Englishmen's guide to New England - Day 2

Portion Size

Now I touched on this yesterday. [http://theblackcountryprophet.blogspot.com/2012/03/englishmans-guide-to-new-england-day-1.html] Portion sizes in New England are something of a feat. For a humble englishman, who is normally proud of his eating prowess, where eating a large Domino's Pizza is a matter of normallity, meals are something of an enigma - 2 parters, sharers.

One plate = 2 people?

That's unpossible.

Here's some massive, luminous American stuff.

I've tapped into an American tradition, however. The old 'doggy bag', which is actually more of a polypropy-whatchamacallit box, has been used to great effect, transporting some of New England's finest 'Lobster Pie'.

It seems that you can take the Wolverhampton man out of the Black Country, but the Blackcountry is ever present in him.

Advertising

Coach Carter is a good film, no? Well it is when you are able to watch it without Amica Insurance rearing their ugly consumer heads every six minutes.

6 minutes of programming equals 5 minutes of advertising.

I had to stay up for 3 hours to watch that damn film. Knowing that I had fallen exactly into their trap of being hooked on a suspense-filled moment, was the worst thing. I knew what was happening and still filed off the edge of the cliff in true Lemming style.

But, like all true Brits, I stood in that visual queue, waited patiently, and thanked them for their programming even though I was hollow inside.


Consumerism sucks. (How American is that ya'll ?)

Here is a typical American advertising format:

"Hi, I'm from [insert faceless corporation name here]. [Smile inanely] We're great. We provide [this service]. Here is an actor we've paid to pretend to be a contented customer to tell you that we are also great."

"Hi, I'm a contented customer." Cut to another contented customer.

"I'm also content with their service."

Then, if it's a drug commercial, masses of disclaimers so you can't sue if your liver falls off due to its usage.

Salem

Why is New England called New England, I hear you say.

Well, it's where the Puritans orginally arrived from their pilgrimage out of Plymouth, England, so what did they do first, named it Plymouth.

Years later, some girls heard some stories of withcraft and started damning people for witchcraft which the puritanical people wholely believed and executed the accusees.

So we went to Salem, where occult people, who looked very much like greebos, were selling cheesy, withcraft related items.

It seemed like they were bagging up soil, labelling it 'Love Potion' and selling it for 15 dollars.

Great system!

Here's me as a witch: