I Feel Bad About My Neckby Nora Ephron

And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman.
Published in 2006. 137 pages.


This collection of personal essays is a quick read.

My favorite essay was "I Hate My Purse." I totally relate to Ephron's opening statement—

I hate my purse. I absolutely hate it. If you're one of those women who think there's something great about purses, don't even bother reading this because there will be nothing here for you. This is for women who hate their purses, who are bad at purses, who understand that their purses are reflections of negligent housekeeping, hopeless disorganization, a chronic inability to throw anything away, and an ongoing failure to handle the obligations of a demanding and difficult accessory (the obligation, for example, that it should in some way match what you're wearing).

The list of profundities in "What I Wish I'd Known" included one that made me literally laugh out loud—

When your children are teenagers, it's important to have a dog so that someone in the house is happy to see you.

Ephron addresses more serious issues too, albeit with humor. From the essay "Me and Bill: The End of Love"—

The way I saw it, if Bill had behaved, Al would have been elected, and thousands and thousands of people would be alive today who are instead dead.

And from "Considering the Alternative"—

But if the events of the last few years have taught me anything, it's that I'm going to feel like an idiot if I die tomorrow and I skimped on bath oil today. So I use quite a lot of bath oil. More than you could ever imagine.

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