Reply #19: I saw a post the other day

[mr blur]

somewhere or other where some guy in Texas who proudly said that he had never been out of Texas (and didn't want to be) was sneering at England for our "non-existent health care" and "lousy cuisine". Considering that every high street here now has McDonalds and all the other fast-food crap that the US has exported around the world, this was almost too dumb to take offence at. Presumably "fine cuisine" consists of some slab of barely-dead cow accompanied by enough starch and carbohydrates to keep your average non-US family going for a week.

When I was on vacation in Florida a few years ago we took our son to what passed for a restaurant and a guy (preumably noticing that we "talked funny") asked me where we were from. I said "London" but I might as well have said "Venus". He looked stunned and asked, "But...but.. how did you get here?!" Er... on a plane. Anyone can do it - you get on in London and get off it in the US. People do it all the time. You should try it sometime.