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[textualdeviance]

Too much to do before sleep/going back to work tomorrow to give a detailed account of the last week of the trip. That's on the agenda for sometime in the next few days.

Til then, a few notes:



Missed:

-Mountains! Those little things in Scotland and Ireland are cute, but they're not mountains. Sorreh.
-Clean air. The cities reeked of car and ancient sludge, and the country reeked of sheep. There were a few nice spots, but I'm spoiled rotten by where I live, I think.
-Proper Mexican food (salsa =/= chutney!)
-Proper lemonade
-Proper street signs (a grubby, tiny little sign on the corner of a building is not enough to identify the street!)
-Roads wide enough for two small cars to pass each other without the desire to wet one's pants
-Modern plumbing, including toilets that you can flush fully more than once every 10 minutes.
-Washcloths in hotel rooms (I take it you're supposed to bring your own and reuse it? Ew. Germs live *forever* on a soggy cloth. Bring me back a fresh one every day, tyvm.)
-Varied Asian food. Lots of South Asian options, of course, but never saw more than a few Chinese places anywhere outside of London. All y'all need Thai and teriyaki on every corner like we have. ;)
-Normal on/off freeway exits. Roundabouts are INSANE. Then again, we also have collector/distributors, and those are nuts, too.
-Other fat people. There are lots over there, yes (and they even let them on TV! OMG!) but I was usually the fattest person in the room, and felt conspicuous. Then we got to Minnesota, where there are people my size in every room, so...
-A great deal of racial/ethnic diversity. London had plenty and Manchester wasn't half bad, but I'm so used to having more shades of brown around. There were quite a lot of Eastern Europeans, though (even more than we have here, which is saying a lot), which was cool.


Now that I'm back home, am missing:

-Fandom friends. Why, oh why did I get hooked on a primarily-UK fandom? Sigh...
-Ancient architecture every other block
-Living history and world-class monuments, artworks, etc.
-A somewhat-limited gene pool that means every other person sorta resembles someone I've seen on a UK TV show.
-A gorgeous mix of accents, that change (if subtly) if you drive 30 minutes in any direction
-Mostly independent shops, with a few interesting chain stores
-Soft drinks sweetened with actual sugar instead of rat poison
-Access to the BBC iPlayer. And everything else I enjoyed watching live over there. :(
-Tomatoes and mushrooms with breakfast
-Pain au chocolat on nearly every breakfast buffet
-London cabbies, who are a breed of their own. I overtipped every single one, just because.
-Sandwiches! Of every concievable variety, and in every concievable grab-and-go eatery. Dude, our 7-11s have a few subs and a few turkey and ham.
-Convenience-food "cakes" that make Hostess look like the lard-flavored drywall it truly is
-A decent rail system. Yes, there are issues, but we can only dream of that kind of alternative-transportation reach here.
-Magpies. I know y'all consider them a pest, but we don't have them here, and I think they're purty.

Remembering with amusement, but not really missing:

-20 minutes out of town, and the hills are paved with sheep. And occasionally cows. And stone fences that are most likely 200 years old.
-Commonly eaten items that would horrify most Americans. Then again, the South has scrapple, so...
-Every hotel buffet had the exact same brand of hash browns: hard little triangles. Somewhat tasty, but they were strange