
It must be nearly Thanksgiving! Apparently the turkey shooting is more organized than I thought - I had visions of people just wandering out into the woods to look for turkeys.
After 24 years in the United States, I find myself more American than I ever expected to be, yet not so American in many ways.

Swine flu? That's NOTHING compared to America's seasonal plague of political ads. They infect every TV, radio, billboard, mailbox, lawn and trick-or-treat bag. There's no vaccine. But at least Uncle Jay can explain how to understand them!Elections happen on Tuesday next week and even though there is very little difference between the two candidates for mayor of our town, (other than the fact that one is the incumbent and the other isn't,) I will be voting. Because I can, when for so many years I couldn't. Because it's the right thing to do - even though I think in the long run it probably won't make much difference in this particular local race :-(
Nappy Valley Girl's excellent blog post about Halloween has prompted me to write about it yet again, even though I wrote about it in 2006, 2007 and 2008!
Valentine’s Day: red and pinkI'd add blue and silver for Hannukah and red, green and black for Kwanzaa and that the holidays each have specific shapes associated with them too:
St Patrick’s Day: green
Easter: yellow (and pastel shades generally)
Memorial Day and Fourth of July: red, white and blue
Hallowe’en: orange, black and purple
Christmas: green and red.
Valentine’s Day: heartsThere are lots of other 'special days' that don't necessarily involve decorations that the kids learn about in school:
St Patrick’s Day: shamrocks
Easter: easter eggs, bunnies and chicks
Memorial Day and Fourth of July: stars and stripes (of course)
Hallowe’en: pumpkins and ghosts
Thanksgiving: turkeys
Hannukah: Menorahs and dreidels
Christmas: Christmas trees, holly and candy canes
Kwanzaa: kinara (candelabras)
Winter (if one is decorating for the season but avoiding specific holidays to be politically correct): snowmen and snowflakes
Arbor DayGiven the shortage of school holidays over here, they do help mark the passing of the year, even though most of them are not actually days off school. I would love to have the kids follow a 190 day English school year with regular holidays instead of the 180 days of school with most of the holidays in the summer. DD was horrified to hear that in the UK the kids are still in school till the middle of July or later. I bet she'd love to have a 2 week holiday at Christmas though! This year she'll be in school until 3 p.m. on December 23rd - what do you think of that, Auntie England?
Chinese New Year
Cinco de Mayo
Earth Day
Father's Day
Flag Day
Grandparents Day
Groundhog Day
Labor Day
Lincoln's Birthday
Mardi Gras
Martin Luther King Day
Mother's Day
Patriots Day
Presidents Day
Rosh Hashanah
Veteran's Day
Yom Kippur








Was woken this morning by shouts from DS:









I would have said that there was nothing like our local New England fairs in the UK but I bet if we visited the Cheshire County Show nowadays we would find it very similar to the show we went to last weekend. The Cheshire County Show was in somewhat of a decline when I was growing up and we never went to it but it has changed significantly in the past few years. It's just another reminder to me of how long I've been away from the UK and how careful I have to be when speaking about it. So much has changed over there in the last 24 years! The UK I left does not exist any more.
"No person shall deliver within the Commonwealth from outside the Commonwealth any blackcurrant (Ribes nigrum) plant, root, scion, seed or cutting."So no blackcurrant bushes in our backyard for the foreseeable future! Still, over the years I have gotten to like blueberries for what they are and appreciate that, unlike blackcurrants, you can eat them raw. In fact, I've decided that's mostly my favorite way of eating them, though I don't object if they're cooked into pancakes or muffins. Tonight's dessert was definitely one for blueberries though, not blackcurrants, as it did need raw fruit. However, I modified the original 'Real Simple' recipe slightly and the 0% fat Greek yogurt (instead of cream cheese and cream - thanks for the inspiration Mum!) along with the lemon zest (called for in the original) gave it some of the tartness I miss from blackcurrants.
This animal (for the sake of argument let's assume it was a bear) knew what was down there and actually did us a favour with its digging. It's hard to tell from the photo, but the hole is about 9 or 10 inches wide and a foot deep. At first glance it's just a hole, and rather a tidy one at that. In another location it would look like a hole dug for a new plant. But look more closely and you can see what the bear was digging for.
This was a nest of yellowjacket wasps. (Did you know that bears do like to eat wasps? They are a good source of protein!) We regularly have to get rid of paper wasp nests, but at least those are easy to spot as they're usually hanging from the eaves of the house or the roof of the kids' climbing structure. This was hidden between the side of the house and the hatchway to the basement and could have been there for ages without us spotting it. Incubating large quantities of vicious stinging insects! I know they're supposed to be beneficial because they eat other insects, but they are also extremely annoying. Had the bear not started digging to get at the grubs, it would have taken us much longer to discover the nest and spray it. Here's hoping the bear had a feast, and also that it decides not to return. I'd hate for it to be poisoned by eating the grubs and wasps that have now been sprayed. If it comes back through the yard anytime soon, I hope it will decide the compost bin (which is much further away from the house!) is a more promising place to snack!
When I first came to the United States I had no need of a driver's license. Instead I got what was called a "liquor ID card" after I discovered that my UK passport was not considered adequate proof of my age when I wanted to get in to a local bar!
I have misplaced my UK driver's licence. I'd kept the original slip of paper (because that's all it was - not even a photo on it) safe for almost 30 years, and then sometime in the last 2 years I lost it. Given that I don't live in the UK anymore and I don't even need my licence when I'm over there as my US one is good for 12 months, it doesn't really matter, except that it's a link to the United Kingdom I wasn't planning on giving up. It looks as though I'll have to though, as I can't get a replacement.