Sloane Crosley

“I attended an extremely small liberal arts school. There were approximately 1,600 of us roaming our New England campus on a good day. My high school was bigger. My freshman year hourly calorie intake was bigger.”

“Teddy bears are best because they understand it's nice to be alone.”

“Personal technology has given us the freedom of being able to do whatever we want - and in the case of celebrities and athletes, whomever they want. But it can also serve as a humiliation jetpack.”

“The reason that war is such a fascinating subject for writers is because it's a revealer. Put a bunch of people in an adrenaline-fuelled, life-or-death situation and their fundamental behaviours are exposed, the scrim is taken away and the motivations behind each personality come out to play.”

“The year most of my high school friends and I got our driver's permits, the coolest thing one could do was stand outside after school and twirl one's car keys like a lifeguard whistle. That jingling sound meant freedom and power.”

“Yes. I am writing full-time. Which is strange. It feels like not having a job.”

“I am starting to like L.A., but the concept of a place you have to get used to so much seems a little weird to me. I have been to many foreign cities where I didn't have to acclimatize as much as I did to L.A.”

“I use Ole Henriksen eye gel when I think of it, and go for facials when spa gift certificates appear as a professional thank-you or in a gift bag. Once ensconced in a facialist's chair, I let myself be coaxed into all sorts of treatments, because I'm there already, so why not?”

“I would gladly have accepted a heaping spoonful of nepotism when I got out of college and was looking for a job.”

“Brits and Americans have hundreds of different phrases for the same thing. Luckily, it's usually a source of amusement rather than frustration. A flashlight by any other name is still a torch. My personal favourite is 'fairy lights,' which we boringly refer to as 'Christmas lights.'”

“Everything in New York seems to merit preserving. If it's not historical, it's personal. If it's not personal, it's cultural. But you can't. You can't save everything. You just have to pack it up in your brain and take it with you when you go.”

“The children were overwhelmingly morbid. Not a single adult asked me where butterflies go when they die, but this question was more popular than pixie sticks with the under-four-foot set. I cursed parents for not preparing their children. When I was five, my mother and sister sat me up on the kitchen counter and explained the facts of life: the Easter Bunny didn't exist, Elijah was God's invisible friend, with any luck Nana would die soon, and if I ever saw a unicorn, I should kill it or catch it for cash. I turned out okay.”

“Cohabitation seems a greater leap in cities because it's all the harder to extract oneself if things turn sour. It's what keeps otherwise functional adults living with their mothers.”

“The real proof that I have tried to love and that people have tried to love me back was never going to fit in a kitchen drawer.”

“Perhaps if I'd had God in my life growing up I would have been able to understand the total and complete unfairness of the universe rewarding mean girls”

“Some of the writers I admire who seem very, very funny and very emotional to me can develop a closeness with the reader without giving too much of themselves away. Lorrie Moore comes to mind, as does David Sedaris. When they write, the reader thinks that they're being trusted as a friend.”

“There's just no concept of layering a thick-sleeved sweater under a coat in L.A. A coat is more of a gesture than a necessity. You know, in case the temperature goes down to 55 degrees.”

“I don't do emoticons unless I'm making a big deal out of them. I'll type out, 'This is so amusing it makes me want to grin in pixels.' And then do it.”

“For a long time I wanted to draw, but I could never get the proportions right. My still life sketches were the artistic equivalent of someone who has misjudged the space constraints of a postcard, the handwriting shrinking uncomfortably at the bottom.”

“I have definitely had experiences where I can feel the shift from simply living my life to being slightly outside of my life and taking notes.”