Growing up, of course I was the coolest girl in the 3rd grade because I told everyone that my dad was a wrestler, and I would bring in these wrestling magazines of him, and every Saturday morning, he would be body slamming me on my bed.
I always wake up early Saturday morning, and I have a little bit more time, so I go to the gym.
For a gut punch of nostalgia, consider that Saturday morning cartoons are now largely a thing of the past.
On Saturday morning, I like to get up early and go out - TV is banned!
Being raised Muslim, we had to get up at the crack of dawn to pray. There was no sleeping in, no getting up Saturday morning to watch cartoons because there was no TV in the house. But you got up and you worked, cleaned the house.
It's the little things you remember. My mam, Sue, would take me to training in a taxi when I was a kid if Dad, who is a builder, had to work on a Saturday morning. You look back at the stuff like that and realise the sacrifices were all worth it.
I didn't want to be an actress; I never thought of being an actress because, as children, there were three of us - I was the middle child - and we spent our time in church from Sunday morning to Saturday night.
I listen to Ustad Vilayat Khan's 'Raga Khamaj' and 'Raga Jaijaiwanti' virtually every morning, a lot of Abdullah Ibrahim, Michael Kiwanuka, Savages, and contemporary Ugandan pop.
I have fond memories of consuming a handful of almonds that were soaked the previous night and peeled the next morning. All through my school life, my mother would ensure she kept some almonds in my tiffin box so that I would always have my daily dose of nutrition handy.
As for my daily, it usually consists of a smoothie in the morning with banana, spinach and blueberry and veggie protein powder, then some kind of tofu or tempeh scramble with veggies. Later, I may have some type of rice and beans, salad with lentils, sweet potato, nut butter sandwich and another smoothie.
I used to live in an old historic shipyard town called Trenton, Michigan, and a month after I moved in, I started hearing this woman screaming my full name at three in the morning, every night. Finally, on the seventh or eighth night, she screamed it again, and I woke up.
I started writing morning pages just to keep my hand in, you know, just because I was a writer and I didn't know what else to do but write. And then one day as I was writing, a character came sort of strolling in and I realized, Oh my God, I don't have to be just a screenwriter. I can write novels.
In a still hot morning, the tide went out and didn't come back in. This was not a spectacular event. The sea did not roll up like a scroll, like the sky in Revelations. It quietly withdrew.
In the morning when I wake up, I'll exfoliate. Then at night when I shower, I'll also use an exfoliating scrub. My routine is easy, and I just get clean skin.
I once waited on Sean Connery. A long time ago. This was at the Caledonian Hotel in Edinburgh. They closed down the restaurant for him, and when he walked in with his morning paper, all the waitresses started squealing. He was a big guy, bigger than in the movies.
People will come up to me and try and be secretive and say, 'Can you do the Gollum voice for me?' And I'm like, 'Are you kidding? It's 8:30 in the morning on the Victoria Line.'
I was a very self-righteous 15-25 year old. Anyway, I wake up every morning and thank God I'm not a kid anymore.
I love the smell of shampoo on a girl's hair. You can walk past someone and be like, 'Wow, you took a shower this morning, didn't you? Because you smell lovely.'
I think people have to sharpen their eyes and look. I always feel like a big sponge: I feel like I learn lots of things by osmosis, and I feel that I'm always absorbing. I mean, when people say, 'What is your inspiration?' I could throw up. I mean, I'm inspired by the fact I get up in the morning. And I'm still here.
Ronald Reagan believed in America as the shining city on the hill - Morning in America. But Donald Trump has a much different vision of American greatness, of nationalism - a much darker view, I think, of the world.
