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I grew up in the Northeast; I've seen hurricanes before and trees down and cars destroyed.

I've been through quite a few hurricanes. I worked in North Carolina, where there's a housing development whose name was Landfall.

I've been through natural disasters. I lived down in Miami and was down there for Hurricane Andrew which was a Category 5. There were members of my family that thought they were going to die. Everyone was in the bathtub.

I have lived through many major hurricanes during my lifetime: Camille, Frederic, and Ivan, to name just a very few. However, never have I seen destruction, panic, and fear on this massive scale.

I grew up in the African bush in Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda, which is my thing. I love the smell of the dust as you bump along in a Land-Rover. I go back there often.

I grew up in Louisiana - a little suburb right outside of New Orleans - and I wouldn't have it any other way!

I feel very at home in L.A., I think, because it's dry, and there's sun, like the West Texas I grew up in.

My grandmother had a lilac bush at her home in Long Island. I always associate the scent of it with her and try to have lilacs in my home.

The mornings along the coast where the fog and mist meet with the salty spray of the seas is one of my favourite smells. I love the smell in the evergreen forest just after it rains - The Redwood Forest in California has the coast, too, so you have the best of everything!

Hurricanes are dangerous things, and they're no fun to go through. And if you come out of it in one piece and your house comes out of in one piece, it's no fun living with no electricity for a day or a week, a month, whatever it is. And I speak, unfortunately, from personal experience on that matter.