The Author's Revised Proverbs for Today
Sometimes, suppressed mischief shows up in my writing, like this.
Over the years I’ve noticed our common stock of proverbs has grown sadly out-of-date. For example, ‘a stitch in time saves nine.’ In these days of throwaway clothes, who can remember what a stitch is
So, while I can’t update all laws and proverbs in one post, here are my suggestions for making some of them modern – while curing the sunny optimism too many of them embodied
If something can go wrong, it will, to which I’d add, ‘and even if something can’t go wrong, it will.’
Find a penny, pick it up, and all that day you’ll have a sore back, which will turn out to be a herniated disc requiring major surgery
More haste, more speed, more dead.
Man cannot live by bread alone. He also needs beer, sports, and barbecued red meat
Men organize. Women empathize. Children demoralize
Brute force and ignorance will overcome anything -- if they’re intelligently applied.
Don’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs, put her in a ‘gracious living retirement home’ instead
Honesty is just one of several policy options open to the modern leader.
Where there’s life, there’s hopelessness
The proof of the pudding is in the… dietary information on the package.
And finally, all’s well, that ends.
