No Place Like Home....s

Hey! I'm gonna blog.

Lots of things have happened since I blogged last. Here's a one sentence synopsis: We moved to a new house, had visitors for a month, visited America, then another visitor.

To get the ol' bloggin ball a rollin again, I thought I'd do a Britland vs "The States" list. See, there were a lot of things we were looking forward to in America. Space, fountain drinks, space, food, space, oh, and friends and family... Once we got there, though, I was looking forward to some of the Britishy things I'd left behind. So here they are, all organizationally layed out for you and whatnot!

God Bless American...

* fountain drinks * road space * Mexican food * mountains *

smoke-free beaches with sunshine * boating * junk food * hot dogs

* campfires * Old Navy * friends & family * country music *

exchange-rate making everything on sale for us people who are paid in pounds *

campfires * lack of inhibition * Slurpees and SnoCones *

Reeses anything * stores that stay open past 5:00 pm * SUVs and pickups *

weaponry (pocketknives, bb guns, etc) *

Good Old Britishy...

* roundabouts * cheese * chocolate * Indian food * public transportation *

accents * politeness * wellies * rain on the conservatory roof *

markets * healthy eating * spunky old ladies * friends *

international holiday destinations * history * villages * London

* Caramel Digestives * teapots * Lush bath ballistics * footpaths * countryside *

Primark * double-decker busses * the kids saying Britishy phrases *

overall Britishy-ness *

It looked all cute and in different fonts and sizes, but then it all went away, because sometimes blogger hates me. Enjoy anyway!

drugged up and uterus free

Hey all! This is going to have to be a picture-free blog post, so let's all pull out our imaginations and dust them off. Good, good!

Today I'm all drugged up, slightly dizzy and nauseous, and I am 100% more uterus-less than last time I posted. That's right- I'm one of those foreigners who has come to the UK and taken full advantage of the national health care system. Now we can go home! Not really. I was planning on having this done after moving back to the US, but life likes to shake things up a bit, so I went ahead and had surgery now. The good news is I will have several weeks of free-ish time to blog. The bad news is that I might be drugged up as I blog, so good luck making sense of anything I write.

I guess today we can tell you all about the differences in health care between the UK and the US. Now, you might think health care here is free. It is in that you don't pay any co-pays, and kids get free prescriptions. I feel like a thief every time I leave the pharmacy and they just hand over a bag of drugs and wave goodbye. Even though I know it's free, I have to force myself to just take the bag and leave without feeling like I'm doing something shifty.

It's not free, though, really. You pay enough taxes to cover costs that it makes one want to start dumping tea into the harbor. That being said, national health care is turning out to be a much better plan than I had thought it would be. I think some of that might have to do with the overall attitude of Britishy Folks, though. Here in Britland, the average Joe, or maybe average Dave since we're in Essex, thinks of health care like this: "Well, what a jolly good plan. We can't have people running about without a Doctor, can we? Let's all chip in, and everyone queue up at the Surgery. (doctor's office.)" In America people think national health care sounds great, but the average Joe thinks of the plan like this: "Heck yeah the government should be paying for health care! Psch! We demand doctors and hospitals, I mean c'mon, it's our right as human beings! Pay up, government! Now, outta my way, I'm ten times sicker than you, I get to go first in line." Yes, he is grammatically incorrect, but that's what he would say. So... yes the health care system here seems to be getting the job done, but it hasn't convinced me we should do the same thing in America.

Now, being the paranoid American that I am, we were glad to see basic private health insurance was part of our benefits plan. I was pretty sure without it we would all catch random diseases and die before we could get in to see a doctor. It doesn't quite work that way, though. As far as I can tell, private health insurance in the UK is like those FastPass Tickets at Disneyland. Without it we would still be able to get in to see a doctor for regular things like sinus infections and immunizations. We would still be able to get broken bones fixed or emergency procedures done. For non-life-threatening surgeries, though, you "jump the queue". I only needed 2 weeks notice for my surgery. If I didn't have private health care, I could have waited years from what people tell me.

There are other perks, too. When I asked the nurse at the pre-op appointment what the private health insurance did, she said, "It means you get a room of your own at hospital instead of sharing one with a crackhead." Pretty much summed it up right there, I guess.

So, kids, here's what we have learned in this drug-fog ramble of a post:

*National Health Care rocks in the UK, but would crash and burn among us demanding Americans

*I no longer have a uterus.

*Private Health Insurance in the UK is just your Disneyland FastPass

*Blogging on drugs might not be as good of a plan as I originally thought.

More to come! Anything you want a slightly loopy Phyllis to fill you in on in the next few weeks? Let me know!

Proper Classy

Say it like this: Prah-pa Clossy. Then you are.

In the spirit of good blogging, I am willing to tell stories that make me look like an idiot in order to entertain you all. You're welcome. This story is set in classy Cornwall.... (cue flashback wavy lines and harps...)

Phyllis and the Cream Tea

Whilst on holiday in Cornwall, I decided it was high time I sat down to a proper English Cream Tea. Finding a cafe advertising said tea, I went in. When I made it to the front of the queue, the cashier lady was down the counter at the till with the previous customer, so I waited patiently like a good British Folk should for her to return. A man behind the counter was in the middle of scooping ice-cream into a blender, when he suddenly looked up and said "You all right there?" That usually equates to "How are you?" or a similar greeting, but the way he said it was more demanding, like I was doing something weird that needed to be addressed. "Yep. Just waiting for my turn to order." "Well?" the man asks impatiently. I guess I was supposed to have assumed that he meant to multi-task by taking my order while he scooped and blended, even though he hadn't said anything or even looked up at me yet.

I ordered the boys some ice cream and a cream tea for myself. I pointed to a row of boxes of tea on display and asked if these were the flavors of tea I could choose from. (They were boxes there for purchase, like, buy the whole box, not these are the flavors we have today. I assumed they were the options I had, the question was more rhetorical.) He stared at me blank-faced for a second then said in a very slow and careful way, "The tea comes with scones, and jam and clotted cream to put on the scones." "Great...(?)" I said, nodding. Then he pointed to the boxes of tea and said, "Which kind of tea would you like? The kinds we have are just over there" (pointing to the boxes I had just asked about.) I refrained from rolling my eyes and shaking my head, picked some tea, and sat down.

I told Jimmy D about the tea man and how he was treating me like I was a very stupid person who didn't understand English. The tea man kept glancing over at me like I was a phenomenon beyond his comprehension. Not in a good way, either. I could understand that if I had actually done something stupid, but I hadn't, so I was kind of bugged. He brought over the tea and scones, and on the saucer was a tiny, light brown sugar cube. I hadn't seen a brown sugar cube before, but assumed it was something trendy or organic or whatnot, dropped it into my teacup, then poured my tea over it. The man, who had been watching me closely from behind the counter in a suspicious way, came over to me and said (loudly) "That's not sugar. That's fudge. I can bring you some sugar if you'd like."

Crap!!!! I wasn't supposed to give him a valid reason to assume I was just another stupid American tourist! Darn you pretentious tea man!!! Why couldn't you have just let me sip my fudgy tea in ignorant bliss! Sigh.

"Oh... well.... no thanks..." I said, fishing my fudge out of my teacup as the entire cafe looked on.

There you go. Proper Classy.

(Note the look of deep concentration on my face. I had to be sure not to do something else to further discredit myself, like spreading jam on my teacup or eating the cream with a spoon or anything.)