Thusnelda says...

Posted 8/21/12

JANUARY 23, 1986

Before we get too far into this New Year, I’d like to make my list of things I could happily have done without in 1985.

1) Christmas sales in July. Monster sales for …

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Thusnelda says...

Posted

JANUARY 23, 1986

Before we get too far into this New Year, I’d like to make my list of things I could happily have done without in 1985.

1) Christmas sales in July. Monster sales for Hallowe’en. I’ve never had any desire to own a monster, and July is enough of a celebration without trying to work in Christmas along with it.

2) “Punkies,” the new wave of the 80’s. They always look like they’ve been in a dog and cat fight and I never can tell who won. As a matter of fact, they look like something that was pulled out from under a rock, and I wish they’d been stepped on and put right back.

3) Letters that say “To open, tear along dotted line and peel top copy off back copy.” They do not tear on the dotted line, so you wind up with shredded snips of paper in carbon coated hands, and you wonder forever after if there just might have been an important message in there somewhere.

4) Boxes that say “Press Here to Open.” You press until your thumbnails pop off and you nearly have a stroke, but the tormented things won’t budge. I wind up stabbing them with the back end of the nearest table knife... THWACK! and then of course, the hole get too big so the contents spill all over, or the tab falls back into the box, and it won’t pour anyway.

5) “Child Proof” bottle caps. Any child can open them but I can’t. When I finish struggling and swearing at them, I take a screw driver or a butcher knife and pry the tops off. Which leaves me with loose bottle caps and more apoplexy. Liquids spill, or the damn pills fall out and roll all over the floor, and you never can find them. But rest assured, your child will spot them immediately! Are people so stupid, clumsy and thoughtless that the manufacturers have to make all these tormented safety devices so we won’t accidentally kill ourselves or our children? And, as a result we wind up with broken fingers, tendonitis and burst blood vessels just trying to open bottles and packages?

6) Four ice storms in the two weeks before Thanksgiving. Do I need to comment on that?

7) Football bowl games. They have more bowls than I have in seven sets of dishes.

8) The on-going Ann Landers debate over whether it’s proper to leave the toilet seat lid up or down. Some folks have very set ideas on that subject, it seems. One lady told Landers that she covers her seat lid with thick terry cloth and then appliques a very heavy rose on it, so it cannot possibly be left up. And I can just see some poor little boy getting caught as the lid slams down, and hear him wailing: “MOMMY! I’M STUCK!.. .MOMMY!... WAAAH!”

I’m sure there’s lots more, but it’s now 1986, and I have to get on with what I could do without this year.

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