Glad you enjoyed it here in America.
I don't get the fascination with accents myself, but then I'm Southern, I probably sound like a hick without meaning to (I do say ain't and ya'll).
And yeah, we do like bigger portions than the rest of the world. I don't know if it's true or not, but I think the origins of that had something to do with people going overboard on food once they could actually afford it again after The Great Depression and lots of food just got ingrained into the culture that way. Not sure though.
Start publishing on
DD Comics!
Advertise with us
Comic Talk and General Discussion *
Impressions of America
Haha! It's nice to hear what you thought. I've lived in New Jersey and Texas (Texas for most of my life) and not too long ago, I went to San Diego. I agree with the comment that California is sort of like a different country; definately different from Texas (things seemed so much neater there and more organized. For example, because Texas is so huge and there's a lot of landfill space, we never recycle or anything so people don't conserve as much here).
And you thought there were a lot of flags?? Haha, come to Texas and you'll see the American flag *and* Texas flag everywhere. This is the only state I know of that tons of people know the state flag and state pledge. I guess like California, we are like another country as well ^^;
I wonder how you felt about the weather there; that's one thing I love about California. Awesome weather!
Denny'sGod, I wish people didn't count that as an American establishment.
It's an embarrasment to my generation.
I'm inclined to agree with this. Honestly, the first time I ate at Denny's was when I went to San Diego, haha. And I hated it >_>
I also find them to be overly cautious at times and there seems to be this never ending quest to make things as idiot proof as humanly possible.
Haha! Because you can get sued for *everything* here. There was a guy who sued because he witnessed an accident and he claimed that it traumatized him xD. I have a lipgloss that says "Do not apply on eyes"
I'd probably go the states if I could afford it. But depends on which one. I'm from a political family.
I've known a few 'Merics, though. One of my college tutors, one of the first year student in my second year of that college (He then went back to Vermont) and then a girlfriend of one of my then friends travelled to Scotland all the way from Virginia and then he, she and I spent about two hours on the 204 First Bus to Lomond Shores.
Poor girl didn't know what a cheese toastie was…
One thing I'm very fascinated by is the (visibly) not as strong focus on class in the US compared to the UK. Sure. There's poor people and rich people but I think there's some kind of subconscious mutual knowledge that almost every person from there is less than five generations away from an immigrant. Race seems more of an issue than class. And it's no wonder. The remaining people are less than 5 generations away from slaves or slave owners.
Politics look about the same. The politicians have whiter and straighter teeth. But at least ours usually have their own (Shwing!).
All you have to do is talk "middle class" in the UK and you get a bunch of people in hoods burning shit outside your house.
Usually your own car.
I wonder how you felt about the weather there; that's one thing I love about California. Awesome weather!Cold, chilly and humid :(
When I flew in there was an un-ending sea of flat cloud coating the place. On the first day the sun came through a few times and it suddenly got sweaty and humid, but for all the other days it was just cool… The only other time I saw sun and blue sky in the US was one day in Anaheim. That day was nice and warm :)
But I want to lipgloss my eyes!I also find them to be overly cautious at times and there seems to be this never ending quest to make things as idiot proof as humanly possible.Haha! Because you can get sued for *everything* here. There was a guy who sued because he witnessed an accident and he claimed that it traumatized him xD. I have a lipgloss that says "Do not apply on eyes"
Yes, idiotproofing was something to see. It wasn't on everything though, just some things.
I love all the ads for prescription only pills where they ask you to beg your doctor to prescribe you them for things, then go on to tell you that they can actually make all your problems worse or even kill you! o_O
Apparently all anti-depression medication makes people want to kill themselves…
Most ads on TV are weird lifestyle things… Like living with debit in various ways, credit, credit, credit! Loans… Saving money on car insurance! Anti-chaffing cream for fat people! Vaginal cleaning solutions!
I'm not making any of that up.
Another strange thing is how movies and TV shows are promoted EVERYWHERE. Even on train tickets… Stuff completely unrelated to movies in any way with be covered in promotions for some film that's not even out yet… Receipts you get from somewhere, a broacher for local sites… anything.
