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

[Wilson Gray]

My grandmother, (1897-?) used "Why can't we keep/have anything nice
around here?" My mother, 98, used it a lot, when my brother and I were
children.

When the reconstruction of Widener Library was begun, back in the
'90's, a cardboard sign reading, "No Entrance" was placed on the
former main door to the stack, located by the old circ desk. As time
passed, the sign was eventually left hanging by a single corner, held
by a strip of Scotch tape. One morning, some undergrads, having
forgotten that the old stack entrance was no more, came up to the
door. As they looked at the sign, one commented,

"As my mother would say, 'Why can't we keep anything nice around here?' "

A quick check showed that all members of the circc staff of whatever
age age had heard his/her mother make this same lament.

-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Mark Twain





On Tue, May 19, 2009 at 1:19 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things (UNCLASSIFIED)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> What about the *much* older, but, apparently still-used version, "Why
> can't we ever have /keep nice things around here?" I have a busy day,
> so I won't continue with this point till later, unless nobody cares.
>
> -Wilson
> –––
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -----
> -Mark Twain
>
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, May 18, 2009 at 6:14 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC
> <Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
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>> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
>> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things (UNCLASSIFIED)
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> 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: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster: Â  Â  Â  "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
>>> Subject: Â  Â  Â This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things
>>>
>> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> --------
>>>
>>> Â  Â  Â  Â  How old is this meme? Â The earliest I see is from the Hartford
>>> Courant, 2/10/1999, quoting Colin Quinn on Saturday Night Live the
>>> previous week: Â "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!'"
>>>
>>>
>>> Â  Â  Â  Â  Anything earlier?
>>>
>>>
>>> John Baker
>>>
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>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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>> Caveats: NONE
>>
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