American Stuff

My cousin and other expats talk about how being in a different country makes you appreciate and miss your own country.

I think my cousin believes that if I come to live in Australia, I will be like her and miss America.

Well, the funny thing is, I'm actually still IN America, and I kind of miss it.

This summer has been so totally about Australia.  We watch an Australian TV show. I have been sometimes forgetting to speak with my American accent.   Most of friends are Australian.   I write in a blog about Australia. I do research about Australia.  Lately, all the music I listen to is Australian.

In some weird way, I'm already a bit homesick for America.

So in honor of my homesickness, I decided to write a post celebrating that which I currently love about my own country.

Here be my list.

1. Stephen Colbert--He doesn't make me proud to be American, but he makes me feel okay about being American.  He can make me take a break from hating our government....fearing it, and have me laughing at it instead.   I rarely watch his show anymore, but when I do, I almost always end up laughing hysterically.  I think he's so funny that he doesn't even really have to say anything funny.   I just look at him and laugh.  Oh!  And I love when he struggles to keep a straight face. He's too cute when he does that.  

2. My TV Shows!   I love McLeod's Daughters, but I really miss my American shows, and I can't wait for them to come back on. My current favorite American shows are Medium, Eli Stone, and Lost.  Well, Lost is kind of Australian related too since the fated plane did take off from Sydney.

3. American authors.   The funny thing is one of my favorite books about Australia was written by an American.   Blue Latitudes by Tony Horowitz.   I highly recommend that book to anyone interested in Captain Cook and all that stuff.  And I also love another Australian book written by an American. In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson.

I love a lot of popular American fiction writers: Stephen King, Anne Rice, Pat Conroy, John Irving, and a lot of less known authors as well.   

4. Joshua Radin.   I got into his music after hearing it on Eli Stone. I'm not big into music and usually do not get interested in a specific artist.  I'm one of those people who never knows what's going on in the music world.   You guys could probably tell that from my post about my favorite Australian music.    I didn't really have anything current on my list.

But I love Radin's music.

5. Chocolate Rain.   I didn't even know about this until my friend told me about it.   It is a huge YouTube phenomena and I totally missed it. I thought it was very creepy when I first heard it and then I found myself wanting to hear it over and over.   I like the song.   I love that some guy wrote a song, recorded it, put it on YouTube, and then became famous.  I also love all the parodies.

6. Americans.   I love the people who live in my country. Close to half of us didn't vote for Bush, and I think many of those who did now regret it.   Yes, we're a bit ignorant about what's going on in the world, and yes we're very ethnocentric.  But most of us are fairly okay.   As a whole, we're pretty decent humans--okay, even some of those who still support Bush. As Jesus said."Forgive them for they know not what they do."  



Below is the first Joshua Radin song I've ever heard.   I'm waiting for someone to put the clip from Eli Stone up on YouTube, but no one has yet.  So, here is a VERY awesome cover by FabTheGap.   BTW, He's not American OR Australian.