YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD BE NICE?

It isn't hard to describe the home-like comforting side of England. Rain, magpies, badgers. Pot of tea. Buttered toast and marmalade. Exempli gratia: "Lord Roger always liked a spot of nimboo achar with his roast beef, it reminded him of Yorkshire. Archibald would particularly enjoy shortbread which cousin Gertrude had sent down from Scotland with his tea. Lester was out in the garden, messing with the geraniums, when Elizabeth came out to tell him rationing had been declared. They decided to have some tea. The magpies fell silent when the air raid siren went off; Jerry was over the downs. Newspaper headlines proclaimed that the continent was isolated as there was heavy fog in the channel. Those Americans had done it again! There would be a regrettable shortage of marmalade this year."

See? All of that automatically brings up thoughts of England.

It's touching on key tropes that does it.


An acquaintance with bad habits is particularly fond of British soccer, which he avidly follows. I suspect that's because unlike the gibberish chants of continental supporters, he can sort of understand what the Brits are yelling at the match. After all, they speak a half-way intelligible language, unless they're from Glasgow, Yorkshire, or London.

Soccer, of course, leaves me cold. The two best teams in the universe are Ajax and PSV. Everything else is just booga-booga shouting savages trying to imitate Feijenoord.
Whatever language they speak.

So really, watching it on the teevee is quite pointless.


But I do rather enjoy such typical English things as shortbread or khari biscuit, buttered toast and marmalade, geraniums, corvids, strong tea, and nimbu achar. All of which are findable here in San Francisco -- bear in mind that I can make my own nimbu achar if I have to -- and fog is a regular occurence, cutting Oakland off from civilization.

Tea particularly. It helps adjust the body's temperature as well as the mind's equilibrium.
Everything must start with tea. Khari biscuit, shortbread, rosgulla.
All of these are better with a spot of tea.

Even soccer on the telly, air raid sirens, or British cooking.
Their horrible plumbing is also more tolerable.

Oakland is not improved by tea.
It's those Americans.



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