“Look Ma, I can swing all by myse-OHSHIT!”– Photo Credit: BillBl (https://www.flickr.com/photos/billbliss/) — Subject to CC Attribution 2.0 Generic Copyright.

Back in March of 2012, my wife and I were in the kitchen cooking chili. (And not just any chili, but ultra spicy, bowel shivering, anus puckering death chili.)

During the course of the food preparation, we struck up a conversation about German vocabulary. Specifically, she taught me how to say the word “television,” which is “der Fernseher.” Literally, “Fernseher” translates into English as “far seer.” I nodded and stroked my chin, and we both took a moment to enjoy the blatantly obvious logic behind this discovery. Then my wife smiled and gestured with a large wooden spoon in her hand, swirling it in the air like a magic wand of knowledge, declaring:

“I like when we speak German together so that we are both learning. Like Tarzan and Jane.”*