Halloween

I needn't tell you that Halloween is big in the US. But look at the size of the pumpkin one of Laurence's colleagues spotted on the highway:

President Obama

Well, the votes have all been cast and counted, and the results are clear: Barack Obama has been elected President of the United States by a landslide.

No, you haven't slept through the entire 4th of November. This was the outcome of the mock election held at my children's elementary school today.

The Sound of Silence

One of the disappointing sides of autumn and the onset of winter is that it has robbed me of one of my favourite pursuits.

Sitting on the kerb waiting for the school bus to arrive, I would close my eyes, filter out the everpresent background hum of cars and wallow in the chirping of the crickets, croaking frogs, chattering chipmunks and rasping cidadas. For me it is the sound of summer, and recalls holidays in the sun, and more particularly southern France; a meditative, soothing, almost primeval lullaby that I could easily immerse myself in for hours.

In August this chirping, croaking, chattering and rasping was sometimes so loud that were were convinced it couldn't possible be natural and could only be caused by the overhead power lines.

Now all I have is the occasional honking V of Canada geese flying past. The rest is silence - and of course cars.

Party Colours

I was recently surprised to learn that the American Democratic Party, the marginally more left-wing of the two major political parties in the United States, is associated with the colour blue, while the more conservative Republicans have red as "their" colour despite the fact that it is typically associated with socialism, communism and other left-of-centre causes.

I was even more amazed to discover this weekend that neither political party had a standard colour until as recently as eight years ago (indeed the colour-coding is still unofficial). It wasn't until the 2000 election that NBC journalist Tim Russert decided at random to refer to "red states" and "blue states" when talking about traditionally Republican and Democratic strongholds respectively - and the classification has stuck.

Ironically, therefore, there must be right-wing extremists across America who are hoping the country will go red tomorrow, while diehard Democrats live in fear of the red peril.

Local News

I know you can't wait for the latest news from the Crime Watch section of my local paper, the Beacon. So without any further ado, I give you the low-down on our crime-riddled community in the immortal words of ace reporter D.W.:

   A woman living at a home on (...) told police that she left home about 1pm Oct 15 and discovered a small amount of money missing when she returned at 3pm.
   The woman left a couple of doors open at the home. When the woman returned, she noticed that the doors were slightly open.
   Inside, she saw a kitchen drawer open and an air compressor moved from its previous location. The only thing she noticed missing was about $2-$3 in loose change that had been on a television set.

Car Alarms

One great thing about America - if you're a driver, that is - is that most cars have alarms, and most car doors are locked and unlocked by remote control. So when you get out of your car, you simply press the "padlock" button once to lock the car, and a second time to prime the alarm. Cool, eh? Well, not entirely.

You see, what they don't tell you at cross-cultural training (yes, I've done that too), is that whenever people prime their alarm, the car horn sounds briefly to confirm this. I can't tell you how often I've jumped out of my skin thinking some SUV was bearing down on me, when actually the driver probably hadn't even noticed I was there. Even my own car still gets me spooked about 6 times out of every 10 - and it's me operating the remote!

Having more or less got used to this car-horn-does-not-equate-with-danger scenario, I now face a far greater peril: getting run down because I ignore a polite appeal to get out of the way of a fast-approaching, four-wheeled gas-guzzler.

You Are What You Eat

Yesterday we all went out to celebrate our quarter year in the Land of Opportunity.

Food is always a wonderful gauge of cultural assimilation. I've seen sweet and sour frogs' legs on several Chinese restaurant menus in Paris, and you can get curried sausages at chippies across Berlin. I've even come across (no pun intended) curry- and rhubarb-and-custard-flavoured condoms in a vending machine at Gatwick Airport. Last night's trip to the California Pizza Kitchen was a superb example of such culinary eclecticism.

Although we did not have the classic spaghetti with meatballs which most Americans will swear is genuinely Italian, our exquisite meal was definitely a case of adapting foreign cuisine to suit local palates. All of us had a pizza; my daughter Anna had a Hawaiian, my son Tom a barbecue chicken pizza, Laurence's had a pile of guacamole on the top, while I had a Thai chicken pizza that featured the following classic Mediterranean ingredients: beansprouts, peanuts and sesame sauce.

All thoroughly delicious, but I do wonder what Italian tourists must make of it.