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By Hank Campbell | December 9th 2008 11:55 AM | 5 comments | Print | E-mail | Track Comments
About Hank

A wise man once said Darwin had the greatest idea anyone ever had. Others may prefer Newton or Archimedes.

Probably no one ever said...

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From Esquire magazine, 1949:

"A word to the wives is sufficient.  And the word is NO.  When you have serious shopping to do, leave the pretty things at home.  They can call in a few harpies from the neighborhood, set up a Kaffee-klatsch, tear a few reputations to ribbons, and be as happy as birds."

Now, this is not a Sciencetatorship, you are welcome to go ahead and use these sentiments despite me cautioning against it, but be forewarned that this was meant to be funny even in 1949.  And it's still funny.   But in 1949 they didn't have No Fault divorce laws and community property.  

So use some judgment - a girlfriend under age 30 will probably put up with it, a wife of a few years will likely put you on the couch, but a wife over 7 years could well be sipping fruity umbrella drinks on the beach with a cabana boy while you raise the kids if you use these words in a group of friends and you are not packing flowers, some jewelry and a smile.



This Santa did not heed my sage wisdom.

Comments

Becky Jungbauer
Sounds like you had a personal experience... Query: what if I don't know any harpies? And since when did men do any kind of shopping, serious or not?

Also:
A word to the wives is sufficient.  And the word is NO.

I'd assume this advice works in a veritable plethora of situations. How will the womenfolk know how to live their lives otherwise?

I have an old almanac from the 1800's that describes a malady called female hysteria. One of the prescriptions is a slap to the face.

Hank
I like that better than the ominous use of the term 'womenfolk' Becky threw out there.  I think she is baiting us!!

Becky Jungbauer
Perhaps I'm just being hysterical. Or harpy-ish. I'm sure a good forceful NO and a slap will take care of it.

I guess they actually believed this back then. You see a lot of the malady and the cure in movies from the forties.

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