2009

OK, so what if Chicken Little was right? Chicken Little is that bird who got hit on the head by a falling acorn and then ran around screaming "The sky is falling!" He got all his forest friends in an alarmist tizzy and, on their way to tell the king, they were summarily fooled and eaten by that Foxy Loxy.

While here in the heart of Africa, I think of Canada often. Fall is no exception.

An early-summer highlight of mine was this comment from a gentleman who stopped me in a London, Ontario church to say, "You know, your book cost me $4,000."

It's hard to know most days what might go through the mind of any three-year-old, let alone an orphan from Africa.

If I have one urgent piece of practical advice for young men today, it's this: Look forward with great hope to the day you marry and have children.

"You're such a Dad-Dad." This phrase, a recent favourite of my three-year-old Jon, has reminded me anew that there's nothing like fatherhood.

KAMPALA, UGANDA – "The time has come," the Walrus said, "to talk of many things." From Lewis Carroll's nonsense verse "The Walrus and the Carpenter," this is what comes to mind when I read the newspapers here. Is the world getting madder?

Is it the global credit crisis? Is it the evil that lurks? Or is the world just getting madder? Whatever the cause, there’s a spike in ritual murders in this impoverished African country.

So it's that time of year when all of our New Year resolutions aren't yet broken. Among mine is to get into jail more often.