Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.
— United Nations, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, quoted in The Unschooling Unmanual
Howlers
Comic blunders by schoolchildren have been collected by H. Cecil Hunt and published under the title Henpicked Howlers. Some examples are given here:
An epistle is the wife of an apostle.
Chivalry is the attitude of a man to a strange woman.
Louix XVI was gelatined.
Catarrh is a musical instrument, especially in Spain.
Philosophy means being able to explain why you are happy when you are poor.
When letters are in sloping type, they are in hysterics.
The Tropic of Cancer is a rare and dangerous disease.
An antidote is a funny story you have heard before.
Doctors say that fatal diseases are the worst.
Ali Baba means being somewhere else when the crime was committed.
A symposium is something like a symphony, only not as bad.
Contralto is a low kind of music that is sung only by ladies.
— Herbert V Prochnow & Herbert V Prochnow Jr. in Jokes, Quotes & One Liners Volume 2
A practical driver
I’m reminded of a Cobb & Co. driver whom I often met in my childhood days in western Queensland.
He was once asked by a lady passenger if he’d ever been caught in a bushfire.
‘Oh yes,’ he said, ‘I certainly ‘ave.’
‘And what did you do?’ asked the lady.
‘Well, ma’am, I tied a billy full of water to the back axle. Then I drove like ‘ell through the fire. When I reached the safety of the boundary gate, that water was just on the boil an’ ready for tea!’
— “Western Girl” in Bill Wannan’s Come in Spinner
PMT
What’s the difference between a woman with PMT and a terrorist?
You can negotiate with a terrorist.
— Allan & Barbara Pease in Why Men Lie and Women Cry
