[Kobi]

Columnist Erma Bombeck was known for her quick wit and her wisdom about motherhood and family life.

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• We've got a generation now who were born with semiequality. They don't know how it was before, so they think, this isn't too bad. We're working. We have our attaché cases and our three-piece suits. I get very disgusted with the younger generation of women. We had a torch to pass, and they are just sitting there. They don't realize it can be taken away. Things are going to have to get worse before they join in fighting the battle.

• I'm going to stop punishing my children by saying, "Never mind! I'll do it myself."

• Making coffee has become the great compromise of the decade. It's the only thing "real" men do that doesn't seem to threaten their masculinity. To women, it's on the same domestic entry level as putting the spring back into the toilet-tissue holder or taking a chicken out of the freezer to thaw.

• Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the 'Titanic' who waved off the dessert cart.

• 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."