Notes from a Big Country

Whilst I was looking after my workmate's daughter, i came across a book that i had been wanting to read properly for some time - one that my workmate had promised to lend me, but had forgotten (presumably). The book in question titled 'Notes from a Big Country' is written by Bill Bryson - a well-known American travel writer who, after living in England for 20 or so years, decided to move back over here and ended up writing a newspaper column about life in the USA. Seeing the book bought back some memories - as the column, in question, was for a UK Sunday Newspaper ('The Mail on Sunday' - Republicans would love it!) and I can certainly remember reading a few of the columns when they were published originally. This book, a collection of a good number of these columns, is something of a gem - particularly for an alien living in the US - and i'd heartily recommend it to any foreigners coming to live here. I guess, in some ways, my blog aspires to be like this book - although my blog is perhaps small potatoes compared to this.

Take for example, the column on why Americans don't walk anywhere (the author invites his neighbours round for dinner and they drive), the one about how his local bar decides to put signs up saying that the maximum amount of drinks they can buy is three. Another priceless gem is the section on filling in the tax forms - which are akin to reading a video manual in Japanese - or how wonderfully inefficient American businesses are (this all starts because the Federal Aviation Authority were selling control of the landing of planes to another company, yet couldn't remember the name of it). Bryson writes with ease and wit - and i find myself with every column nodding my head in agreement - having observed first hand some of the things he's stumbled across. In all, though, I have to say that it's nice to find a former native of this country having just as much of a perplexing time adjusting to life over here, than I have had. But, hey, i guess life would be dull otherwise.