In Search of Cider

Some British expats may crave a creamier form of chocolate, others may desire Heinz baked beans on toast, but my main miss (well, apart from affordable dental care) is a certain fermented apple drink.

Yes, English cider is tasty, refreshing and surprisingly cheap.  It was my chosen beverage back in my Bohemian days (many fond memories of slurping Old English with various punk and anarchist types), but it is far less common in the USA, which comes as a surprise, as it must have been brewed by some of the early settlers and pioneers?  Another casualty of Prohibition perhaps?

To be fair, there are American ciders out there, commonly sold in small bottles, rather than the large one or two litre ones you get in the UK – but it is often a bit on the sweet side for me (no sharp taste) and more mid-priced than cheap, as well as being weaker in regard to alcohol content. 

 

It is also the case that many Irish bars here in Florida do sell cider from “across the pond” on draft, according to my experience, although it is usually the modern Irish brew, Magners, which dominates.  I have come across Strongbow on draft a couple of times, however, which is always a pleasant surprise.

The truth is that I like the very dry, and strong taste that is associated with the traditional English ciders, rather than anything sweet and weaker.  In fact, I am not averse to seeking out some scrumpy or a pint of “rough” when down in the English West Country – the cloudiness of the cider certainly isn’t an issue for me.

Which is why I was thrilled to bits to find my recently revamped local liquor store now selling cans of Blackthorn cider at a pretty reasonable price (I like the way that the Americans label it: “Hard Cider” by the way, it makes me feel a little more manly for drinking it!). 

 

But seriously, I am so happy, I am tempted to go into a few verses and choruses of the Wurzels’ classic, I am a Cider Drinker.  But I won’t.  Oh, all right then: “When the Moon shines on the cowshed…”

More British and American humor differences

I have written about this topic before, but I was inspired to explore it further after stumbling upon a fascinating Stephen Fry video recently (more on that later!).  Humour really is a fascinating area - what people find funny really does give an insight into their philosophy, culture, and general world outlook.

Some of the feedback that I got previously was that some Americans felt I was a little harsh in my previous writings, where I said that Americans were generally more serious and that a lot of British humour gets lost in translation in the US, particularly irony. 

I will try to explain these two points a little more, but first I think it’s worth pointing out that I suspect the average American maybe underestimates how many differences there are, when it comes to British and American humor.  Yes, there are large areas of overlap, but also major differences.  Okay, you may have seen Monty Python and Mr Bean, but humour operates differently in all sorts of ways in the UK that don’t generally reach or work on this side of the Atlantic.

Reverence

One major difference that I remember the US writer, Bill Bryson pointing out in his book: I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away, is that humour generally is far more revered in the UK than in the USA.  Bryson cites the classic (and rather great) John Cleese quote that: “An Englishman would rather be told he’s a bad lover than he has no sense of humour”.

You can actually get away with almost anything in the UK, as long as it is presented as humour.  You can insult the queen, your employer, religion, the army, whatever, as long as you do it right and make some people laugh.  Even if someone were mildy offended they wouldn’t generally protest, they tend to be more worried about appearing to have no sense of humour, which, as Cleese says, is a major taboo in the UK.  America, with its diverse population, devout religious communities, and occasionally rigid political correctness, can sometimes seem very sensitive from a British perspective.

A portion of British humour might be also labelled as “smart” in the US, where although some people might find it funny, you can also get into trouble for it more easily than you would in the UK.

Of course, it's also true to say that British irony can also very easily devolve into cynicism and sarcasm too, which are less appealing sides of the English psyche.
 

Americans are more serious?

Generally speaking, the American philosophy and approach to life is very different in certain respects.  Americans are generally optimistic: life is an opportunity for success and it has real meaning and there are always avenues of improvement open.  The British philosophy tends to be much more downbeat: yes, life can be good, but often it can be an ordeal, tinged with absurdity, and sometimes you just have to just grin and bear it.

Mark Twain

What gets lost?

