I work out in prose what I imagined the day before. Yes, I don't really sit at the desk and invent. I tell my students not to do that either. Do your invention and imagination before you sit down. A lot of writers, I think, do work like that.
Writers often are dreamers and when they drive a car, they think about other things.
I think I've made it a deliberate technique, with other writers it may be more unconscious. Northwestern University has been on such an upswing in the past five years that it's exciting to be connected with it. Chicago is exciting. It's wonderful to walk around and see those buildings and the lake. It's very different from New York more open, designed.