I'm Back...

...and indeed I have been for a while. Two weeks.

The States were great. Wedding was lovely, Buckeyes won their football game, my family are fine. And I love New York. I love it because you can walk around it, I love it because of its history, I love it because they take pizza and cheesecake with the seriousness that both require.

Mostly I love it because - well, I love America, and Americans, though I was not fond of their last administration. But sometimes the sheer cheeriness and earnestness gets a little overwhelming when you come from a culture where shop assistants ignore you unless you ask for help, and taking things seriously is a rarity in social discourse. New Yorkers are funny, talk fast, and say stuff they don't mean. The guy behind the counter at the World Trade Center memorial sold me a keyring and looked me in the eye maybe once, because he was busy kidding his friend that he was a psycho about to go on a rampage.

I could have hugged both of them.