Gillan Gibbons Pardoned After Profuse "Mea Culpa"

Gillan Gibbons, the British teacher, who was almost executed for allowing her students to name a teddy bear Mohammad was pardoned today by Sudan President Omar al-Bashir, after much groveling by the British Embassy.

To most people, naming a teddy or pet after a great prophet is not insulting. However, the incident in Sudan also reminded me of the time we almost had a mutiny in our family when we named a puppy “Duchess.” It seems that no one knew that my father-in-law always called his wife “Duchess” in private. She was not a great prophetess, but she took great offense to the name we chose for our puppy, like becoming a bit of a parseltongue, threatening to move out of the lasagna zone or never visiting at all, sticking pins in her voo doo doll then calling me up every day to see if everyone at our house was still alive… Gillan Gibbons is very lucky.