What Bill Bryson describes as “verbal sleights of hand” are just far less common in the US.  Wordplay, double entendre, and yes, irony, are far rarer here and the average American often just doesn’t expect such trickery to occur in general conversation and so it goes straight past them.  (When I was first living here, I had the opposite problem, I tended to over-analyse things that Americans said, when almost always, they were being completely literal.)

That doesn’t mean that I am saying that all Americans don’t get irony, by the way, it is more a question of degree.  Obviously, there have been many great American humorists, such as Mark Twain, who were masters of ironic humour and there were thousands of Americans  who bought his books and found them funny.

The humour differences can make things difficult sometimes though, if you are a British expat.  We Brits don’t do overt shows of emotion much, so when our ability to communicate through language and humour are limited, it can feel a little stifling sometimes.

Stephen Fry

Anyway, back to the excellent Stephen Fry video that I mentioned at the start.  In it, Fry explores another aspect of British and American humor that differs considerably.

Essentially, the British comic hero tends to be a loser.  He or she has high aspirations (and may also be pompous, or pretentious), but he/she is constantly failing to pull him or herself out of the hole. 

The American comic hero, on the other hand, tends to be a success - he or she is a wisecracker, throwing out clever quips at the expense of the idiots that surround him or her.

Americans tend to celebrate success.  Brits love a failure.

Fry says it better than me though…

US beer vs UK beer

I like to believe that I deal with all the weighty cultural issues in this British expat blog and what could be of more import than the relative merits of British and American beer?

The first thing that I would say is that the almost universally negative image of American beer that exists in Britain (and Europe too for that matter) is certainly too simplistic.  (The negative image is summed up by the old Monty Python joke: “American beer is a little like making love in a canoe.  It's f**king close to water.”)

The problem for American beer is that the only brands that you tend to see in the UK are the awful ones like Miller Lite and Budweiser (Anheuser-Busch).  These really are bland, watery beers.  Like in the UK, however, the better American beers tend to come from the smaller, local breweries, rather than the leviathans.  (To some extent, the US has similar problems with beer as the UK did in the 60s and 70s with aggressive major breweries [with crap beer] trying to muscle out the smaller and medium-sized breweries [with good beer] with the intention of creating local monopolies.)

Because of the localized nature of brewing and the size of the US, plus my own admittedly limited experience, it would actually be ridiculous for me to even attempt to give a comprehensive major overview, so instead I will just settle for giving my personal experiences of living in north-central Florida. 

My favorite (big brewery) US beers that I drink regularly here in North Central Florida:

 

Shiner – brewed in Austin, Texas is easily my favourite that I've found.  It has a strong and distinctive taste.  When I used to visit Florida, I couldn’t believe how dirt cheap it was in the store.  By the time I’d moved here, however, they’d bumped up the price!  They only sell Shiner in certain US states and luckily Florida is one of them - I was disappointed to find that I couldn’t get hold of it up in New York.

Blue Moon – A Belgian-style wheat beer which is very palatable (despite being a Coors product!)  Belgian-style wheat beers (think Hoegaarden) seem to be fairly common here nowadays (I believe that US breweries started making witbeers about 10 or 15 years ago), but German-style, tarter wheat beers are generally rarer, it seems.

Sam Adams produce reasonable beer and I enjoy some of their selection packs - some of these beers can be a little gimmicky but it’s fun to try them.

Yuengling is for me just on the right side of the line between the watery American beers and the good ones in my opinion.  I will drink it sometimes, however, because it’s often cheaper(!)

Most British/Irish beers are relatively specialist in the US in my (limited) experience.  The most commonly available ones in the bars and stores where I am are Newcastle Brown Ale and Harp, which seems a little bizarre to me, as these drinks were common in the UK back in the 70s and 80s but have largely waned in popularity. 

The best British beer, the real ales, aren’t really available in draught form, which is a pity, but no surprise.  You can get a limited but reasonable range in the bottled section – although the US tends to put everything into small (approx 300ml?) bottles, which still irritates me a little.  I still find it strange seeing a US miniature, differently shaped version of the iconic Newcastle Brown Ale bottle and there is something sacrilegious about seeing hefeweissen sold in bottles below 500ml in size (although you can buy the ‘proper’ German 500ml bottles in the specialist stores!)  ;-)

European beers are also fairly widely available in the US in my experience and I drink a lot of Becks Dark, Warsteiner, and Heineken here.  I have also found a couple of outlets locally that sell my all time favourite (more specialist) European beers, which tend to be from Germany*, Belgium, and Central Europe.  German hefeweissen will always be one of my favourite tipples.