——————
As to class-
Didn't see any evidence of class at all. But then it might not be something readily apparent or even regional. I know it'd be hard to see evidence of the class thing in Australia, but it's there in some subtle ways.
Didn't see any racial problems in the US where I was. All were equal ^_^
That entire post just reeked of disturbing similarities to the UK.
I have eaten quite a few imported foods from the US since they were either sold over here and taken off the shelves for one reason or another or probably won't ever be exported.
I mean, we only just recently got Mountain Dew this year and Gatorade in '07. I can't wait a decade for Lucky Charms to follow suit.
And I have no idea why Nerds are available in Germany but over here we have a cheap ripoff to make up for their absence.
You used to be able to go into any corner shop in the late 90s and pick up a few boxes but sometime around 2000 they just vanished off the face of this small surface area of the Earth.
I looked up some possible causes but all I get is "They were full of sugar!"
A lot of other things are. I just don't get it!
Yep. Complete with little balloon model people.That entire post just reeked of disturbing similarities to the UK.They market anti-chafe cream for fat people on TV in the UK too? o_O
But I'm sure the US doesn't have ads with baths and umbrellas made out of sanitary towels with little bumper cars riding on top of them to represent where the blood goes or ads for contraceptive pills with sperm balloons.
Yep. Complete with little balloon model people.That entire post just reeked of disturbing similarities to the UK.They market anti-chafe cream for fat people on TV in the UK too? o_O
But I'm sure the US doesn't have ads with baths and umbrellas made out of sanitary towels with little bumper cars riding on top of them to represent where the blood goes or ads for contraceptive pills with sperm balloons.
o_O That's so odd! And I thought that the birth control and erectile dysfunction ads here in America were awkward, haha. The commercials in the UK did strike me as a little weird from what I remember. But then again, when I went there I was visiting family in London, so I didn't get to watch a lot of TV.
Those ads finished recently. But the sanitary towel company have released a new one with a giant one strapped onto a mechanical bull.
The slogan is "Have a happy period!" as well…
How the hell can you make blood and flesh dripping out of a woman's crotch for a week a happy experience?
Nice to hear you enjoyed the US for the most part! Especially California (my native state :))! Since you've already experienced the painful process of consuming a Denny's "meal," might I recommend for next time trying a place called Chili's? Better quality and still pretty affordable!
Also, I think you had it lucky with the whole not running into cars thing…it's probably the exact opposite in LA/SF.
I'm sure you also noticed the fact that "meteorologists" are a bit of a joke in Cali. I almost feel like the fact that they mention a chance of rain, ever, is because they get tired of throwing the little sun icon on the screen. Come on, we all know it's going to be sunny the next day. And the day after that.
One thing you also might find interesting - from the sound of it, you didn't travel that far north - but Northern Cali is almost like a different world compared to the Southern area.
Oh, and since you visited California, now you'll be labeled as "guy who has personal relationships with all the celebrities and guy that does nothing but surf all day." ;)
Come on, we all know it's going to be sunny the next day. And the day after that.lol!
In two weeks: 2 days of sun. One of those was only for about half an hour and the other was when I was in Anaheim for the day.
Everyone was saying how unseasonable and unusual the weather was… Quite chilly :)\
The weather app on my phone says it's mostly been the same there since- pretty mild
I didn't mind though. It made it a lot easier to wear my big furry hat and fur edged hussar jacket to the con! ^^
Hey, at least now everybody knows why they're so pissed all the time.How the hell can you make blood and flesh dripping out of a woman's crotch for a week a happy experience?They just do! Don't question it.
Let us never speak of this again. :(
Me? I still can't comprehend the whole "Does my butt look big in this?" thing.
Neither does my mum for that matter.
Anyway, I do wonder though about how much America affects us here in England.
Scotland is supposed to be more like America and it definitely shares a lot of vernacular, pronunciation of certain words, cultural focus on Halloween and New Years Eve and their levels of patriotism are probably exactly the same based on the testimony of the Virginian girl. I'll probably need to save up and take a trip one day to find out.
