Today I'm channelling... the Wicked Witch of the West

"Don't make me get the flying monkeys."
The Wicked Witch of the West

Today I'm channelling... Amy Poehler

Yes Please is published in the UK by Picador on November 6

"Fighting ageing is like the War on Drugs. It's expensive, does more harm than good and has been proven to never end."
Amy Poehler

Preorder Yes Please from amazon

Today I'm channelling... Winona Ryder

"I think too much. I think ahead. I think behind. I think sideways. I think it all. If it exists, I've fucking thought of it."
Winona Ryder, born today 1971

Today I'm channelling... Bill Gates

"Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose."
Bill Gates, born today 1955

Today I'm channelling... Sylvia Plath

"It's a hell of a responsibility to be yourself. It's much easier to be somebody else, or nobody at all."
Sylvia Plath, born today 1932

Today I'm channelling... Picasso

"Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone."
Picasso, born 25 October 1881

Today I'm channelling... Haruki Murakami

"Don't feel sorry for yourself. Only arseholes do that."
Haruki Murakami

Today I'm channelling... Doris Lessing

"You simply don't get to be wise, mature, etc, unless you've been a raving cannibal for thirty years or so."

Doris Lessing, born today 1919

Today I'm channelling... Carrie Fisher

"Females get hired along procreative lines. After 40, we're kind of cooked."
Carrie Fisher, born today 1956

Today I'm channelling... Edna St Vincent Millay

"I'm glad that I paid so little attention to good advice; had I abided by it I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes."
Edna St Vincent Millay (1892-1905)

Today I'm channelling... Cheryl Strayed

Strayed on the Pacific Crest Trail in 1995

"Fear, to a great extent, is born of a story we tell ourselves, and so I chose to tell myself a different story from the one women are told."
Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild

Today I'm channelling... Oscar Wilde

"Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken."
Oscar Wilde, born today 1854

Today I'm channelling... Angela Lansbury

"I just stopped playing bitches on wheels and people's mothers. I have only a few more years to kick up my heels."
Angela Lansbury, 89 tomorrow

Today I'm channelling... Katherine Mansfield

"Risk anything! Care no more for the opinion of others... Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth."
Katherine Mansfield, born today 1888

Today I'm channelling... Lenny Bruce

"The 'what should be' never did exist, but people keep trying to live up to it. There is no 'what should be', there is only what is."
Lenny Bruce, born today 1925

Today I'm channelling... Orson Welles

"If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story."
Orson Welles, died today 1985

Today I'm channelling... Margaret Drabble

The cover of Drabble's latest work, Pure Gold Baby

"When nothing is sure, everything is possible."
Margaret Drabble

Today I'm channelling... Diane Keaton

"I wanted to be Warren Beatty, not marry him."
Diane Keaton

Today I'm channelling... Jenna Lyons

"As far as I'm concerned, leopard print is a neutral."
Jenna Lyons

Today I'm channelling... Bette Davis

"A sure way to lose happiness, I've found, is to want it at the expense of everything else."
Bette Davis, 1908-1989

Today I'm channelling... Anne Sexton

"Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard."
Anne Sexton, 9 November, 1928 - 4 October, 1974

Today I'm channelling... Werner Herzog

"The world reveals itself to those who travel on foot."
Werner Herzog

Today I'm channelling... Margaret Oliphant

Katharine Hepburn, the personification of style

"Never mind the fashion. When one has a style of one's own, it's always twenty times better."
Margaret Oliphant