Cider

Cider isn’t a beer, of course, but it’s drunk in a similar way, so I thought that I would give it a mention.  I actually love cider as a refreshing alternative to beer and having cheap, available cider is something that I miss here in the US, especially when you’re on a limited budget (cider is often the cheap drunk’s tipple in the UK!). 

From what I gather, cider wasn’t particularly common in the US (compared to the UK) until relatively recently.  Now it’s easier to get hold of, but the ciders tend to be the big Irish brands that are advertised to be drunk over ice, such as Magners.  American ciders often seem to be sweeter and relatively weak, compared to the stronger and drier British ones, in my experience. 

Scrumpy style cider is pretty specialist in the US, although it’s difficult to imagine that it doesn’t exist in a rough form somewhere in the USA? 

The good news is that do sell Strongbow on draught in some bars of the bars around here – hurray!

*German bars are quite possibly the best place in the world for drinking draught and bottled beer, in my opinion.  Mainly because they are scrupulous when it comes to storing their beers at the correct temperature.  This is why Germany is generally known to be the best place for drinking draught Guiness methinks (even better than Ireland, ironically).  The sad and slightly strange fact is that in places like the US and Britain, bars will quite often undermine a great beer by storing, or serving it too cold or too warm in my experience.

Religion in America

I normally try to avoid religion and politics in my blog, but from time to time, I enjoy the challenge of trying to sail it through choppier, more unpredictable waters.

The power and influence of religion in America was certainly a jolt to the system when I arrived here from the UK.  I already knew that the US was a much more religious place than the UK of course, but even so, it is still quite a culture shock.  I am not sure how much the shock is compounded by the fact that I am not at all religious myself (I would generally describe myself as an atheist).  It was certainly fascinating to read (British expat) Iota’s blog on the subject of encountering US religion, and it made me appreciate that aspects of the experience of coming here may well be quite different for those who are Christian, as she is.

Religion generally plays a very quiet and low key role in the UK, but here in the USA, religion is big and brassy and most American people are very up front about telling you all about their religion and beliefs.  I know that Iota found this approach refreshing, but for me, I must confess that I can find it awkward and I can easily end up smiling and nodding vaguely, as people tell me at length about Jesus and their experience of being saved, or whatever.

The language here is different too - in the USA, if someone is having problems, say they are sick or something, people will talk about praying for them, or ask people to pray for them.  It some circumstances, it can just be a turn of phrase, of course, but even so, it is one example of how the American language contains more religious overtones.

Another difference for me is that religion in the USA nearly always means Christianity, certainly down here in the South, anyway.  Back in Britain, where I was working and living in the inner cities most of my adult life, Christianity was just one of many belief systems: Islam, Sikhism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism etc.  But here in the US, there is a general sense that Christianity is the big one, certainly down here in the Deep South (although there are multiple different Christian denominations and sects, of course).   

As a non-believer, I often get the sense that being Christian is perceived as the “norm” here and that many Americans generally see atheism (and to some extent some of the other religions aswell, such as Islam) as being more than a little bit suspect.

There is a social respectability that is accorded to those who attend church and pronounce their faith  and values here too, which hasn’t really existed in England for a long time.  What I mean is that you are perceived as being more upstanding and moral by some if you publicly subscribe to being a Christian.  I guess that is why politicians and public figures here pretty much always have to play up their Christian credentials, which is almost the opposite to the UK, where Tony Blair was constantly trying to play down his Catholicism.

One of the peculiar paradoxes about religion and politics in the USA is that essentially it is a secular country (enshrined in the constitution) with a very religious population, whereas Britain (also paradoxically) is officially a Christian country (The Queen is head of state and head of the Church of England) but the population aren’t particularly religious.

