No matter where you fall in the religious spectrum, you can get behind the Rabbit of Easter. He bring of the chocolate — and that, quite frankly, is a bunny miracle that none of us want to examine too closely. 
We are in Ireland for our second Easter, so some of the subtleties of the season have become more apparent. (more…)
There are many things that I love about living in Ireland. There are a few things that annoy or trouble me. But there is one thing that I clearly hate — the fact that butter comes in a single chunk of butter — 454 grams, to be precise. Why is it 454 grams, you ask? Because that is as close to one pound of butter as you can get in metric terms.
I could deal with a big block of butter if only there were measurements on the wrapping.
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Through a FOIA request submitted this summer, it has come to the Bugle’s attention that all American tourists travelling to Europe received the following instructions:
From: North American Tourist Authority
To: US and Canadian Citizens bound for Europe
Date: [redacted]Dear US and/or Canadian citizens bound for Europe,
Tourists from North America have always been drawn together by the sound of their non-British accents. For decades, the Standard Greeting among these travelers was, “Where are you from?” or “Where ya from?” or some variation thereof.
As of [redacted], 2008, the new Standard Greeting is “So, what about this election, huh?” Please use this Greeting when encountering any person with a non-British accents in Foreign Countries.
An image of the letter, as received by the Bugle in response to our FOIA request, is available in PDF form.
The Bugle already sent a letter to the President of NATA with the following message:
We respectfully request that American expatriates receive timely notice of any future changes in the Standard Greeting. NATA should be aware that expatriates with American accents may be disoriented when visiting tourist sites around Europe without having prepared a Suitable Response to a new Greeting.
That is all.
Ordinary Dubliners want to talk about the coming election for the US Presidency, given any excuse. In fact, the Europeans we meet want to talk about the coming election, given any excuse.
And everybody talks about the American economy, but especially Americans.
All that is by way of introduction to two podcast episodes that I found fascinating and accurate in representing the mainstream of English-speaking European thought about the US. (more…)
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Hating and Haters: A Conversation
As the steward of this blog, I unilaterally decided to draw attention to an ongoing discussion about international enmity that’s occupied the comments for a few old posts. Most of the discussion occurs in response to two posts: Do You Hate the British Too? and Now I do hate the British.
The word “hate” was excessive in both titles, but it did generate some worthwhile discussion (and a whole lot of traffic from the Google search engines). I ask that those who want to continue the discussion make comments on this post from now on. Feel free to link to old comments, or quote them, if you want to make specific references to the comments to date.
I’ll contribute by writing the following in this post, rather than in a comment on an old post. (more…)