American Dreams

By the time you read this, we should all have landed in Seattle, picked up the enormous hire car and be partway through spending our first night sleeping in it at the side of the road. Hello America!

Road-tripping is partly fantastic, because we get to go basically wherever the mood takes us. It is also crap for just the same reason. With only 36 days of car, how on earth can we decide what we want to do with our time?

Luckily, Mummy et al have spent a nice long time making a list of all the things that must be done in America, compiled from cool things and typical American life they have seen on TV:

1. Watch a cheer-leading competition (cheer leaders at other sporting events do not count)

2. Go to a frat party.

3. Go to a self-help/improvement lecture (Get Rich Quick, How to Attract Women in 10 Easy Steps, etc)

4. Find Bigfoot/see geysers.

5. See World’s Largest Ball of String.

6. See site of World’s Biggest Cheese (now gone).

7. Go to a Vegas Casino.

8. Go to a rodeo.

9. Secretly be spies/witches in spare time, with hilarious consequences.

10. Storm-Chasing.

11. Alligator-Hunting.

12. Eat some steak.

13. Go to a yard sale (and buy something).

14. Correct their spelling.

15. Mutilate bodies (choice between piercing, tattoo or cosmetic surgery).

16. Comic Book/Star Trek/similar convention (in costume).

17. LAN party.

18. Drive-In Movie.

19. One of those big sand competitions in the desert.

20. Walk in Memphis.

21. Spend at least one night in California.

22. Watch NASA launch a rocket.

23. Go to a service station and be very British to get free stuff. Also, shower.

24. Graceland/Dollywood.

25. Hide and seek in huge mall.

26. Eat hotdog on street whilst shouting at someone for no good reason.

27. Find someone who thinks they have been abducted by aliens (extra points for successfully carrying off a date with them).

28. Man carving enormous rock thing, possibly man? (S to clarify)

29. See a beauty contest (ideally not children).

30. Watch filming of Jerry Springer/Oprah.

31. Sit under a bridge in Los Angeles and contemplate life.

Free Coffee*

If there’s one acclimatisation to North American culture which had already made a big impact on our lives before arriving, it’s advertising desensorisation. The flashy banners, singing people, ridiculous promises and content-free personal-opinioniated endorsements (”I believe that Actimel helps my family lead a healthier lifestyle”) have taught us that really, in the long run, it’s just not worth the effort.

Which is why when a few days ago I saw a person-sized fake cup of McDonald’s coffee billowing dry ice onto the street, I simply thought “Hmm, I wonder how much that costs to run per hour?” rather than actually giving a second thought to the slogan plastered across it: Free Coffee*.

Clearly, it’s not going to be free coffee, is it? It’s going to be * With $10 purchase at participating restaurants only or * One voucher redeemable per customer, available for purchase at your local branch or maybe even * When you take up employment with us, minimum contract length 18 months subject to availability. What self-respecting chain would actually give away free coffee for no good reason, and in exchange for nothing?

Luckily, L is much cheaper than the rest of us, so she had a good look at it. And, to our shock, the little star of disappointment led simply to the phrase “Limited time only”. This couldn’t be true, so we had a look at the website. Nothing doing there. It wasn’t until I walked away with my free Arabic coffee in hand this morning that I could actually believe it.

Free coffee!

From any of the many stores!

Many free coffees!

It is most pleasing. For reference, it’s not very nice. But still much nicer than microwave coffee, which has been my staple drink as of late.

* Subject to reader finding and restraining me for a period of no shorter than 60 minutes, valid until 31st May 2009, please see underside for full details.

Wish You Were Here - Toronto

I bet you’re just itching to be in Toronto with us, eh? And not just to poke me into updating more often. Good news; using the power of freon and imagination,, you can create the Canada experience in your very own home! Just follow these simple steps and create the travelling experience for cheap, and without having to travel thousands of miles:

1. Buy a Brita Filter and put it in the fridge. Canadian water is crystal clear and freezing cold. If possible, try to force the air you breathe through the filter too, to render it completely tasteless.

2. Open the freeze door sporadically. For no apparent reason, you will be occassionally blasted with a hit of bitterly cold air whilst in Toronto. Ideally, have a friend open the freezer door for you, so that you’re hit when you least expect it.

3. Strap ice packs to your feet. If you can still move your toes, you’re not trying hard enough. Your flesh should be so cold that it’s red-raw and peels off during the night.

4. Rub salt into your lips. This will achieve the correct layer of irreperable chapping.

5. Cover all your food in maple syrup. Yes, everything. See those baked beans? Wouldn’t they be much tastier in maple syrup rather than tomato sauce? How about that ham; that can take a bit of syrup. Oh, and those scrambled eggs. In fact, cover everything in maple syrup unless…

6. If it looks like something that should be covered in syrup, fry it in eggs. Mmmm… Cinnamon muffin. That could use a bit of syrup. WRONG. If the foodstuff in question is sweet, you need to cut it in bits, dip it in egg whites and fry it. You can put maple syrup over the top of it later, if you’re desperate.

