The Feast of Saint Nora

Brothers, Sisters, and Transgendered Comedists Everywhere,

This weekend we celebrate the birthday of one of the great wits of our day, Nora Ephron. Author of Crazy Salad, Wallflower at the Orgy, and I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman, she has also written the screen plays for When Harry Met Sally, Heartburn, Sleepless in Seattle, My Blue Heaven, and You've Got Mail. She regularly blogs over at Huffington Post and is one of the most insightful social critics we have. A few of my favorites:

So many of the conscious and unconscious ways men and women treat each other have to do with romantic and sexual fantasies that are deeply ingrained, not just in society but in literature. The women's movement may manage to clean up the mess in society, but I don't know whether it can ever clean up the mess in our minds.

As far as the men who are running for president are concerned, they aren't even people I would date.

Beware of men who cry. It's true that men who cry are sensitive to and in touch with feelings, but the only feelings they tend to be sensitive to and in touch with are their own.

I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive.

In my sex fantasy, nobody ever loves me for my mind.

Insane people are always sure that they are fine. It is only the sane people who are willing to admit that they are crazy.

My mother wanted us to understand that the tragedies of your life one day have the potential to be comic stories the next.

Summer bachelors, like summer breezes, are never as cool as they pretend to be.

There are plenty of men who philander during the summer, to be sure, but they are usually the same lot who philander during the winter-albeit with less convenience.

The Wonderbra is not a step forward for women. Nothing that hurts that much is a step forward for women.

Happy birthday Nora Ephron.