I guess I should point out in conclusion that despite me not generally being a big fan of religion, I do strongly believe that people have the right to believe whatever they want.  I am generally a live and live kind of person.  Some of the more conservative Christians here in the US seem less tolerant than me, however.  I have developed a lot of compassion for the plight of gay Americans since I’ve been here, especially those who live outside of the big coastal cities, who can have a particularly difficult time, it seems.

Things that I do and don’t miss about the UK

Every British expat blogger at some point has to write the what-I-miss-since-I-moved-away-from-Blighty list.  It is obligatory.  So here is mine.

Do Miss

Hot cheese and onion pasties (especially on a cold, rainy day).  Hot pasties don’t feature a great deal in sub-tropical Florida.  I have yet to find a branch of Gregg’s.

Affordable dental treatment.  My dentist warned me in sombre tones about the US being absurdly expensive for dental treatment and the standards of treatment being very variable.  I didn’t believe him until I got here.  Some treatment is well over ten times what I paid on the NHS in the UK!  Crazy.

Walking places and catching a train.  I’m completely car dependent where I am living, which is a far more common situation in the US generally, as the towns and cities are often spread out thinly.  I really miss being able to walk to the shops, or back from the pub, and being able to choose to go on a train somewhere.

Hills and mountains.  It’s very flat in Florida.  Climbing up at Otley Chevin or gazing out over the mountains of Cumbria does have a big appeal, although I do enjoy the swampiness here too, but in a different way.

Beans on toast.  Although you can actually buy Heinz beans in the English Section at one of the local supermarkets, so maybe I should do that!  I love it that they have English food section sandwiched in the “ethnic” area between Indian and Chinese, like we are somehow exotic!  Much of it’s the crap food British people ate back in the 1980s, though, stuff like tinned treacle puddings, but I guess the older Brits must buy it?  Or maybe I am just a snob about food?  Both are probably true!

British politics.  American politics is just screwed: playground arguments that pass for a debate, a divided political class who hate each other, a stagnant and archaic political structure founded 200 years ago that can’t cope with the modern world and makes the British system look almost modern… Okay, maybe not quite, but the situation isn’t good!

Don’t miss

The British weather.  Although the sun in Summer can be oppressive here in Florida, I hate those weeks in Britain when it never gets light and just keeps on raining…

Rude store staff.  I hate it when you are stood at the checkout and the person who is running your stuff through the till is talking to one of their mates and ignoring you.  That doesn’t happen so much in the US.  I find it embarrassing to be British sometimes, when I see how rude some of my fellow countrymen can be.

Tea drinking culture.   Tea and the rituals of making and drinking it are revered in the UK, but I’ve never cared for the stuff, so I don’t miss it.  Give me a mug of coffee and I am happy.  Or better still, a beer!  Not all American beer is crap either.  Only about 2/3 of it.  There are actually some great American breweries and failing that, there is plenty of Continental European stuff to buy too – although  the Americans do insist on selling European beer in small bottles, for some strange reason.

Marmite (yuck yuck yuck!)  Why do British expats go on about Marmite? 

The British royal family  I have never been a big fan of the Royal Family, although I did have fun watching the Will and Kate wedding, I admit.  Actually, when I think about it, there’s actually probably *more* coverage of the Royal Family over here than there is in Britain!

British Celebs that I really can’t stand, but they also moved over here, so it feels like I can’t escape from them!

Russell Brand

The Beckhams

Piers Morgan

British English vs American English: Which is best?

Following on from my last blog, where I mentioned how lots of Americans love the English accent, I thought that I would ‘stick my oar in’ on the old British English vs American English debate.  The most recent incidence of this controversy reared its ugly head a couple of months back, when Matthew Engel announced in an article on the BBC website, that he found Americanisms irritating.  This was then countered by American writer, Grant Barrett who staunchly defended American English.  A debate then ensued with British and American readers joining the (increasingly) heated debate.

