I say, would you care to join the Berkshire hunt?

Its very easy to be adamant about not adapting to American English when you first get here. Then you realize that no-one has a clue what you are saying and its sometimes much more efficient. Hear me out on this one.

You very quickly realize that the looks of bemusement when you talk are partly because you are talking so quietly, partly because your accent is so fucking posh (all British accents are posh. Even you, Birmingham), but mostly because they are working out what the words you just said actually mean based on the context. Three seconds after you finish they smile and realize that when you suggested they 'pop their bag in the boot'* you actually wanted them to stuff it in the trunk of your car. Most of the Americans I have met (from all over the US) have tried really hard with this - they know about these differences and they try hard to spot them before they become an issue. (Its the same with weights and measurements - they always try to convert fahrenheit to celsius, pounds to kilograms, and then back to stone, or miles to kilometres, then back to miles for us. Poor bastards. This half-arsed imperial/metric shit we got going on in the UK is ridiculous.)

You also frequently come across words that actually mean something else here. A cookie in the UK is a sort of fat squidgy biscuit, but a biscuit in the US is what Brits call a scone. And don't get me started on fanny and fag. 

Finally, you start to realize just how hilariously idiosyncratic some of our lexicon is. Once you've had to explain, amid hoots of laughter, what a 'hen do' is (the 'hen bit is fine, if a little odd when you look at the counterpart 'stag'. The most difficult bit is the 'do'. Try it, go on. Now, what if I throw in a casual 'hairdo', what does that do to your definition, eh? And if I lob in 'a bit of a to-do'? This language is ridiculous) you start to see the words you use from someone else's perspective. 

Describing what you did at the weekend as 'bugger all' ** suddenly feels downright Dickensian. And a bit dirty.

http://giphy.com/gifs/vJJBNWygJucuI

http://giphy.com/gifs/14up2cTMOGbXPO

Once you learn how to control your new power you can entertain and delight at any social gathering. Throw in a few choice examples of cockney rhyming slang (it matters not a jot that the first time I actually went to the East End was when I was 26) and innuendo*** and you'll have 'em in stitches. And if you want to go even deeper****, crack open some Polari. Its a lesson in history, politics, law and popular culture all rolled into some beautiful linguistic wordplay. And sex.

I do enjoy a bit of Profanisaurus action, too. This goes down best after a few drinks***** and the conversation naturally gets a bit fruity (just me?)

Of course we now touch on the difference between the American and British sense of humor, which is another discussion entirely, though we Brits do get a lot of pleasure out of a good pun******, or double entendre. We are the nation that brought the world Carry On films and Julian and Sandy, after all. 

I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing to the english stereotype in the US, but fuck it. If these berks don't have a scooby then who am I to give a friar tuck. Bollocks.

http://www.reddit.com/r/blackpeoplegifs/comments/1ezmp7/when_im_riding_dirty/

Index of double entendre

*At least buy me dinner first.

**Sounds like a standard Friday night. Ooh-er.

***In YOUR end-o.

****Like your mum.

*****Like your mum.

******Like your mum. And your nan.

The magic of Chicago popcorn

America has mostly got the whole flavour combination thing right, with a couple of notable exemptions. First of all, what's the beef with vinegar? Asking for vinegar to go on my chips* is like asking to take a shit on the bar. I am met with confusion and then horror. And I presume this is why Salad Cream** isn't a thing here too. Ketchup/Catsup or whatever the hell you call tomato jam is available in abundance (I, unlike the lad, am not a fan of ketchup), but I am denied the vinegar-y tastiness of the yellow ambrosia. 

That said, I don't like vinegar with everything - American pickles are CLEARLY superior. vinegar, salt water and, I think, sugar - thats a shit ton better than just vinegar. The same goes for beetroot - urgh - why does my delicious, sweet beet taste like off wine? Hmm? 

With that in mind, let me fuck with your tastebuds a little more. Salt & sweet - salted pretzels covered in chocolate, salted caramel ice cream, chic chip cookies with sea salt on top. Some Brits are down for this, and if you're prepared to give it a go, you won't be disappointed. Just note that if you're going to do S'mores with salted crackers ditch the Hershey's and go for Cadbury's. Shit, go for Nestle if you want, or dog turd - its all better than Hershey's.

