Joke of the Day (Nora Ephron, on Teens and Dogs)

“When your children are teenagers, it's important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you.”—Screenwriter-director-essayist Nora Ephron (1941-2012), I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman (2006)

Nora Ephron died on this day five years ago in New York, the city of her birth. Although she may have seemed almost predestined for a Hollywood career as the daughter of stage and screen-writing team Henry Ephron and Phoebe Ephron, I think that the woman responsible for, among other films, Sleeping in Seattle and You’ve Got Mail really found her natural genre in the essay, where her wry voice was unfiltered and most original.

Most parents, I suspect, would agree with her quote above. An even higher percentage of women, I think, have, over the years, nodded their heads in agreement over this one: “As far as the men who are running for president are concerned, they aren't even people I would date.”