I must admit that I am pretty much an anarchist on this matter and have never worried much about the influences on, or particular fate of British English.  I never really minded Americanisms appearing in Britain and I would hate there to ever be some sort of national council sitting to decide the official rules for what words can and can’t be officially used, as happens in France.  I tend to think that the whole thing should be allowed to proceed organically without any artificial “rules” being imposed.  I am also generally skeptical of anti American English opinions expressed in the UK and suspect that they are rooted in snobbery to a greater or lesser degree.

Although there has obviously been interplay between Britain and America for four hundred years or so, the American English invasion never really got going until the 20^th Century when American English expressions started creeping into British English via the American Movie/Film industry.  Before that, British English ruled supreme, thanks to the British Empire.  But as the British Empire declined and the increasingly cool American movie/film stars dominated the popular imagination, all sorts of expressions slipped into the UK.  The process became even more pronounced with the American forces arriving in Britain during World War II, American music coming onto the radio, and more recently, American English expressions arriving via computer and internet technology (e-mail instead of e-post etc).

One possible reason for my own relaxed attitude to English is that I grew up speaking with a regional accent and back in the 1970s, when received English  (“BBC English”) was still seen by some as the “proper” way to talk.  In the class-ridden UK, regional accents were generally looked down upon, which I resented (that said, regional accents became increasingly more accepted by the “well-spoken” from the 1960s onwards and are now pretty much accepted).  Anyway, I think it made me more sympathetic to the attitudes towards language found in the “New World” countries, with their generally more egalitarian approach.

Language is, of course, deeply political.  The Celtic nations in the UK have attempted to bolster and/or revive their traditional languages in recent years, which are associated with a sense of independence and pride.  That makes me wonder how Americans would feel if the situation was reversed with English: if their own American English expressions were gradually disappearing and being replaced by British English equivalents?  Since I began living in the USA, I have noticed that there is a small but significant minority in the USA who feel threatened by what they perceive as an increasing Spanish language influence on their country, especially in the South of the country.  I tend to agree with my fellow British expat blogger, Rob, who argues that America has been a multilingual country pretty much from the beginning and so it is a bit late for people to start complaining.

Anyway, moving swiftly away from the social politics and back to the strictly personal, one practical problem that I have on an everyday level with regard to the British English vs American English debate is, of course, spelling.  When should I use British English spelling, and when should I use American English spelling?  This problem is especially profound when it comes to the internet, which has no national boundaries.  My solution has been to use American English when my writing is mainly aimed at Americans and British English when my writing is aimed at Brits.  And when my writing is aimed at either or both, like with this expat blog, I just spell the words however I like!

Anglophilia: Americans Love the English

I was told by numerous Brits and Americans before I came to the USA that the Americans love the English.  But I didn’t quite believe it until I got here.  Here is an extract from a conversation with my next door neighbour, which is pretty much transcribed word for word:

“Where are you from?” she said.  “You sound foreign!”

“England,” I replied.

“Where?”

“England!”

“Italy?”

“No, England!”

“Oh, England!  I love your accent!  I’ve always wished that the pilgrims had kept their English accents after they got off the boats and we didn’t speak like we do now - you know, with the American accent…”

Okay, the neighbour is slightly dotty, but her general sentiment has been expressed to me over and over since I started visiting US and then living in the USA as a British expat.  Basically, the Americans love the English, and the English accent, although ironically, many Americans can’t locate my own Northern English accent until I tell them where I am from -  I’ve been asked if I am from Australia or Poland many times.

US and UK mugs owned by my wife and I

I guess I should be pleased, but I do find it a little disconcerting sometimes.  I have never been to another country like this.  As an Englishman, I can travel a short distance to parts of Wales, or Ireland, and find people who dislike me because of my nationality and what they perceive it stands for.  Across the Channel, there are French and Germans who will mutter behind your back when you’re at the bar about the “bloody English” (or sentiments to that effect), thinking that if they say it in French or German, no one in your group will understand them.

(Digressing briefly, I once did a similar thing in Berlin, Germany.  There was some awful music playing in a café where I was eating with a German-speaking English friend.  The barmaid had previously been conversing to my friend in fluent German, so I assumed she was German.  Although many Germans speak reasonable English, I was still confident that she wouldn’t understand me when I described the music to my friend as “dross”.  Imagine my surprise when she bellowed at me in a broad Ulster accent: “This music is not dross!  I picked it myself!”)