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Hold on to your hats, people, and follow me down the rabbit hole as we explore the realms of sweet and...cheese-y.

We're not in Kansas anymore, Toto, we're in Chicago. I first tried the cheesy caramel popcorn megamix in Singapore and lived off it for 2 days (while I sat in my hotel room with the curtains closed dealing with jet lag), but I have since been informed that its actually a Chicago thing, which gives me a good reason to visit Chicago - these people have clearly got their shit together. 

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These are CHIPS. Oh hell yeah.
Cover that shit in vinegar then salt so
that it sticks to the soggy potato.

* Not fries - theres a fucking difference. Chips are fat and soggy and designed for soaking up vinegar or curry sauce. Fries are thin and crunchy and can have seasoning on.

**To my American chums - Remember, Salad Cream is not our version of Ranch dressing - its not just for putting on Salads. Its a delicious alternative to ketchup, can be used to make egg mayonnaise or tuna mayonnaise taste uh-mazing, and is fundamental in making thousand island sauce. All of these things make it waaaaay superior to ketchup. I appreciate I'm in the minority, even in the UK, but I hope that the more I harp on about it the more people will join the revolution!

These are fries. They are also good,
but different.  And if there's one thing
Sesame Street taught us its that things
can be equally as good even if they are
different. These are from somewhere
called Chilantro BBQ.

And I can't even deal with how yummy
these fries look, from Hideaway Lounge
in Cali.

These Arby's curly fries are also good.

Best. Airports. Ever. Part II

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/yjbmm.gif

Fed up of mincing through the airport security in your socks with your belt-less trousers round your
ankles? Then fly through Dallas, Texas - they give you little elasticated shower caps for your feet so you don't have to schlub around on their scabby floor. Bloody brilliant idea! You might still have your arse hanging out of your de-belted trews, but you won't have to brush floor-pepper off your sweaty feet before popping your shoes back on after security. Fanks, chaps!

Still being punished for being British...

My morning routine starts with getting up with the lad and getting a hot beverage on the go. Some days it'll be a pot of coffee in a cafetiere, some days it'll be a mug of tea. 

Yes, TEA. It turns out that it is/was a symbol of the British oppressors (the King and Queen drank it and John Adams declared it a 'traitor's drink' post war). Thats probably less of a 'thing' now - maybe after year's of 'aggressively seasoned' food the gentle flavor doesn't punch the remaining American tastebud up the bracket. 

http://www.reactiongifs.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/coffee.gif

Whatever - Americans' don't enjoy tea in the same religious way that Brits do. Back in the office in London we were making tea rounds 5 or 6 times a day (minimum). (Well, as my colleagues will tell you, I wasn't making these rounds. My tea was apparently shit. Hey, if you want not-shit tea, go make it yourself! Oh, you are. Why, yes please, I'd love a cup. No, I don't give a flying fuck whether the milk goes in first. And yes, I do still want 3 spoons of sugar in my enormous mug). 

So, I'm not a tea connoisseur, obviously, but I do like a nice mug of Lady Grey, and the lad likes a nice strong Tetley. Aside from the obvious issue of trying to source familiar teabags in the US, there are the peripheral issues. Sure, the US loves its coffee, but that generally comes out of a Nespresso machine, or out of a professional barista's trendily tattooed hands, so the functional white plastic kettle simply isn't a 'thing' here. The voracity with which Brits consume hot tea and granulated coffee is obscene, and we do so at our desks at work, so we need a little plastic device to heat water up in a tiny 'kitchenette' on our floor. There is no space for a hob and a whistling kettle - the impracticality is laughable! 

At home, however, I am busily following Polly's example and putting the kettle on (literally). 

