Nick Offerman

“I'm very hairy, and men in film and TV are no longer allowed to be hairy.”

“For years I drove a big Ford F250 pickup. That was my ride because two-thirds of my work was wood work, and I'm always driving up to Northern California, where I harvest salvaged trees.”

“When I was in high school, I would perform every year in those plays and there was something I really loved about it. But I was completely unaware that you could sort of get into an acting career.”

“When I hear young people today complain about being bored - and the things that keep them from being bored are generally exclusively videogames and/or computer pastimes - I just try to encourage them to go outside.”

“My uncles, who are farmers in Minooka, Illinois - I grew up with them and their pickup trucks and mustaches, and to me that was masculinity: big hairy sweaty guys who could pick up a bus.”

“I am a saxophone player.”

“I would like Americans to make things with their hands. Thomas Jefferson and I feel that makes for a much stronger nation.”

“If properly dried and trimmed, New York-style pizza could be used to make a box for Chicago-style pizza.”

“Instead of playing Draw Something, fucking draw something”

“I've learned through experience that to trouble celebrities with my handshake doesn't do anybody any good.”

“I've had to learn and discipline myself that I'm much happier and much less depressed if I give myself a project. It's just that simple.”

“I grew up in a small town in Illinois, and my dad was a basketball coach. Thanks to him, I have excellent fundamentals in both basketball and baseball.”

“I'm enjoying the opportunity that 'Parks And Recreation' affords me to exploit my own soapbox agenda, which is to try to encourage people to make things with their hands.”

“I think it's fascinating that I receive attention for what people perceive to be a level of manliness or machismo, when amongst my family of farmers and paramedics and regular Americans, I'm kind of the sissy in my family.”

“I grew up among farmers in Illinois and so you always have to have the tools you might need in the eventuality of a flat tire or a broken window.”

“It's funny, growing up there was never anybody around me with any kind of artistic bent.”

“If you're an original thinker, you are going get told 'no' a lot, and you have to be able to hear 'no' many times from the bankers and trust that at some point, someone is going to recognize that you are an artist and not a can of soda.”

“You know, even working actors can end up having a lot of spare time. And you can either go sit at the Starbucks and wait for your agent to call you, or you can go learn how to build a Shaker blanket chest with hand-cut dovetails.”

“And what we've lost sight of is that performing manual labor with your hands is one of the most incredibly satisfying and positive things you can do.”