Anyway, back to Anglophilia, or rather, moving on to its opposite: Anglophobia.  The truth is that there are many negative stereotypes of the English around the world, but these are probably the main ones:

1. The English are arrogant and consider themselves to be superior to everyone else.
2. The English are duplicitous and they play mind games with people (especially when it comes to politics).
3. The English are at best cold and aloof, and at worst, downright cruel, especially with their humour, which they use to berate people that they don’t like.

How true the negative stereotypes are is a matter of opinion, of course, but Americans don’t generally buy into any of them in any significant way, in my experience.  Quite the opposite, in fact, they have all sorts of positive stereotypes (I can feel a little embarrassed sometimes, because I feel sure that I won’t live up to expectations!)

Britain does generally do a good job of projecting itself abroad.  Possibly too well, I sometimes think.  I remember being back in Blighty and working with immigrants from places like India and the West Indes.  They would sometimes tell me how naïve their views on Britain were before they moved there.  They thought that everyone lived in big houses, either in beautiful old cites resembling central London, or in rambling green countryside, and the British people were very polite and civilized.  In reality, of course, lots of people live in grotty inner cities with grey suburbs and the British people can be a pretty surly and miserable bunch at times (unless they’ve had a few drinks in the pub).

There is a tendency in the US culture to look for simple truths and to some extent there is a tendency to split the world’s countries into goodies and baddies, or white hats and black hats, as they say here.  Americans generally prefer cultures that are similar to their own.  I remember reading a survey that showed the American public overall feel most positive about the Canadians, closely followed by the Brits.  I do sometimes feel a little sorry for the peoples that are designated black hats though (generally those people in arab and muslim countries).

Anyway, having said all of the above about Anglophilia, one question still puzzles me: If the Americans are so positive about the English, why does every other American movie seem to cast an Englishman as the leading bad guy?  ;-)

The UK Riots

A Scottish expat living in Canada asked me about the UK riots the other day, when I was playing an online game of draughts or checkers (the name varies according to which side of the Atlantic you hail from).  They dropped the subject when they found out that I was living in Florida nowadays.  The joke is that I know as much about the riots now, as a British expat, as I probably would have done living in Britain.  Because of the internet, my news sources regarding the riots in the UK are exactly the same here in the USA as they were in the UK, mainly the BBC and The Guardian online (although I can also get pretty much get any US or UK tv channel or newspaper over the internet).

I have lived in numerous places in the UK, but spent much of my adult years in the Leeds area, which strangely enough, was largely unaffected by the UK riots.  I say strangely because Leeds is a big city with some very rough areas and bleak housing estates.  The Chapeltown area, which I know well, rioted back in the 1980s riots, but there was relatively little trouble there this time around.  I have lived, or spent quite a bit of time in some of the English inner city areas that were affected, however, including Dalston in London, Manchester in the North, and Leicester in the Midlands.

I must admit that I wasn’t surprised that there was rioting in the UK.  The sudden drop in living standards caused by the recession was likely to spark trouble at some point.  Plus, for some reason, there often tends to be more disorder when the Conservatives are in power (although that may well be because they are usually voted into power at times of economic struggle).  But like most people, I was shocked by the form that the riots took, with mobs of amoral underclass youths looting at will.  It seemed almost medieval in character.  I’ve heard the UK riots described as ‘shopping with violence’, and it seems difficult to disagree with that assessment.

Everybody looks into the smouldering ashes of the burnt out shops and cars and sees what they want to see at the end of the day and I am probably no different, but here is my take: In recent times, the UK seems to have lurched from crisis to crisis: the MPs’ expenses scandal, the police getting bribes from the News of the World, bankers awarding themselves massive bonuses despite being kept afloat by huge public bailouts, and now the inner city riots...  I am on the centre left politically, but strangely enough I found myself agreeing with an article in the (conservative) Daily Telegraph, namely that:

“The culture of greed and impunity we are witnessing on our TV screens stretches right up into corporate boardrooms and the Cabinet. It embraces the police and large parts of our media. It is not just its damaged youth, but Britain itself that needs a moral reformation.”