Additionally, if you are consuming a double shot expressacino with whipped foam and caramel on top you DO NOT want to dip your giant doughy cookie in it. No need - its already a delicious beverage and a snack all in one. Convenient 

http://www.reactiongifs.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/bill-murray-drinks-coffee.gif

If, however, you are drinking milky water you DO need a dry biscuit to dunk in it and bring a little joy to the 11am tea round. And that brings me to the second peripheral issue. No tea means no dunkable biscuits. Try and find a Digestive, a Hobnob or a Nice biscuit and you will come a cropper. Try and find a chewy, doughy 'cookie' with chocolate ganache inside that is ENTIRELY inappropriate for dunking and you will be inundated with options. (That said - don't get excited by these delicious looking cookie mountains. They are often plastic and flavorless. They look like they are going to be epic and are sooooooo disappointing). In fairness, I am not a fan of Maryland cookies - they leave a weird film in my mouth, and the chocolate is average. Give me a Hobnob anyday. * 

The closest I've found is the Oreo, but if you deviate from the black or white oreos (watermelon, anyone? Birthday cake?) they get a bit too sweet and a bit too plastic. 

So, my morning routine (putting a whistling kettle on the hob and experimenting with a freaky flavored dunking tool) is a little odd, compared to what I'm used to. I guess there should be some repercussions to drinking the traitor's drink, but being forced to endure a poor excuse for a dunking biscuit is surely an excessive punishment.

* For a stunning graphical representation of dunking check this out, from Green Hat creative design company in the UK.

California foxes are ugly little bastards

So, I've been wondering where all the wildlife is here in NorCal. I've seen the hummingbirds (Ah-freaking-mazing) and the black squirrels and the odd wasp (I have no idea where those little bastards come from, but this is MY house, and, in lieu of a firearm I suck the little fuckers into the Dyson to die amid my hair balls) and I've read about the annual tarantula migration in the mountains round here (what fresh hell is this??), but I've not seen anything like the badgers or foxes you get in the UK. Until yesterday, when I saw the most heinous of creatures - like a giant fucking rat with balls of steel!

I was on my way back from the cheap-ass mall in Milpitas (don't judge! They have delicious plastic mango cake and Banana Republic with a permanent sale) and I had to swerve to miss what looked like a giant rat in the middle of the road. It was completely still, staring, with squinted eyes, into the scrubland on the roadside. As I passed he didn't flinch. A second car passed and again, he moved not a single muscle. I actually started to think it was a prank and that someone had placed a stuffed giant rat in the middle of the road. Then he trotted off into the sunset, the lights changed and I was left asking 'WTF?' very loudly in my car on my own.

http://www.lovetherunning.com/2014/02/stupid-opossum-you-cant-even-spell-your.html

Meet the opossum. Cheery little fella, hey?
It turns out that the possum is an adorable little munchkin who lives down under. The opossum is the yang to the Australian yin - the least adorable little rat-faced fuck I have ever seen in real life. Look at him. LOOK! His long pointy, freaky little face. Imagine a cat-sized rat. Urgh.


I was kinda hoping to see a raccoon or a bandicoot or a jackalope* (whatevs - we didn't learn much about North American wildlife in my school). I see them as akin to the fox or the badger - scruffy and cute from afar (though don't ever piss off a badger. They are mean. MEAN!!) See, these are like the little fellas that lived in our garden in London.

And they have the courtesy to scarper as soon as you come within 30 feet, so you never really have to deal with their nasty side.**

I literally never want to see one of these fuckers' on a bad day:

http://www.nps.gov/prsf/naturescience/virginia-opossum.htm

I'm serious. This little fella could take me down in a shot. Shudder.

* A little nod to any cryptozoology fans. Fun fact - the jackalope is a mythical antelope/jackrabbit hybrid that apparently roamed the American planes. Sightings of rabbits with 'antlers' have been recorded for centuries, and biologists now attribute these to the shope papilloma virus. Seriously, google some pics. Gross.

** I paint these little critters in a very positive light, despite the fact that they scream in the night like kidnapped babies, and tear the shit out of any rubbish bags you leave outside. The second of these habits can be forgiven though, because if this happens to you once and you are scraping old KFC from your driveway then you don't do it again. You buy a wheelie bin, or put your rubbish out on the morning of bin day. Don't you? Seriously?? Am I picking up your fucking rubbish off my driveway again, moron?? I know who you are - the fox has handily left some of your junk mail covered in old egg just behind the back wheel of my car. Don't worry. I've picked it all up and will post it all through your letterbox while you're at work, Steve at number 27. You're welcome.

