English Life...

Well, I've been living in England now for 4 months and I feel I've been here long enough to write about how my life and lifestyle have changed since I moved here.

LANGUAGE

I know, some of you are thinking, "Language?!? How can that be a change when they speak English in both the States and in England? Well, certain words are not only spelled differently but have different meanings here. For instance, "pants" in the US can be used to refer to "slacks", "jeans" or "trousers". "Pants" here in the UK means "panties" or "undies". Also, they spell funny here. They don't put 2-"Ls" at the ends of words like "fulfill" and they put "Ss" where "Zs" should be, like in "spiritualise" (see, right there my word processor flagged the word cuz it's WRONG!!!) and "conceptualise". They also say and write a lot of "-ed" words w/ a "t" instead, as in "spelt" and "learnt" which is just infantile in my book. I mean, what's wrong w/ "spelled" and "learned"? With a "t" they sound so harsh, like the word is German or something. (Y'know how German is: no matter what they say it sounds like they're cussing you out!!) And of course there's "Mum" as opposed to "Mom" but really when they say "mum" it sounds very much like "mom" to me.

That leads me to another thing about the language difference . . . I've dubbed a great many of these "fine English speakers" MUSHMOUTHS because when they talk, that's exactly what it sounds like . . . MUSH!!! I can't understand a word some of these people say!!! It is so garbled, almost like they just came from the dentist who put gauze in their mouths . . . everyday. The word "three" becomes "free"; the word "other" becomes "uvah"; words that dare have a "t" sound in the middle of them DON'T anymore so "later" becomes "lay uh". It's crazy. Hannah had a soccer coach (and YES I called it SOCCER, not FOOTBALL b/c the term "soccer" is slowly but surely catching on over here.) who neither of us could understand. Why? Because when you take Mushmouth and combine that w/ yelling simple instructions down a field or a court, not even God could understand that crap! BLECCHH!!!

PEOPLE

Well, the people are ok, not the greatest but ok. The adults actually seem like they know how to be polite and somewhat thoughtful, y'know that stereotypical Englishman mentality and politeness? It is beyond me how they wind up that way. It's like they go away for a while after their "high school / early college" years, get processed through a machine and are all of a sudden super polite, very proper individuals. I say that b/c the kids and ESPECIALLY the teens are the worst I've ever come across in my life! I remember the crappy kids in school growing up and NONE of them were as bad as these little TURDS here!! I HATE the kids in this country!! The younger ones are ok but even they border on Little-Turd-dom! The kids here in this country definitely lead an accelerated life! And we thought kids in the States were growing up too fast! That ain't nothin' compared to here! AND I live in Brighton which is NOT London where the kids are FAR WORSE!!!!!!! Kids in Hannah's class and some in the year below her have cell phones! 8- and 9-year-olds w/ cell phones!! What the cow?!? Oh, and here they have no qualms about kids going to other kids' houses during the week for sleepovers and play dates during the school year! That took me by total surprise!! And they are very convincing with the things they say! No matter what it is they will have you convinced it's the best thing for you and it's perfectly alright w/ their parents. Yeah, kids do that in the US and probably world-wide (where it's relevant, anyway) but these kids here are much better at it. In the states, you KNOW that's what they're doing but here the level of intelligence (i.e. street smarts) and the confidence w/ which they speak is a much more effective and stealthy combo! It's unsettling!

But, getting back to the polite and proper adults, yes, it MUST be true that they got shipped off to some remote part of the Isle of Man and were duly processed into the kind, etiquette-minded creatures I see before me today. The thing about that is that it seems fake to me. When people are "too nice" or "too polite" I get little alarm bells ringing in my head and have to wonder about their sincerity. Of course, I was raised in Texas where people are not so consistent w/ their niceties and it was much easier to tell the "baddies" from the "goodies". Here, at least for me, there is a cultural barrier that makes it a tad more difficult to read people. In general, though, everyone (adult-sized and up) seems pretty nice and congenial.

And the thing we've all heard about the English and their tea . . . it's true! These people love them some tea, boy, lemme tell ya! Their thing is, "Pop over for a cuppa!" I love that! A "CUPPA"! When we first moved in and the movers were unloading the trucks, Mark, the "ringleader", was "joking" with me saying, "Have you got a kettle?" and, once he'd found the mugs, "Hey, Paul, look what I found!! Mugs!! What goes in mugs??!? TEA!!" He was funny although I had a difficult time understanding him at first because, well, the whole MUSHMOUTH thing and also I was so TOTALLY not expecting him to ask me about my "kettle". I don't do KETTLES!! If he only knew to whom he was talking!!! OMG!! As a matter of fact, I'd almost forgotten the difference b/w a teapot and a kettle so when he actually found our TEAPOT in one of the boxes I was a little nervous and perplexed. I kept thinking, "I can't put that on the stove and boil water in it, can I? Is that a KETTLE? I thought that was a TEAPOT!! Maybe it's some strange English dialect that I'm not aware of!" Stuff like that. They were a fun bunch, that crew. I felt sorry for Mark, though. He was the smallest of the bunch, short and slight but he could hold his own. Our mattress is a "California King" I think which means it's really thick as well as a big king. Our bedrooms are all upstairs and our stairwell is VERY NARROW!!! So narrow, in fact, that the designer of the house built the banister so that it could be removed in order to get anything upstairs!! The mattress barely fit through the doorway leading from the living area to the kitchen area which is right where the stairs are.



It took all 3 of the workers plus me helping from the bottom to SQUEEEEEEEZE the mattress up through the narrow stairwell. At one point, none of us thought we'd get it up there. It took us 15 minutes of pulling and straining and crushing poor Mark between the mattress and the wall (and sometimes the stairs themselves) to finally get it upstairs. Luckily it was only going to the first floor (here they call the "second floor" the "first floor" and the "first floor" the "ground floor"). Our house has 3 floors and the ground floor is split-level. The mattress made it in one piece but it was very slightly ripped in a few places. At first I thought the ripping sound was the ceiling about to crack from the pressure of the mattress. That's how tight a squeeze it was! Mark asked me how long we planned on living here and was VERY relieved when I told him for many years! He said he'd keep note of our address and find some very qualified people to come get our mattress OUT!! He was staying clear of the whole thing!!

That's all for now. I have more to say about English life but it will have to wait until later. I have things to get done before the day is out! Love to you all!!!