Over here in the US, the problems are no better, but they take a different form, with political polarization virtually paralyzing the government and all the cross party consensus of previous years seeming to evaporate in the new, vitriolic atmosphere. 

The world is not in a good place at the moment.

Further Reading

An American expat in the UK talks about her experience of living in the capital during the London riots in the Telegraph:  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/expatlife/8697385/Expat-in-London-my-fear-during-the-riots-gave-way-to-pride.html

Telegraph: London and UK riots: 50 powerful images: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/picturegalleries/uknews/8693000/London-and-UK-riots-50-powerful-images.html

Blowing my own trumpet (and 10 other peoples!)

In the second and final part of my reflective expat blog posts, I thought it would be a good time to recap some history of my British expat blog and give some of the positives that have occurred over this time.  Despite having blogged extensively in the past on sites such as Myspace, I wasn’t actually sure what or where I would go with this blog when I started out.  I did want it to have some sort of definite theme that I could hang my experiences around, rather than just writing a general blog about whatever random thoughts came into my head.  I flapped around in some of the early posts, looking for a style and plan.  

For instance, I tried writing about my experience of the K1 fiance visa process as posts, but after a while I decided that they were too dry for a general consumption (unless you have gone through, or are going through the process, you really don’t want to know about the relationship proof requirements for the I-129 Petition, or the financial support documents needed to support an I-485 Green Card application).  In the end, I put my visa experiences in in their own separate blog which I imaginatively named: My K1 Fiance Visa Experience.

Titles were also something that I toyed around with.  The “From Sheep to Alligators” name was actually the third title I tried, but I felt happy with it enough to make up a unique banner header using an old alligator picture and Adobe Photoshop.

Features and Blog Award

My expat blog about living in Florida has featured online in various websites and online publications, including 'The smart-insegors Daily', the online publication of the expat website for professionals, Insego, which I would heartily recommend as a friendly place to visit if you want an intelligent debate, information and advice or just a place to fraternize with other expats.

Australian blogger, Robynne from Robynne's Nest gave me a versatile blogger award, which I will display here below (I guess the term ‘versatile’ maybe fits, as I tend to mix up my blog with humour, trivia and serious discussions).  I am not quite sure what I am supposed to do with the award, but I do appreciate it.  Do I award it to someone else after I’ve finished with it, or just leave it to gather dust on my virtual mantelpiece?

Reddit

Early on, I got into putting links to some of my posts on the Social Bookmarking site, Reddit.  Two of my humorous posts got voted up the rankings and each received over 3,000 straight after they were posted.  I enjoyed the rush of 4 digit viewing figures, but I must admit that I felt a pang of relief when the party was over and my blog stats returned to their normal 15-50 visitors per day!

Google Traffic

I must admit that, unlike blogs that I have written in the past, I have deliberately courted Google traffic with this one, picking my keywords and tags carefully.  The nice thing about Google traffic is that people come to your blog even when you haven’t written anything new for a while (if I was ever to cease writing, I would probably continue to get 20-30 views a day from Googlers). 

The Blogger stats tell me how people have reached me.  It is amazing how many people want to know about Lake Alice, brown sauce and bacon butties!  There are also some strange ones.  Because I have written about the different names for underwear in Britain and the USA and my blog is called From Sheep to Alligators, I get visitors coming to my blog who have typed in Google searches for “sheep knickers” and “alligator underpants”, which strikes me as a little, urm, unusual.

The Google searchers are usually casual strangers, however.  So they crop up in viewer stats, but don’t tend to write comments.  I still like my loyal followers, the ones who like to comment and make some online banter, some of whom I know or have known in person, but many of whom have come from cyberspace and the blogosphere.

Pimping: Top 10 Best British Expat Blogs in USA

Last but not least, I pimped some of the other British expat bloggers in my Hubpages article: Top 10 Best BritishExpat Blogs in USA.  Keep on writing folks!