A tax-related near-homicide averted

The lad and I live about 45 minutes outside of the big smug, so if we want to soak up some of that Prius-driving, sushi-eating hippy magic in a trendy bar-du-jour we have to get the Caltrain (and do the Cinderella dash about 10:30pm), get a taxi (and simper as we realize how much it cost the next morning) or book a hotel. 

One of the things that I am pretty awesome at (in addition to my navigation skills and my baking) is my ability to source cracking hotel deals in the best locations. Its not really that tough, with the arsenal of comparison sites at your fingertips, but it does take a bit of cross-checking. You check against google maps for location, check the cost of parking (very important in SF! $30 minimum. Its a freakin' joke!) and check tripadvisor. Weighing up all these fellas gives you a spanking deal 90% of the time.

Well, that was all from the UK. Now I'm in the US it should be the same, surely? SURELY??

Aw hell no! After spending 2 hours doing my usual trick and finding a splendid little boutique hotel on Union Square I click though to book and BOOM! The price jumps up by $50 to include the previously unincluded sales tax (an apparently arbitrary 14%) and the mystical 'city tax' of 2.5%. What? WHAT?? Why would I ever, EVER need to compare prices without tax. As I'm sure I've mentioned before I WILL ALWAYS NEED TO PAY THE TAX so why quote anything without it? 

And, even more frustratingly all the different comparison sites seem to include tax/exclude tax at random, so they seem to compare apples with oranges and, sometimes, badgers.

Having stamped my little feet at the fucking ridiculousness of the situation I suddenly realized that the site I had been looking at was now showing a 'total price' including all taxes. What had changed in the last 10 minutes? Had I missed something?

It turns out that I had spotted an awesome little trick that shows that these sites know their audiences. Most of them have a little flag and a title currency indicator somewhere near the top. When you select the stars and stripes it automatically chooses the greens. The interesting news is that if you select the little Union Jack and then change the GBP to USD it still shows the prices in dollars, but, in a nod to the sensibleness of the British consumer, it gives you the TOTAL price you're going to pay including taxes and fees. I nearly cried! All this extra information at my finger tips! No hidden charges! I could actually make value decisions with the numbers I had in front of my tired little peepers. God save the Queen!

So, in short, if you want to compare the total price in $$$ including taxes, make sure you select the Union Jack instead of the Stars and Stripes, and change the currency to USD.

Dr Johnsons' post-watershed word of the day

Dr Johnsons' post-watershed word of the day

Aw, hey! I've missed you guys! You're looking great! Have you been working out? Me? Oh, I've been a bit slack recently.









Geez, fishing for compliments, much?








Well, some of us would benefit from a bit more exercise and a bit less navel-gazing, Mr Gouty-pegs!








Fuck off - you know thats hereditary.







Anyhoo, my little wordsmiths, we're going a little bit naughty today, with three words that mean very different things depending on where you plan to use them! And I'm not just talking about pronunciation issues (I'm looking at you, the delightful Mickey Flanagan)! If you're a cunning linguist then you've probably come across 'fanny' before...

Fnar!!!

Grow up! You know what I meant. In the US this is a slang term for your bottom, but in the UK its actually slang for a lady's vajayay.







Yeah, I think you'll find we invented the fucking language, so I don't know how you guys got so
confused. You don't know your crack from your clunge!





Gross.
Secondly we have a US term that has very different connotations in the UK, bearing in mind the use of the word 'bum' as slang for 'bottom'.

bum-rush

verb

USinformal

Suddenly force or barge one's way into.





Pfffffffft!!








Seriously, grow up.

Finally, a rather offensive slang term for a homosexual man in the US, 'fag', can be heard throughout the sixth form common rooms of the British Isles, as young people ask to 'bum a fag' meaning to 'have one of your cigarettes'.







BAHAHAHAHA!!










