Word Prisms

My wife, Nicola, and I were in a car accident in Africa that should have caused feelings of terror.   We were passengers in a “taxi” with eight or nine other people on our way from Nairobi to Tanzania when our driver spotted a Maasai man herding his cattle across the road.   After pumping his useless brakes a few times, he attempted to drive around the herd.   He swerved into the dirt beside the road smashing into the head of the lead cow.   Then, he attempted to swerve back on the road.    After a whoop from the husky woman seated beside Nicola, the driver attempted to return the car back to the tarmac.   The tires gripped the edge and we went careening off to the far side of the road.   The driver turned back.   The car rocked and then shot back in the direction we’d come.   He tried one more time to straighten it out before the vehicle started to roll and roll and roll.   Not once did the idiot think to take his foot off th...

            The word “fair” is of Germanic origin meaning pleasing or attractive.   Eventually it was the given the meaning it has today; “Impartial and just treatment or behaviour without favouritism or discrimination” as defined by the Oxford dictionary.   I first started caring about “fair” when my brother entered the world after I'd enjoyed two years of my parents' undivided attention.   Suddenly, I was the bad guy, the bully, the one   who should give way to the needs of his brother because they said, he was smaller and obviously more innocent.   My brother was many things but innocent was not one of them.   At age six, I remember standing in the hallway our first home and him saying that he could get me in trouble anytime he wanted.   Of course, a dare could never be left unchallenged.   “No way,” I said.   "Watch," he replies and then  doubles over yelling that I’d punched h...

A stewardess with West Jet is suing the company for wrongful dismissal after she accused a pilot of assaulting her.   He’d invited her for drinks on the balcony of his hotel room during a layover in Maui.   Then he grabbed her, dragged her to the bed and began groping her genitals.   And that got me thinking, genitals?   Why genitals?   I mean guys are obviously genitals, what with all the different parts just hanging there.   But why women?   When I posed the question to my wife she said, why don’t you write a blog post about it?   And I thought, why not?   But before I did that, I thought I should do some research And I did and now I feel stupid because, after all, I am supposed to be an educated guy and I did once teach sex ed to Grade 9 students.   My favourite lesson was on STDs where I utilized the assistance of a flip chart.   As I faced the students, a description of the STD would appear on my side of th...