American humorist (1927-1996)
Families aren't easy to join. They're like an exclusive country club where membership makes impossible demands and the dues for an outsider are exorbitant.
ERMA BOMBECK
Family: The Ties that Bind ... And Gag!
There were really only two men I knew who ever got a laugh out of paying their income taxes. One was cheating the government and getting away with it. The other had a sick sense of humor and would probably have set up a concession stand at the Boston Tea Party and sold sugar cubes and lemon slices.
ERMA BOMBECK
At Wit's End
When a child is locked in the bathroom with water running and he says he's doing nothing but the dog is barking, call 911.
ERMA BOMBECK
attributed, On Being Blonde: Wit and Wisdom from the World's Most Infamous Blondes
In the minds of women, fatherhood used to be considered a part-time job. It was something men did at the end of the day between parking the car for the night and going to bed.
ERMA BOMBECK
Forever, Erma
He who laughs ... lasts.
ERMA BOMBECK
Forever, Erma
It is upsetting to many parents that their teen-agers introduce them to their friends as encyclopedia salesmen who are just passing through ... if they introduce them at all. I have some acquaintances who hover in dark parking lots, enter church separately and crouch in furnace rooms so their teen-agers will not be accused of having parents.
ERMA BOMBECK
Just Wait Till You Have Children of Your Own!
You hear a lot of dialogue on the death of the American family. Families aren't dying. They're merging into big conglomerates.
ERMA BOMBECK
San Francisco Examiner, October 1, 1978
I wanted to go to a place where you were important and people listened to what you had to say. Mothering hadn't done that ... and yet ... wouldn't it be ironic if my turf yielded the most important commodity being grown today? A family? A crop of children, seeded by two people, nourished by love, watered by tears, and in eighteen or twenty years harvested into worthwhile human beings to go through the process again.
ERMA BOMBECK
Family: The Ties that Bind--and Gag!
Raising a family wasn't something I put on my resumé, but I have to ask myself, would I apply for the same job again?
ERMA BOMBECK
Family: The Ties that Bind--and Gag!
Sex is only a three-letter word so how can it be dirty?
ERMA BOMBECK
Just Wait Till You Have Children of Your Own!
The only reason I would take up jogging is so that I could hear heavy breathing again.
ERMA BOMBECK
attributed, And I Quote
Let us hope manufacturers can come up with a diaper that is environmentally sound. To go back to cloth would send us back to the day when breathing and raising a baby at the same time were incompatible.
ERMA BOMBECK
Forever, Erma
You show me a boy who brings a snake home to his mother and I'll show you an orphan.
ERMA BOMBECK
Family: The Ties that Bind ... And Gag!
I think one of the real tests of a stable marriage is being married to a man who worships at the shrine of burnt food -- the back-yard chef.
ERMA BOMBECK
I Lost Everything in the Post-Natal Depression
All of us have moments in our lives that test our courage. Taking children into a house with a white carpet is one of them.
ERMA BOMBECK
attributed, Words from the Wise
Just think of all those women on the Titanic who said, "No, thank you" to dessert that night. And for what?!
ERMA BOMBECK
Woman's Day Magazine, November 13, 2007
Men who have a thirty-six-televised-football-games-a-week-habit should be declared legally dead and their estates probated.
ERMA BOMBECK
I Lost Everything in the Post-Natal Depression
Children should be judged on what they are -- a punishment for an early marriage.
ERMA BOMBECK
I Lost Everything in the Post-Natal Depression
I think it's time we women stopped carrying supplies for the entire family. If children don't have room to carry their own toys, if men don't have pockets in their pants, tougho.
ERMA BOMBECK
Forever, Erma
I've always felt there are two things a woman should never do after the age of thirty-five: stand in natural light and have a baby.
ERMA BOMBECK
Family: The Ties that Bind ... And Gag!