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Britain is Repossessing the USA

To: The citizens of the United States of America:

In light of your failure to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).

Your new prime minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a governor for America without the need for further elections.

The House of Representatives and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1. You should look up 'revocation' in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up 'aluminium', and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

2. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix -ize will be replaced by the suffix -ise. The letter "z" is generally not in favour. You will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary').

3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as 'like' and 'you know' is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.

There is no such thing as US English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell- checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of -ize.

4. You will relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen.

5. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday. It will be substituted with a proper holiday, "Boxing Day." Look that up too.

6. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

7. All American cars are hereby banned. They are rubbish and this is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean and thank us. Holden Monaro's are also approved.

8. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrification will help you understand the British sense of humour.

9. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol, which you have been calling gasoline, at roughly $8.00/US gallon. Get used to it.

10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you insist on calling chips are properly called crisps.Those things you call French fries are closer, but not real chips either. (pronounced "eye-ther") Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

11. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a vegetable peeler .

12. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies).

13. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. As an acceptable substitute you may learn cricket. Proper cricket bats will be distributed.

14. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

15. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

16. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups - never mugs - with high quality biscuits (you call them cookies) and cakes; strawberries when in season.

God save the Queen..

John Cleese

Creativity - Baking

Amanda decided to bake a Mother's Day chocolate cake. The only flaw was she was a little bit premature in taking it out of the cake pan. But, being the chocolate loving family that we are, we didn't let a small aesthetic issue get between us and a cake.
It was goooooooood!

Creativity - Clay / Ceramics

Mom's being creative again! Here's her latest work in progress, a ceramic clown.
NO, IT IS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE ME!!! (well, maybe my nose)

March Madness

Number 15 is our own high school superstar, Amanda. She plays center for the ACS-Egham Jaguars.
Great game Thursday!! When we arrived, the score was 20-3 with our team on the short end of the score. That was about half way through the first half. The Allens must have been lucky for the Jaguars that day because from that point on they proceeded to score 22 points, and allowed only 4 by the other team the rest of the game, winning in the final seconds by 25-24. Very exciting.
Their tournament included teams from Germany, Spain, Sweden and France. Former NBA star Vlade Divac (LA Lakers, Sacramento Kings, Charlotte Hornets) was in attendance to watch his son's Spanish team play.
Sadly their season ended with a loss this morning.
This is Amanda's first year playing and she did well, looking forward to watching her next year.

Mother's Day in the UK

Well, for starters, we missed it. Who knew they had their own day?

It is always three weeks before Easter and dates back to the 1500s when it was traditional to visit your mother church once a year. Doing that was called "going mothering" and the day was called 'Mothering Day.' It wasn't about mothers back then. Since your mum probably went back to the mother church too, you visited your mother that day. Children traditionally made gifts at church and gave them to their mothers.
The British holiday was the inspiration for the American holiday which Julia Ward Howe brought to the US around the time of the Civil War, if I remember right. Today they are very similar in focusing on Mother's, and both have become heavily commercialized.
In our family, the US Mother's Day has the distinct advantage of being a week or so away from Shirleen's birthday, so we get to celebrate her twice close together.
And just a few weeks after that is the highlight of the year, Father's Day!

Gas Prices

I have read the concerns about rising gas prices in the US.
To make you feel better, lets do a little math.

Gas is sold by the liter in England.
A gallon is equal to 3.785 liters.
A liter of gas costs £1.04.
Applying today's currency conversion factor - that works out to $7.81 per gallon.
We put 15 gallons in our Accord the other day, it cost $117.15.
Every week! In both cars!!!
Feel better?