You
Precious
" They say that women's sexual peaks are in their 30s or 40s, and I think that it happens because they're more comfortable. It's not some hormonal change that happens at that age. Of course, it would be nice to have more physiological insight on that. "
Mary Roach
Change
Nice
Say
" To me, death is dark, pain, grief. "
Mary Roach
Grief
Pain
Dark
" Ultimately, the problem is that sex is perceived as a personal, intimate thing, not in the realm of science. But that's not true. It's physiology; it's anatomy. It deserves to be studied. "
Mary Roach
Problem
Personal
Science
" Chew on this: Human teeth can detect a grain of sand or grit 10 microns in diameter. A micron is 1/25,000 of an inch. If you shrank a Coke can until it was the diameter of a human hair, the letter O in the product name would be about 10 microns across. "
Mary Roach
Name
Teeth
You
" For the scientists, they're kind of puzzled and pleased that somebody finds their work interesting. It makes it fun for me. I feel like I've sort of turned over a stone that hasn't been turned over. "
Mary Roach
Feel
Fun
Interesting
" I spend a lot of my time on the phone, pestering people. 'What's new in your lab? Can I come visit your lab? When can I come visit your lab?' I'm basically a professional pesterer. "
Mary Roach
Time
New
People
" Because there are now online databases of federally funded research, and these databases are searchable by keyword, sex researchers have to be careful how they title their projects. It's become a simple matter, for those who are so inclined, to find and target researchers whose work they object to on religious grounds. "
Mary Roach
Now
Research
Sex
" When you buy my books, you kind of know what you're in for. It's kind of self-selecting. If you have a delicate sensibility, and you're easily grossed out, you probably will never read one of my books. "
Mary Roach
Know
Never
You
" When I was a kid, I hated everything. I was really skinny, and I'd have a milkshake with an egg in it. Growing up, I ate, like, five different foods. I was not an adventurous eater. But as soon as I left home, that all changed and from that point on, I've been a pretty enthusiastic eater of new and strange food. "
Mary Roach
Growing
Strange
Home
" I think by and large, humans prefer to think of themselves as minds from the neck up. We don't really like to think of ourselves as another animal, another digesting, excreting, mating, snoring, sleeping kind of sack of guts. I don't think we like that. I think we'd rather not be reminded of it. "
Mary Roach
Animal
Sleeping
Think
" Any time you can take a book a little beyond the realm of pure entertainment, I think it's a good thing. But I don't really have it on my to-do list when I write a book. It just evolves naturally during the process of immersing yourself in a subject. "
Mary Roach
Yourself
You
Time
" There are fast chewers and slow chewers, long chewers and short chewers, right-chewing people and left-chewing people. Some of us chew straight up and down, and others chew side-to-side, like cows. Your oral processing habits are a physiological fingerprint. "
Mary Roach
Long
Down
Slow
" You won't see me writing about particle physics, or even planetary geology, or chemistry. I practically failed chemistry, and if I had to write a book in any of those areas, I don't think it would go well. "
Mary Roach
Book
Chemistry
Me
" I have a nice little office, with a nice little window in it, but I do basically spend huge amounts of time in what you could consider solitary confinement. "
Mary Roach
Little
You
Window
" When someone tells me, 'Oh, we have so many problems on Earth; space exploration costs too much money,' I say, 'I absolutely agree with you. But I still hope we do it.' "
Mary Roach
Earth
Money
Problems
" All the clothes in my closet are Oakland, California, clothes. You can't wear those anywhere else. The barometric pressure drops and then where are you? "
Mary Roach
California
Clothes
Pressure
" Though it's harder to justify the use of a cadaver for practicing nose jobs than it is for practicing coronary bypasses, it is justifiable nonetheless. Cosmetic surgery exists, for better or for worse, and it's important, for the sake of those who undergo it, that the surgeons who do it are able to do it well. "
Mary Roach
Nose
Better
Well