American wet dream

I write this from a business park in the mid-south of America, having achieved a long held ambition in defeating an erupting volcano. I’m not getting too cocky though as it might yet trip me up on the return leg, the horrific consequences of which would be a weekend in New York paid for by my company. Those African kids just don’t know what they are bitching about.

I arrived in the States last Friday, with the intention of being looked after by a group that are friends of a friend. I wasn’t sure what to expect, not having travelled here since a trip to Disneyland when I was kid, my most prevailing memory of which is agonising crotch chaffing after a day spent running around in wet shorts at a water park. I had no expectations in so far as what this group would be like, but from my vast experience of American sit-coms I thought there was certain to be witty jibes, whacky misadventures culminating in a moral life lesson, and at least one member of the group would be semi-retarded.

What I got, as I walked into their flat at around 10.30am, was the sound of one girl vomiting in the bathroom, and a beer cheerfully offered to me by a hung-over Australian with visible teeth marks on his shoulder. I knew at this moment that these were my kind of people.

The rest of the day was spent visiting museums, going to various tourist spots and seeing some splendid examples American architecture. No, just kidding, we went to a load of bars and got wasted. Of the blurred memories that have stuck to me, I recall on several occasions breaking the promise to myself to not discuss politics, aware as I was of the deep dividing lines over here, and the fact that the standard punch I’d receive in Europe would most likely be upgraded to a bullet in the face. I can however report that Republicans, as I have witnessed them, do not all have hideously oversized foreheads, nor do they seem to feast on the children of brown people while reciting Nazi literature. That said, I’ve only been here a few days.

The group holding my hand through the NY experience were all fantastically open and friendly. There are Swiss people I’ve known for two years whose marital status I have no idea about. Within literally minutes of being introduced to the Americans I was aware of the fact that one of them is currently seeking via the internet a small slave boy for the purposes of sadomasochistic domination.

Anyway, I was extremely sorry to leave New York to head to my office in Princeton. Not nearly as sorry, however, as the driver of the car who picked me up on Sunday morning and had to scrape me into the back of car, a quivering mess on the precipice of a vomit session which would have filled his massive SUV to the brink.