Dammit! I can't take you anywhere!

'Dickhead' is the same both sides of the pond though, right?

Jerk.

Dollar bills, ya'll

It wasn't til I was in Starbucks and the creepy guy behind me told me not to playfully toy with my debit card that I realised how fucking easy it is to fraud-it-up in the US. Its actually laughable.

So, the Social Security number that all proper people in the US are given (DON'T get me started on that. Yes, I have a valid visa. No, I do not have an SSN because I am not really welcome in the US. Whatevs.) and it is super SUPER important. You can't share it with anyone. It is super secure, like a giant PIN. However, because it is so important and it represents all your important deets you have to wheel it out about 3 times a day to every pleb that works in a phone shop, insurance company and bank. Not so fucking secure now, eh?

And what is the reluctance to buy in to PINs on bank cards and credit cards?? I either have to sign for stuff (which, BTW, can be forged. And rarely does the shop clerk check that my scrawl actually matches the card) or I just swipe and go? Wha??? So, I give you my card (which, BTW, is no longer a thing in the UK. You don't ever have to hand your card to someone else. You jam it into the machine and you take it out - at no point does anyone else have their sticky little fingers on it) and then you take as much money as you want without me checking it first? Um, no.

Finally, the cheque (spell it properly! We're not 5 years old - it doesn't have to be spelt phonetically) situation.

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<<Bites finger to stop oneself from laughing out loud>>

www.reactiongifs.com

When I transfer funds online from my account to someone elses the bank still has to PHYSICALLY POST A CHEQUE....BAHAHAHAHAHA!! Sorry, I can't even type it without cracking up. I have nothing to say about this, except that perhaps some of the US banking bigwigs might want to shadow a grown up bank sometime soon?

Travel winge 9

So, after a couple of months in Europe visiting family and friends and having my washing done for me (thanks Dad!) and being generally pampered I am now back in the US after a monster of a flight combo. I am tired from the travel, jetlagged and generally a bit ratty, and even the slightest thing is pissing me off.

Philly airport terminal really did cheer me up (nice shops, pretty good food selection), but I do have a few little things that, if everyone could take note, would make my travel much more pleasant. Are you listening, fat woman on scooter who stank of piss? And you, oblivious twat who trod on my be-sock-ed toes? And you, squawking group of east coast hags??

Queuing twats.

1. We ALL want to get on the fart tube as quickly as possible, and the best way to do that is to sit the fuck down and wait til the lady calls your seat number. Until then, don't crowd round the gate like they're giving away free donuts. They're not. I know you want to make sure that there is space for your laughably vast cabin bag, but, here's an idea, take a smaller fucking bag!

2. Man who trod fully on all my socky toes while I sat on the floor against the wall charging my phone: you are a dick. How can you be completely oblivious to an entire (fairly tall) human, squishing herself against a wall with her bag so as not to be in the way? You trod on me like you genuinely didn't see me, and then looked back a few seconds later and appeared genuinely surprised to see me. Dick.

Yoga twat.

3. Why are you doing yoga in a main thoroughfare at the airport. Surely the man who approached you and asked if you were ok while you spazzed out trying to get your ankle over your head should have been a clue that this is not a normal thing to do in an airport. Stop it.

4. And the biggest winge: US Airways - how come I paid you to get me and my luggage from LHR to SFO and it appears that I am doing half the work? Hmm? I had to pickup all 3 fucking huge cases (that I paid extra for, might I add) at Philly airport and lug them, sans trolly, past your fat ground staff to then place them on another conveyor belt and wave them off to SF?? What exactly have I paid for? I want approx $47.52 of my money back, please. Besides, your chubby airport staff could do with a good workout. Just sayin'.

All of that aside, Philly airport was rather nice - they had the same rocking chairs as Dallas, which is a nice touch (although they could do with a few more), plenty of places to charge me gadge and mini exercise bikes for you to get a workout in before you board your next flight. They were like little unicycles on stands. Nice idea.

The wifi was down for most of my time there, which was disappointing, although searching for another network I did notice that I was travelling with a local political celeb. Nice.