Anonymous meme

Because I thought it was interesting (although was too shy to ask any questions myself!).

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Londonistan?

Found on my friendsfriends list on the same day that I heard that all US soldiers stationed in the UK have been banned from traveling to London.

And this, my friends, is why people wonder what's happened to democracy in the USA.

Everyone here knew that an attack on London was *going* to happen, not because it is some hotbed of terrorist activity, but because Blair sides with Bush on the issue of Iraq. Hitting London is a symbol, the same way that hitting New York and Madrid was.

If the UK is so remiss on cracking down on its Muslim citizens, who apparently are presumed to be behind the attacks (not by any UK news source I've read so far), then why isn't the US also culpable for not cracking down on its white former military male citizens post-Oklahoma City?

Summertime

Today, like yesterday, is what is called "hot" in Manchester. A high around 28C (in the 80s Fahrenheit?) and muggy, the humidity sticking like a blanket despite the faint breezes from time to time.

Air conditioning is nonexistent in our office and the fan only feebly stirs the air--just enough to make it tolerable, but not comfortable. The walk home is much, much hotter, as most of the twenty to thirty minute trek (depending on my energy level) is spent in full sun and, at the moment, I do not have a hat.

Facing this hike of misery, I concluded today that I needed to make a stop at the ice cream truck across the street from my office before heading home. The man in the truck was kind enough to make change for my £10 note, as I used up all of my change on lunch, and he handed me a cone with vanilla ice cream and a Cadbury's 99 Flake. I hadn't asked for the flake as they're nothing like tasty in my opinion, but because he was changing my large note I didn't quibble. I also passed on the raspberry syrup...it's one thing to spill ice cream all over my shirt. It's quite another to have it be ice cream covered in brightly colored pinky-red syrup.

I ate the Cadbury Flake, the chocolate as dry and *cheap* tasting as it always is. As usual I wonder afterwards why I bothered, as the two bites it took me to eat the tiny bar are as blech-inducing as ever, but perhaps it's the child in me, reluctant to throw away chocolate that's been served to me, even if I know I won't like it. Or maybe it's the optimist I generally think is buried deeply under my cynical shell, hoping that just this once I might find it really tasty and finally understand why in the world anyone would actually WANT to eat one. Unless everyone, like me, eats it because they're also hoping to understand why all the people around them like the blasted things.

British soft-serve ice cream is a distinctly different beast from American soft-serve ice cream (unless you buy it at McDonald's, in which case that standardization means you get the same thing as you'd get in an American Golden Arches). It's not the Cheaper-Than-You-Care-To-Think Vanilla flavor or the Edible Styrofoam brown cone...it's the texture. The Brits eschew dense, slightly icy soft-serve for something that is incredibly light and fluffy, like the stage between scooped ice cream and the creamy melted remnants that it leaves in your bowl. It's almost not even cold, really--like a refrigerated extra soft marshmallow in a cone.

Differences in texture notwithstanding, I have a special cone eating technique. You see, I don't like throwing the cone away--that crispy crunch reminds me of my childhood. BUT, crucially, I do not like the cone without ice cream in it. That, therefore, necessitates the "packing" technique. It goes something like this: *lick* *lick* *pack into cone with tongue* *swipe flattened ice cream back towards the center so it doesn't melt* *lick* *lick* *pack* *swipe* And so forth. A perfected technique that, carefully executed, results in drip-free ice cream that is also packed down into the deepest tip of the cone, meaning that each crispy bite is accompanied by sweet, melting ice creamy yumminess.

Oddly determined, for something that's meant to be pleasurable and carefree...but then, I've always been intense in my enjoyment. I do a thing fully, or not at all, be it writing the perfect seminar paper or eating the perfect summer ice cream cone.