Dear Abby:
I am a twenty-three year old, liberated woman who
has been on the pill for two years. It's getting
very expensive and I think my boyfriend should share
half the cost, but I don't know him well enough to
discuss money with him.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! CAN'T . . . STOP . . . LAUGHING!
Dear God! That's typical. Money important. Binding your flesh to another, unimportant.
I hope dear Abby said: "If you can't bring up money with him, I think you need to reevaluate the nature of your relationship." That would be the best advice you would get from her, I think.
I wish there were a handy Internet abbreviation for that kind of laughter that comes out as a snort (sometimes, alas, bringing one's beverage out the nose with it)
Anyway, that's the kind of laughter I'm having.
At our house, those moments are called "Agatha moments", after the spinster school teacher in Jon Hassler's Staggerford. When she was confronted with things like that she would pause, close her eyes, and think about the fact that the Dark Ages were upon us.
Now whenever SisterM and I run across something like this we call each other and say "Here's TODAY'S Agatha moment."
This Dear Abby letter would certainly qualify.
What is she liberated *from*?
You got that out of MAD magazine, right? Or the Onion?
That statement certainly captures the essence of our current society. It should be time capsuled so that future generations will know about this time.