Free If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits? by Erma Bombeck

away at the owner's expense and sold at public auction.”
    “What does that mean?” asked my youngest.
    “It means you have diapers at the bottom of your stack of clothes and you are thirteen years old. It means I am sick of watching you dress each morning over the toaster. It means your clothes have a home and I want to see them in that home.”
    “I've been meaning to talk with you about that,” he said. “Why did you throw my blue jeans in the wash?”
    “Because they were in the middle of the floor.”
    “Were they scrunched down to two little holes?”
    I nodded. “What's that got to do with it?”
    “When they're scrunched down like that, they aren't dirty.”
    “So, how am I supposed to know when they are dirty?”
    “The dirty ones are kicked under the bed.”
    “Why don't you put them on top of the bed?”
    “Because I don't want to get them mixed up with the clean clothes.”
    “Instead of sleeping with your clean clothes, why don't you take them out of the laundry room and put them in a drawer?”
    “Because that's where I keep the dirty underwear I am going to wear again.”
    I took a deep breath. “Why would you wear underwear two days in a row?”
    “Because it is my lucky underwear.”
    “For whom?” I asked dryly.
    “I suppose you want me to put my clothes in the clothes hamper?” he asked.
    “It crossed my mind.”
    “With all the wet towels in there my clothes would get ruined.”
    “You are supposed to put your wet towels on the towel rack.”
    “What'll I do with all your pantyhose and sweaters?”
    “PUT THEM IN THE UTILITY ROOM,” I shouted.
    “Does this mean I lose my place dressing over the toaster?” he asked.
    I planted a firm hand on his bottom. “No, it means your underwear just got unlucky.”
     
    Regulation of Interstate Shopping Cart Traffic
     
    It is my feeling that the driving age of shoppers operating supermarket carts be raised to thirty-five. Going to the supermarket used to be an adventure. Today, it's a combat mission.
    As I was telling a friend the other day, "It's a jungle out there what with all the young, inexperienced drivers and little old ladies who only drive a shopping cart on Sundays after church.
    The shopping cart is the most underrated traffic hazard on the road today. To begin with, no license is required in any state to drive these little vehicles. Anyone, regardless of age, vision, physical condition or mental health can get behind the wheels. (Occasionally, no one is behind the wheels, and these little irresponsible devils slam into cars in the parking lot without a driver in sight.)
    To say that they are unsafe at any speed is an understatement. Consider, if you will, their deficiencies.
    1. Grocery carts are never parked. They are welded together as a group at the door and must be separated by kicking, jiggling, wiggling, and a good stiff kick in the old breadbasket. This possibly accounts for the body construction-being weakened. (Yours, not the cart.)
    2. A safety check would reveal there isn't a shopping cart that does not have all four wheels working. Unfortunately, all four are locked in stable directions. Three wheels want to shop and the fourth wants to go to the parking lot.
    3. There are no seat belts for the children riding in shopping cart seats. Thus, it is not unusual to have them lean into your cart and eat half-a-pound of raw hamburger before you discover they are there.
    4. Shopping carts should be like airplanes and nuns... it takes two to handle the situation. One to drive and one to gawk and read the caloric content of frozen lasagna.
    5. Passing in the supermarket is hazardous because supermarket aisles are built to accommodate the width of one-and-one-half Carts. Thus, we encourage the reckless driver who fears the whipped cream topping in his cart is melting and who will purposely force your cart into produce.
    And here's the shocker. There are no brakes on a shopping cart.
    And what is worse... Ralph Nader doesn't