This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things (UNCLASSIFIED)

[George Thompson]

When a drinking glass got broken -- one given away by a gas station as an inducement to fill the tank with 29-cent/gallon gasolene -- my mother said "it just seems I can't have anything nice".  She didn't have a sister, so Paula Poundstone and I can't really be cousins, but it does make one wonder.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
Date: Monday, May 18, 2009 6:16 pm
Subject: Re: This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things (UNCLASSIFIED)
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU

> Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> Caveats: NONE
>
> Paula Poundstone in the Dallas paper (BEHIND THE LAUGHS - Comic Paula
> Poundstone is her own favorite target _The Dallas Morning News_ -
> Saturday, June 25, 1988 Author: Ken Perkins: p. 5C):
> "She was one of those angry moms that use to get mad at absolutely
> everything. I remember the time I knocked a Flintstone glass off the
> kitchen table, and she said, "Dammit, that's why we can't have nice
> things .""
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> > Behalf Of Baker, John
> > Sent: Monday, May 18, 2009 2:15 PM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject: This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things
> >
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> ---------------
> > --------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
> > Subject:      This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things
> >
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> > --------
> >
> >         How old is this meme?  The earliest I see is from the Hartford
> > Courant, 2/10/1999, quoting Colin Quinn on Saturday Night Live the
> > previous week:  "American warplanes attacked newly installed Iraqi
> > anti-ship missile launchers along the Persian Gulf. An enraged Saddam
> > Hussein scolded his troops saying, 'You see, this is why we can't have
> > nice things!'"
> >
> >
> >         Anything earlier?
> >
> >
> > John Baker
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> Caveats: NONE
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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