7. Reprice your tins. Go to McDonalds and find the price of a normal meal. Halve this. Go home, and write this number on any cans of value food you have in the house. This is how much it will cost now. If you happen to be rich enough to own anything not value branded, double the price. If you open one of these tins, pay the newly-ascribed price. Bread should cost £3. After a day or so, seriously consider fast food as the cheapest way to live.*

8. …then add Tax. What, you thought that was a lot to pay for things? You haven’t even added tax yet! Everything has tax lurking over it, ready to stick itself to your ‘bill’ at the counter. A minimum of 5%, easily 15% in most places. Don’t even think about buying alcohol; you simply can’t afford it. For a truly authentic experience, get your friend to write three letters on the bottom of your receipt, then add an arbitrary number which seems to be no particular percentage of the price you were expecting to pay. Then add 5%.

9. Draw maple leaves on all your possessions. Yes, all of them. That hat needs a leaf, and that top, and those glasses (scratch it into the lens). What about your shoes - are they leafed? Your car? Ideally, the leaf should be red, but you can get away with blue if you’re a secret Tory.

* The exception to this rule is BBQ sauce, which costs 10p for a big bottle. Try to use this to bulk up every other food you possess.

Greg does science

Hello everyone!

Today, Mummy took me to the Ontario Science Centre, which was great! There were lots of kids there, but I managed to stay out of harm’s way and Mummy only got barged out of the way once or twice.

I really like science museums, and this one had plenty of hands on things to do. Some of it seemed too incredible to believe, but it didn’t take me long to discover why…

Me Learning the Secrets of Science*

It’s a bit fast I’m afraid, because Mummy fails a bit.

* Available for 30 days only

L’idiot du Village chez moi

Happy St George’s Day!

After our fantastic experience in the Morrocan Pub in Zambia with the fake Irish-folk band (fake folk, not fake Irish) on St Patrick’s Day, today was a great day to find a similar experience in one of the many English pubs in Toronto!

British pubs, you say? You must mean Irish pubs. They’re everywhere. Well yes, they are, but so are English ones over here! And probably provide the same insight into English culture as Irish pubs do to Irish culture.

Mummy’s current favourite is the Village Idiot Pub, which has excelled itself in bringing across four beers and one cider from England! Yep, you can’t escape from Boddington’s Cream Ale here, nor from Marston’s ever-present Pedigree. And they have Blackthorn. Yummy, yummy Blackthorn.

But what do English people eat? Fish and chips, it seems. Only it’s served with “fries” over here. And for some reason they’ve decided to make the batter using Steam Whistle, the minging lager of Canadian choice. Oh, and Shepherd’s Pie (served with fries). Many many fries to be had.

A lovely, traditional English pub experience. Oh, but don’t get carried away with your trans-Atlantic customs. Should you find yourself standing at the bar, ready to order a round, turn around and flee! Your actions will forever break the billing system, confuse the waitresses and cause the greater part of the patrons to stare. And there’s nothing so humiliating as having an Irishman have to explain to you how to use a pub correctly.

Let’s Go Marlies

I’m in Canada! It’s a bit nippy up here, especially coming just after Africa! Mummy et al keep being mistaken for Australians because they “look too tanned to be from England”, and I am trying to grow a nice thick winter coat. A few photos of Canada should have appeared by now, too.

Naughty Zebra

Oh dear, I left it rather a whle before updating didn’t I?  Sorry people!  I have no excuse really, apart from rushing about in the UK trying to sort out all my jobs before fleeing the country again.

It was very nice to be back in Britain for a bit, to be able to find what I wanted in shops I knew provided said items at the best prie, and to communicate with people and have some sort of idea what they were going on about.  At least Canada will be less of a culture shock, right?

Apologies again - better updates soon.

Bad Photographs

Living in a hole for weeks on end certainly produces some bad pictures of yourself, but here’s the best so far:

Remember kids; take care of that cough medicine.

Cannibalism

It turns out that cannibalism is rife in Africa. But can I really be held to blame, when it was oh-so-tasty?

One of the great things about ex-German colonies is the surfeit of meat, which comes in all forms, from all sides, at all times. The sausages are damn good, but nothing so far has beaten Joe’s Beerhouse, an up-market pub which serves the very best of African game.

For less than a tenner, you can eat an enormous lump of game including springbok, crocodile, ostrich, kudu, gemsbok (oryx; the very tastiest game) and, naturally, zebra!* Here’s a photo of me eating one of my compatriots:

Apologies for the lighting problems, but Mummy was trying to avoid being thrown out.

Nyom! Zebra!

* All of these meats also come smoked in delicatessans.

Green Shorts!

Oh my God, there are real shops in Namibia! They sell real clothing, for suitable prices, and shoes and hair brushes and more than one kind of shampoo!

Mummy et al all went a bit crazy upon discovering this, especially in the wonderful Mr Price. Despite only trying them on as a ludicrous item for a laugh, Mummy ended up coming home with amazing green shorts!

She also bought the most inappropriate travel shoes ever: brown, very high wedge shoes. They weigh far more than any other shoe, and have no real use. Still, who can argue for £4?