Bambi Encounter

I had the radio on the other day and heard the words; "animal encounter" and "stimulus money" in the same news story.
"Animal encounter." My thoughts immediately turned to a vacation in Florida a few years back and the disappointment from certain family members when I chose not to spend $79 a head for a 30 minute swim with Flipper. Everyone else thought it was a good deal, but seven of us times $79 for 30 minutes plus souvenir photos, tee shirts, dolphin safe tuna sandwiches…
Well, it was a good deal more than I cared to spend at the time.
My kind of animal encounter is the San Diego Zoo’s 1,800-acre wild animal park. You ride around the perimeter in the little open-air train and watch African Plains animals in a relatively natural setting. It’s great, I loved it, and the kids loved it too.
"Animal encounter." The words bring to mind soft music, soothing calm and gentleness like tiny kittens or warm puppies. Imagine my surprise when I learned that "animal encounter" is the new term for hitting and wounding, if not killing an animal as well as quite possibly yourself. This is what was once called "AN ACCIDENT!"
Yes, UDOT (Utah Department of Transportation) applied for and received federal stimulus funds to build a fence in Parley’s Canyon so that our 2,654 pound Ford hurtling down Parley’s at 65 (er uh, 70?) miles an hour doesn’t have an "encounter" with Bambi and convert the deer boy into 300 pounds of venison burger!
I’m not against the project. In my youth I came close to having an "animal encounter" when horses got loose on I-15 one night. Several years later a German Shepherd leapt in front of my German car and in addition to killing himself, killed my wallet to the tune of $1,400 American dollars.
So it’s a good project. We can argue the merits or lack thereof of the Stimulus Bill another time. Bambi probably thinks it’s a good project too. I just think that the English language is quite nice and words mean things. So it’s not an "animal encounter", IT’S AN ACCIDENT!