But America has and always will be Scotland's inferior descendant when it comes to it's levels of WTF.
Sure, the US has a lot of numbers. But it's a bigger country. And I've yet to see them create a food dish as awesomely suicidal and humorously slang-savvy as the "Stonner Kebab".
Unless you actually did, Ozone. If you have, then I'd like to hear about it. Set a new bar for me or somebody I know up north to make an attempt at one-upping it.
Scotland is spacious
If you leave El Paso Texas and head east at 70mph (112kph), and don't stop, not even to pee or fuel, 11 hours later, you'll still be in Texas. Somehow I don't see Scotland being quite as spacious. =) (Interstate 10 in Texas is 810 miles long)
I sort of get what you mean, but I have to look at it from my perspective. I'm a professional driver who lives in the United States, and when I was doing coast to coast loads, it took 5 driving shifts of a solid 10 or 11 hours each at 65mph to accomplish this. (Presque Isle Maine to Seattle Washington would take 5 days @ 684 miles each.)
In contrast, I was shocked to see that the physical border between England and Scotland is only about 60 miles. O_o
(Granted, Scotland is wider than 60 miles, but I'm talking about the North Channel coast to the North Sea coast at the points where the line is drawn between both "*lands" ) =]
As for Scotland being like Oregon, only if Scotland is lush on it's severe west coast, and arid (in places, even barren) in the rest. Not much of the coastal rain gets past the coastal mountains, as a result, much of Oregon is dry and rocky. Incidentally, much of Oregon and Idaho smells like potatoes… unless it's the potatoes that smell like Idaho and Oregon… I haven't quite sorted that one out.
Aussie money is almost the same value as US currency, but we don't value $5 notes or $1 or $2 coins as much and certainly nothing bellow that.
It's nice to have American dollars in your wallet though. I don't know why, but it is.
I've read this over a few times and don't understand what you're saying…do you mean that in Australia, anything under a 5 dollar note is basically worthless?
You're forgetting relativity here. ;)Aussie money is almost the same value as US currency, but we don't value $5 notes or $1 or $2 coins as much and certainly nothing bellow that.
It's nice to have American dollars in your wallet though. I don't know why, but it is.
I've read this over a few times and don't understand what you're saying…do you mean that in Australia, anything under a 5 dollar note is basically worthless?
It's not that we see it as having no worth, it's that Americans (from what I saw at least) value the lower denominations so much MORE than we do in Australia.
I mean, just the look on the homeless guy's face when I handed him a bunch of coins and he looked at them and saw they were all dollars was amazing :)
I wanted to keep my shiny American gold and silver dollars as souvenirs , but they would be troublesome to carry and he appreciated them a lot more than I would.
Not really. It's more like; a homeless guy in Australia would prefer a handful of fives as opposed to a handful of ones.
-it's not just the denominations, but the fiscal value they represent of course.
$5 and even $1 is a much bigger deal in America… or where I was anyway.
I think like the money thing Hippie had a query about- it's relative.Scotland is spaciousIf you leave El Paso Texas and head east at 70mph (112kph), and don't stop, not even to pee or fuel, 11 hours later, you'll still be in Texas. Somehow I don't see Scotland being quite as spacious. =) (Interstate 10 in Texas is 810 miles long)
I sort of get what you mean, but I have to look at it from my perspective. I'm a professional driver who lives in the United States, and when I was doing coast to coast loads, it took 5 driving shifts of a solid 10 or 11 hours each at 65mph to accomplish this. (Presque Isle Maine to Seattle Washington would take 5 days @ 684 miles each.)
In contrast, I was shocked to see that the physical border between England and Scotland is only about 60 miles. O_o
(Granted, Scotland is wider than 60 miles, but I'm talking about the North Channel coast to the North Sea coast at the points where the line is drawn between both "*lands" ) =]
As for Scotland being like Oregon, only if Scotland is lush on it's severe west coast, and arid (in places, even barren) in the rest. Not much of the coastal rain gets past the coastal mountains, as a result, much of Oregon is dry and rocky. Incidentally, much of Oregon and Idaho smells like potatoes… unless it's the potatoes that smell like Idaho and Oregon… I haven't quite sorted that one out.
