away too long..

ponderings / north america / away too long..

these quotes are taken from the brits abroad site and there are plenty more where these came from!

you may have been away too long when ...

• you're in a british supermarket and you wait till all the food has piled up before realizing that you'll have to bag it yourself!! [from pin rangar in LosT Angeles]
• you watch the brit awards late night on some obscure channel and want to cry and wish you could hear some decent music in the states. -- paul lyons from manchester now LA
• you start telling people to have a nice day [neil from warrington]
• you turn your head to people who speaks English [ruth wong in hong kong]
• you return to the UK, rent a car and can't decide which side you're going to describe as the "wrong side of the road" [sean lord from blackpool]
• although you knew the pub was going to close at 11.00pm you are genuinely suprised when it really does.. [mark from vienna (originally shrewsbury)]
• you wonder what to do at a roundabout [brian phelps from wales]
• your own kids born in the uk like you start to make fun of your accent!! [a. wells from cheshire]
• you can't tell if someone is from london or australia [eunice from london]
• you land at heathrow, go in a restaurant and ask for hot tea [peg hardy from bury, manchester]
• the smell of the grass after a rainfall brings tears to your eyes [rosemary rehill from ludlow, salop. now philadelphia]
• you start craving eastenders, corrie, and brookie. even worse, you find yourself plugged into their web sites at all hours of the day. [catisfaction from haywards heath, sussex ,now CA] you start thinking the english accent sounds kind of weird. [mark hinton from calgary, formally rugby]
• peanut butter and jelly sandwiches sound good [cel from braintree, essex]
• it slowly dawns on you that Britain IS ACTUALLY A SMALL ISLAND! [paula suckling from london [21 yrs in Canada]
• you hear on the news that marks & spencers are closing all canadian stores & you have a panic attack!! [actually true folks] [paula suckling from london [21 yrs in canada]) you spend too much time watching bbc america on the satellite and realise how much the BBC really was [even though it has a lot of ads over here]. [martin williamson from hampshire]
• you happily put syrup on french toast [eggy-bread] [daniel bell from savannah GA]
• the relatives in England tell you to get rid of that silly twang! [elizabeth batt, originally leicester, now CA]
• you don't hesitate before turning right on red. [emma nason from Houston, via leamington spa]
• you feel OK about living in a wooden house! [anon from london now baltimore]

you know you're not in britain anymore when...

• you need a social security number to have the garbage collected from outside your house [from rodger macfarlane]
• everyone keeps wishing you "happy holidays" at christmas. [from gerry in MI]
• you call your mother to tell her you were doing "yard work" and she says she was gardening! [paula sebusch from (yorkshire, england) arizona]
• nobody knows what marks & spencers is. [anonymous]
• in a restaurant you get offered the cold half eaten remains of your dinner offered to you in a small bag. [giles snare from boston, MA]
• your not drinking with one eye on the clock waiting for a bell to ring [ian joshua from swansea (now NYC)]