It is not until you become a mother that your judgment slowly turns to compassion and understanding.

Like religion, politics, and family planning, cereal is not a topic to be brought up in public. It's too controversial.

A friend never defends a husband who gets his wife an electric skillet for her birthday.

Don't confuse fame with success. Madonna is one; Helen Keller is the other.

For some of us, watching a miniseries that lasts longer than most marriages is not easy.

When your mother asks, "Do you want a piece of advice?" it is a mere formality. It doesn't matter if you answer yes or no. You're going to get it anyway.

All of us have moments in out lives that test our courage. Taking children into a house with a white carpet is one of them.

Sometimes I can't figure designers out. It's as if they flunked human anatomy.

Most women put off entertaining until the kids are grown.

I was terrible at straight items. When I wrote obituaries, my mother said the only thing I ever got them to do was die in alphabetical order.

When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, 'I used everything you gave me'.

Did you ever notice that the first piece of luggage on the carousel never belongs to anyone?

Getting out of the hospital is a lot like resigning from a book club. You're not out of it until the computer says you're out of it.

Somewhere it is written that parents who are critical of other people's children and publicly admit they can do better are asking for it.

Never lend your car to anyone to whom you have given birth.

Someone once threw me a small, brown, hairy kiwi fruit, and I threw a wastebasket over it until it was dead.

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.

Youngsters of the age of two and three are endowed with extraordinary strength. They can lift a dog twice their own weight and dump him into the bathtub.

I never leaf through a copy of National Geographic without realizing how lucky we are to live in a society where it is traditional to wear clothes.

I have a hat. It is graceful and feminine and give me a certain dignity, as if I were attending a state funeral or something. Someday I may get up enough courage to wear it, instead of carrying it.

A friend will tell you she saw your old boyfriend - and he's a priest.

Never order food in excess of your body weight.

I've exercised with women so thin that buzzards followed them to their cars.

Children make your life important.

Who in their infinite wisdom decreed that Little League uniforms be white? Certainly not a mother.

There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt.

I have a theory about the human mind. A brain is a lot like a computer. It will only take so many facts, and then it will go on overload and blow up.

The only reason I would take up jogging is so that I could hear heavy breathing again.

There is one thing I have never taught my body how to do and that is to figure out at 6 A.M. what it wants to eat at 6 P.M.

How come anything you buy will go on sale next week?

I take a very practical view of raising children. I put a sign in each of their rooms: "Checkout Time is 18 years."

My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first being hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint.

Guilt: the gift that keeps on giving.

Never have more children than you have car windows.

What's with you men? Would hair stop growing on your chest if you asked directions somewhere?

Humorists can never start to take themselves seriously. It's literary suicide.

I haven't trusted polls since I read that 62% of women had affairs during their lunch hour. I've never met a woman in my life who would give up lunch for sex.

Onion rings in the car cushions do not improve with time.

In general my children refuse to eat anything that hasn't danced in television.

I was too old for a paper route, too young for Social Security and too tired for an affair.

Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.

There is nothing more miserable in the world than to arrive in paradise and look like your passport photo.

House guests should be regarded as perishables: Leave them out too long and they go bad.

Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence.

Never accept a drink from a urologist.

For years my wedding ring has done its job. It has led me not into temptation. It has reminded my husband numerous times at parties that it's time to go home. It has been a source of relief to a dinner companion. It has been a status symbol in the maternity ward.

It goes without saying that you should never have more children than you have car windows.

On vacations: We hit the sunny beaches where we occupy ourselves keeping the sun off our skin, the saltwater off our bodies, and the sand out of our belongings.

Never go to your high school reunion pregnant or they will think that is all you have done since you graduated.