The UK is a minute little island really, but it's coated with tens of millions, all packed into that small space. That means wherever you go might not be physically far away, in a straight line, but because of the relative population density the infrastructure gets in the way: windy, windy, windy roads, towns, towns, and towns, intersections, traffic lights, stop signs, railway crossings, never-ending suburbs…
And few roads or other routes that just sail straight through the distances, like you're used to in the states. :)
In my state of Western Australia, we could fit in the entire UK easily and quite a lot of the rest of continental Europe. It takes several days of continuous driving to cross it from top to bottom… But there's almost nothing here- 2.2 million people mostly packed into the little state capital, with the rest spread as thin as latex pants on a fat guy's bum. That means that even though it takes ages of driving to get anywhere, it doesn't seem as "big"… because it's empty.
And "spacious" has no meaning in a place like this, whereas in Scotland, relative to England, it does.
———
Hippie's Canada is in a similar situation population density-wise to Australia.
The UK is not as spacious as Texas, and Oregon geography
I'm from Idaho, I know what geographic spaciousness and monotonous driving are, it was a facetious comparison between Scotland and England, not America. I also know what Oregon is like and I don't think a detailed comparison of geography is necessary, it was just a very strong, unsettling feeling I had when I was in Scotland.
"I'm from State and it takes a long time to drive places, America is a lot bigger than England" is the number-one subject in all my "Americans talking to me about England" conversations.
Oz, I'm pretty sure a homeless guy anywhere would prefer a handful of fives to a handful of ones. :]
Oz, I'm pretty sure a homeless guy anywhere would prefer a handful of fives to a handful of ones. :]pffft :P
Point is an Aussie one wouldn't appreciate the ones as much.
It's just an interesting difference…
Maybe most people usually just give small change, whereas here getting $1 and $2 coins is more usually the case than the exception? Hmmm…
Not because Aussies are more generous I hasten to add! It's just that because all $1 and $2 are in coin here form they seem like change.
I'm from Idaho
Heh. That explains the Oregon/Scotland reference. Maybe you can then answer my question… Does Idaho smell like potatoes… or do potatoes smell like Idaho?
I guess I just assumed that since you live in GB (or, at least, that's what I'd thought) that you were a Brit. As for Idaho, I love Coeur d' Alene. Unfortunately, I was more often in the lower portion of the state, which doesn't quite compare. The canyon that runs through the Snake River Valley is cool though.
It's not that we see it as having no worth, it's that Americans (from what I saw at least) value the lower denominations so much MORE than we do in Australia.
I mean, just the look on the homeless guy's face when I handed him a bunch of coins and he looked at them and saw they were all dollars was amazing
I'm a sucker for giving homeless types a buck or two to go away, but one time I was remanded by one that asked for five bucks and found I'd only had 4 quarters to give.
"This isn't five bucks!"
"Sorry, shall I just take it back?"
"Oh… no, that'll be fine… cheap motherfucker…"
Advertise with us
DDComics is community owned.
The following patrons help keep the lights on. You can support DDComics on Patreon.
- Banes
- JustNoPoint
- RMccool
- Abt_Nihil
- Gunwallace
- cresc
- PaulEberhardt
- Emma_Clare
- FunctionCreep
- SinJinsoku
- Smkinoshita
- jerrie
- Chickfighter
- Andreas_Helixfinger
- Tantz_Aerine
- Genejoke
- Davey Do
- Gullas
- Roma
- NanoCritters
- Teh Andeh
- Peipei
- Digital_Genesis
- Hushicho
- Palouka
- Cheeko
- Paneltastic
- L.C.Stein
- Zombienomicon
- Dpat57
- Bravo1102
- TheJagged
- LoliGen
- OrcGirl
- Fallopiancrusader
- Arborcides
- ChipperChartreuse
- Mogtrost
- InkyMoondrop
- jgib99
- Call me tom
- OrGiveMeDeath_Ind
- Mks_monsters
- GregJ
- HawkandFloAdventures
- Soushiyo