Humour and Satire

So, upon my recent arrival back in Uganda after my Canadian visit for this, I was greeted with the good news that the children still had all their limbs attached, which, in such a longer absenteeism, is as realistic a hope as any to have. Of course, I gave them some gifts and this included some Turkish Delight, that enchanted […]

Ugandan neighbour kid to Jean: ‘Where are you going?’ Jean to Ugandan neighbour kid: ‘Crazy. Want to come?’ Ugandan neighbour kid: ‘Let me go ask my Mom.’ Is it the Canadian accent? ++ But when you cross borders there will be, at the very least, misunderstandings, if not risk and a need for courage to […]

Liz continues to do her best to teach her cats how to do new tricks … and take my underwear in the process. If you missed it in the Hamilton Spectator the other day, here’s the news on all this here or below. + PDF Version (The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, September 27, 2014) KAMPALA, UGANDA ✦ Back in […]

I don’t know. All this talk about sex and my manhood. It started when this post simply shared our updated family photo and the news that while the Family Dog is now in our annual shot, our family won’t get larger because I’ve had the snip-snip, that is a vasectomy. My Obstetrician Babe gave her […]

We’re around the breakfast table and the kids are bragging about how old they are, that is how mature and experienced and all that. Liz makes the point she’s in Year 7 now, which, in their international school in Uganda actually means high school. The other two aren’t far behind. Which brings the table conversation […]

Finally, to add to what started with this one and complete this trilogy of posts this week on the news that 19 Somalis were just arrested in Kampala for allegedly plotting to blow some unknown place to Kingdom Come, the only other note to add is that one hopes that jails in Uganda are more secure than jails in Yemen. Yemen, of course, is […]

Since it’s fresh on my mind from  yesterday’s note on the Somalis thrown into a Kampala jail for allegedly plotting a terror attack around here, I should add that I’ve had my own experience with a Ugandan jail. To speak with a certain investigating police officer, Joseph, I was once a visitor at a local precinct after my vehicle was […]

It’s the other day and we laugh about it, Jon and myself, because we had just been fishing at the bayfront and this is what got us on the topic of tattoos. Jon wants a tattoo of a fish. Of course getting a tattoo isn’t what it used to be. Even people of my own set […]

From my last post here, the only thing left to say is that while Jon’s birthday cake was finely decorated, My Bride is very much decorated in another rather beautiful way, with the Order of Canada now, which you know about through this. Yes, it is getting to be a regular question asked of me these days, […]

I was on the phone this morning and got the question – again – ‘so what’s it like being married to someone so decorated?’ I figured the fellow meant this, not the chocolate cake we gave Jon for his birthday party the other day, although it was, I must say, a fine cake, covered in black, red […]

It was the Ungame and this time the question was for Jon: “Describe your father in three words.” “Big nose,” he started out. The other two words, I somehow blocked out. Then I had to answer the same question about my own father. “Old. Tough. German.” Which is what Jon will be facing, someday. So, careful son. […]

We had to pee in the bottle the other day, all of us for our annual check-up and vaccinations against death in Africa. I mean we did this one at a time, in privacy in different bottles, of course, and it wouldn’t even matter that much except for the fact that the doctor soon after […]

It’s dinner time and once again the kids just HAVE to talk about sex, which is quite remarkable considering the only Miley Cyrus they watch is from the days when she was a fully-clothed Hannah Montana who kept her tongue to herself. Of course, the best way to end any kids’ sex talk is to […]

If there is one thing I’ve learned about fatherhood since the condition fell on me (like a piano out of a 4th-floor window) it’s that today’s fathers are perfect. Always. Yep. Every day. Sunup to sundown. And because today’s fathers, and mothers too, are perfect, they should be given great honour. I tell my kids this in subtle ways. For instance, […]

My daughter vomited on the way to school yesterday morning. This, of course, is the sort of thing that makes any parent’s heart go pitter-patter, thump-thump, yes, one of the golden moments of any dad’s day. In our family, on what is a rather onerous school-run every weekday morning, vomiting, in fact, is sort of shared […]