Onion rings in the car cushions do not improve with time.
Interpretation
This quote humorously suggests that some things, like onion rings in car cushions, only get worse over time.
Erma Bombeck uses this playful statement to highlight the absurdity of neglecting small messes or problems, indicating that ignoring such things can lead to deterioration rather than improvement. It's a reminder that time does not fix everything and that certain issues need addressing before they worsen.
In practice
You could use this quote at a casual gathering to lighten the mood while discussing old cars.
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 attache' 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.
You hear a lot of dialogue on the death of the American family. Families aren't dying. They're merging into big conglomerates.
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.
Not everyone is comfortable with the kissing ritual. My husband is one of them. Her refuses to press lips with anyone except his wife, mother, and dog. If someone wanted to give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, he would refuse until he had been formally introduced.
There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child.
Maybe age is kinder to us than we think. With my bad eyes, I can't see how bad I look, and with my rotten memory, I have a good excuse for getting out of a lot of stuff.
Of all bores, the worst is the sparkling bore.
He had only one vanity; he thought he could give advice better than any other person.
Toast was a pointless invention from the Dark Ages. Toast was an implement of torture that caused all those subjected to it to regurgitate in verbal form the sins and crimes of their past lives. Toast was a ritual item devoured by fetishists in the belief that it would enhance their kinetic and sexual powers. Toast cannot be explained by any rational means. Toast is me. I am toast.
One always writes comedy at the moment of deepest hysteria.
A fellow who has a funny bone can learn to hone his skills, but I don't think you can develop a funny bone - you either have it or you don't. And by the way - when you get it, we don't know it.
He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot.
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