Hello friends,

This particular Welshman's only previous visits across the Atlantic were to Barbados to play cricket (alas your correspondent is currently grappling with the very real anguish of a sportsman who gets to his late twenties and realises his body can't do it as well as it used to anymore so no more international cricket tours for me ), but had yet to actually visit the Land Of The Free™.

As it happens though, I took a feel-better-about-being-30-by-blowing-huge-sums-of-money trip with a few pals to Las Vegas a few weeks back, and then two weeks later I was sent back by work to the Microsoft Ignite conference in Orlando. Super awesome y'all. In no particular order are my musings over this cultural exchange, as they come to mind. I anticipate that I'm going to be misdirected on a few things as I don't think either of these places would be representative of the USA as a whole but I encourage you to tell me where I'm getting it wrong:

  1. My first point, and this is perhaps the most important: what is it with your toilet water level guys. It's too high. I don't like getting my knees splashed every time I go to the john. Is it like this everywhere?
  2. Your cars are huge, but so are your roads so I suppose it cancels out. It would be impossible to scootle a Nissan Armada around the windy hill lanes of Felinfoel.
  3. I can't help prefixing every adjective with the word 'super' now
  4. Everywhere I went was super clean and tidy. I expect this a bit more in the touristy areas like Vegas but we even stopped at a few middle-of-nowhere towns in Arizona once on the way to Antelope Canyon and it was the same deal. It makes me wonder what the hell my Council Tax is paying for
  5. PAVEMENTS JUST RANDOMLY STOP AND I DON'T KNOW WHERE TO GO IN ORDER TO CONTINUE
  6. Food portions are bigger and I feel guilty af when I can't finish them. I like that they just fill your coffee back up for free. For guys who seem to have cheese on everything, y'all need better cheese
  7. Boneless wings are a thing, who knew. God bless America
  8. I found myself craving vegetables, I'm not gonna lie
  9. Staff everywhere are friendlier, maybe it's just British miserableness but everyone just seemed generally more cheerful about everything
  10. I went to a baseball game and was in the queue for a hot dog when the tannoy says it was time for the national anthem and holy trout. Everybody in the stadium stopped chatting/eating/walking, including the guys serving hotdogs and started singing the anthem. I had to pretend to play along even though I don't know the words. If we even tried that stuff back home very few people would stop what they were doing if they were in the middle of something, half wouldn't sing and at least 40% would just ignore it altogether
  11. They also sung this song half way through and absolutely everyone got involved. I couldn't believe it
  12. Also if Americans like baseball I can't understand why they apparently wouldn't like cricket. It's just baseball except in 360 degrees and you bounce the ball at them. Dare I say the game is also a bit more fast paced. You don't need those giant catching gloves either, trust me guys it doesn't really hurt (much)
  13. I feel like I'm violating every natural law when I turn right at a red light, but at the same time it feels good
  14. Maple syrup on everything
  15. Single use plastic
  16. Do you really ID everybody for booze?
  17. Free open wifi networks errywhere. I'm used to it being free but having to ask someone for the password or having to go through a ridiculous form system to sign your details away before you get entry (I'm looking at you Wetherspoons), so I enjoyed this
  18. My partner asked for tea and got iced tea
  19. Adverts for various drugs on TV is the most bizarre experience ever. "Side effects include severe internal bleeding" spoken over images of a middle aged bloke smiling broadly while playing frisbee with his family
  20. On American roads you feel like you're doing about 70 when you're actually doing 102 and you've just driven past a police car
  21. I'm sorry guys but I just do not get fluid ounces
  22. In all my hotels and throughout the conference centre it was too damn cold. Air con was set about 2 degrees (C) too low. I was freezing by backside off, but going outside was obviously not a good idea either. Strangely I got used to this after a week
  23. There is always some sort of sport going on. Every bar and restaurant has tons of TVs showing something or other
  24. I missed the whole Ryder Cup and am not happy about this


More as and when I think of them