Auld Lang Shah Rukh

Your correspondent would love to go back in time and give her 2009 self the following quiz.

1. You will live in the following countries in 2010:
a) India
b) England
c) USA
d) All of the above

2. You will have been present for various protests and/or riots in the following countries in 2010:
a) Thailand
b) Nepal
c) England
d) Ireland
e) All of the above

3. Your favorite dessert will be:
a) Laddoo
b) Eton mess
c) Scones
d) All of the above

4.  You will spend the last week of 2010 doing this:
a) Watching ice hockey and American football
b) Training for a Scottish marathon
c) Watching the Bollywood hit My Name is Khan while drinking Irish beer and eating Moroccan argon butter after a lovely dinner of caprese, curry, and baklava
d) All of the above

5.  None of this will be surprising to you by December 31, 2010
a) True
b) False

I bet I would get 100% correct.

Proof is in the Pudding

Your correspondent's younger sister was in charge of the dessert for our Christmas feast this year, but unfortunately she arrived from Boston on Christmas morning with a cold to kill a rhino and had to politely decline.  Undaunted, I stepped in to fill the dessert void with my personal favorite creation: pumpkin fluff.

It wasn't until I had gathered all of the ingredients when I realized what I had done.  I had made a classic mistake.  My Christmas pudding

Desserts

was literally pudding.

Pudding

Nevertheless, with a little pumpkin and spice thrown in it became more than just Jell-O and went deliciously on top of homemade ginger cookies.  And it was far superior, I might add, to fruitcake.

Recipe for an American Christmas

Step 1: Christmas Mass: midnight or otherwise.  (Some of us are jet-lagged.)
Step 2: Prepare turkey.
Step 3: A Christmas Story
Step 4: Watch snow. With dignity.  We're not England.
Step 5: Open presents
Step 6: A Christmas Story
Step 7: Destroy Watch home movies
Step 8: Die of shame  Apologize to boyfriend for being forced to watch home movies  Christmas Carols
Step 9: A Christmas Story
Step 10: Eat.
Step 11- 14: Eat
Step 15: A Christmas Story
Step 16: Eat
Step 17: A Christmas Story
Step 18: Destroy home movies

Parting Gift

Dragged myself out of bed to catch the 4 am bus to Heathrow, arrived at 5:15 am and nevertheless had to jostle with thousands of other travellers, finally got through the mess and found myself a Starbucks breakfast, only to discover -- BLAH! -- porridge is not the same thing as oatmeal.  Blah! Porridge!

That makes this semester's score: British Food 24, Your Correspondent 0.  Get me back to America!

Happy Birthday, Blog

It wasn't until I checked the profile of my blogger page that I realised: I've been writing for more than a year now.  Editing at Large turned one on 21 December.

I didn't exactly expect to be writing my one-year anniversary post from England, but then again life is full of surprises.  I head back to America tomorrow (weather permitting) and couldn't be more ready for College Bowl games, Trader Joe's, and the un-ironic use of the word "y'all".

In the meanwhile, I found a lovely article on The Economist's "Johnson" blog which stands up to a celebratory post.  You may or may not know that my own handle is a tribute to the usual way Economist writers self-refer.  I had never really known the semantics behind the practice, but now I do.

My bus to Heathrow leaves in twelve hours so while I'm airborne fingers are crossed there will be a Dunkin Donuts coffee waiting on the other side of the ocean, just for me.  My family and loved ones wouldn't hurt, either.

At Least the Snow is Good for One Thing

Snowball fights.

My pub's been pelted!

I'm Screaming of a White Christmas

Here's some culture shock from an unexpected quarter:

Snow.

Oh, please.

Six to eight inches of snow fell in Oxford yesterday.  Let me put this in perspective: there are places in my home state of Michigan which sit under several feet of snow most of the year.  In Boston, temperatures can hover around freezing sometimes into early May.  Snow doesn't phase me.

England, on the other hand, has closed its eyes, curled up in a little ball, and is now rocking slowly back and forth, muttering to itself.

It wasn't until this morning that I saw plows going through the streets or grit being spread on the roads.  The universities are closed and bus services were suspended.  Worse, Heathrow is closed.  All flights leaving the country, entering the country, carrying people to and from their Christmas holidays, are cancelled.  All flights meant to be leaving in the next few days will be packed to the gills with no room for the 400,000 folks who have just been misplaced.

I should be more sympathetic.  This little island doesn't usually see more than a few flakes, and if you don't own many plows you can only clear the roads so fast.

On the other hand, a little part of me is saying: It's snow.  I'm used to it.  Why aren't you?

This may be a sign it's time for me to go home.  I just hope I can.