Ontario is full of lakes and rivers, attracting people to hell around in motorboats and on jet-skis in summer, and in winter to venture onto the ice to fish, often using snowmobiles and even pickup trucks. Every winter, the Ottawa papers report incidents in which the ice gives way under these vehicles, dumping their occupants into the briskly running current under the surface. Every winter, I wonder what these folks use for brains. Sometimes they are rescued, but they usually drown.

Sea-sickness is interesting. My Dad, a Royal Navy veteran, was always miserably ill for the first 48 hours at sea; how he stuck it for six years of war I cannot imagine. Years later, when the film of "The Cruel Sea" came out, he learned that he could be seasick on dry land. The opening credits of that film roll over footage of the corvette's rail rising and falling against the horizon, as the waves heave in the background. After about ten seconds of watching this scene, he was overcome by nausea and had to bolt for the door. Mum found him vomiting into the gutter outside.