What do you call a snake with no clothes on?

Il Capo and Nanny were out working in the garden during the recent hot weather when a snake passed them and headed up the path towards the house.



Il Capo shouted after it,

"There's no one home."

No I'm kidding. what she actually shouted was

"Holy Christ! Snake! SNAKE!"

When it reached the house it seemed to disappear, which hardly put these two ladies at their ease.  In fact that evening, Nanny moved her bed from underneath the window, so nothing would slither onto her in the night.



The following weekend we were at a barbecue at our next door neighbours' when someone noticed a snake on their drive.  A group of us trooped round from the back of the house to look at it.  Not Il Capo or Nanny, they didn't want to appreciate it.  It was a garter snake, about eighteen inches long. 



Like this one:

We stood around it in a crescent, which made it nervous and it moved onto our drive.



"Uh oh", said I.  "My wife won't like that", and I called Son Number One to help me drive it away from the house.  He was very excited by this duty and may not have been paying complete attention because even though it was between him and the house he ran straight at it, giggling.  The snake accelerated away towards our front door.  I overtook him and stood in the way, but as far as the snake was concerned I was not nearly as scary as a laughing child waving his arms and it went right past me and hid in a bush beside the front door.



Not a wholly successful manoeuvre maneuver.



I broke the news to the ladies that we had relocated the snake to three feet from our door.



They took it remarkably well, considering.



P.S. Snaked!

Barbecue - a comparison

When we lived in the UK, we had a barbecue. It looked like this.

We didn't bring it because for some reason it got rusty being outside during a British summer.  US customs don't like you importing rusty things.  Seriously, they don't like rust and will impound your belongings if you try and bring in rusty stuff.



Now we are living in a place where you can expect sun during the summer, I thought we should get a new barbecue, or grill as they are known here.  We went to Home Depot and I saw this.



It's got cupboards and drawers and it's even got a fridge for the beer and a roof so you can grill in the rain!  I'm currently in negotiation with Il Capo over its purchase.  As I keep stressing to her, if she ever threw me out the house, I could live in the grill!

Lunar Phase

A local student has been arrested and charged for something he did at a graduation ceremony. His actions prompted the Schools Superintendent to write to him.

"I deeply resent the fact that the Briarcliff community will have to erase the ugliness of your despicable act from what should be a completely beautiful memory that enriches their lives", she wrote.

If you don't want to see what he did, don't click here.

It looks like I'm going back to school

I have applied for my New York driving licencse. A local license is useful both as a universal ID and also because without one, car insurance premiums are close to treble.

You might think that having been driving for twenty years, having driven more than 200,000 miles, having never had an accident, (cough) well, not on the road, that getting a license would a a simple procedure. In a word, no.

I went to the DMV and got a provisional licence, or learner's permit. I won't go into huge detail about the DMV, except to say the staff seemed friendly and completely unaware that we visitors would prefer not to stay the whole day. Once I'd had my photo taken, a test was sprung upon me. There were two 16-year-olds, a girl with her older boyfriend and a boy with his mother (and that right there says so much about being 16), plus me and a German man. It was twenty multiple choice questions of which seven were about driving drunk. One of the other questions was:

Road rage is:
a) not an offense in New York
b) illegal, but allowed the first time.
c) understandable if someone cuts you up
d) a serious crime, punishable by 1-3 years in prison.

I managed to pass the test and got my learner's permit. I assumed the next step was a driving test, but reading up on the subject, I discover I first have to pass a five hour course where I will get a certificate that I then take to the test as proof. I'm not sure how much of the course is practical or theory, but seeing as the average charge for the five hours is $50, I assume that it will not be one-to-one tuition. So it looks like I'll be spending a Saturday in a classroom with a bunch of American school-kids.



It's going to be great

Interceptor

Interceptor. Isn't that a cool word? When I hear interceptor, I think of several things. I may think of the Jensen Interceptor, six litrers of V8, chrome-covered 70s fuel-gobbler.



Alternatively, I may think of this car:



I may even think of Annabel Croft



So, interceptor means power, it means charisma, it means catching bad guys and looking cool.

New York Police Department obviously feel the same way, because they drive around Manhattan in the Westward Industries Interceptor:



Whenever there's a need for a three-wheeled, sub 40mph pursuit with optional milk delivery, the Interceptor is there.

New York Bingo #4

Not strictly a bingo, but I'll crowbar it in anyway.

Il Capo, driving on the highway was overtaken by a man on a Honda Goldwing - jeans, t-shirt, helmet, and poking out of the helmet clamped between gritted teeth was a fat cigar.

Smoking a cigar while riding a bike at 60mph, is that not the embodiment of the American Dream?

A Hendricks by the Hudson

I see in the news that Boris Johnson has banned alcohol from the tube, probably prompting most people to respond, "You mean I was allowed to drink on the Underground?"

This brings to mind the beer at Grand Central Terminal.

New York has a different attitude about alcohol from the UK. Some rules seem more relaxed, others more rigid. It's complicated.

• The UK is more relaxed, look at the 18 age limit on buying alcohol compared with 21 in New York.
• New York is more relaxed, look at the closing times, usually 11.00pm in the UK compared with well past my bedtime (4am) here.
• The UK is more relaxed, watch TV and you will see alcohol all over the place, on US TV people who drink are usually mad, bad or dangerous to know.
• New York is more relaxed, the spirits liquor measures are almost twice the size (45ml to 25ml) and it's half the price.
• The UK is more relaxed, you can buy all your alcohol in supermarket, in New York supermarkets only sell beer. If you want wine or spirits, you have to go to a liquor store (which isn't allowed to sell beer).
• New York is more relaxed, people in the UK have been refused alcohol in supermarkets because they were accompanied by their teenage children, because they are accompanied by their 47-year-old mother, because they are foreigners, even for attempting to buy barbecue sauce without ID. In the UK you have to accept the judgment of the check-out girl as to whether you are a suitable customer.

As I say, it's complicated.

Anyway let me tell you about Grand Central Terminal. The best way to visualise Grand Central is as a large fork, with the main concourse that you see in the films as the head of the fork, and all the platforms laid out like the prongs. To make it more accurate, imagine your fork has 30 prongs and then another layer of 17 prongs underneath (Grand Central's platforms are all underground).

Now imagine you have a long chip French fry on the end of your fork. Actually, two large French fries, one on each layer of tines. These fries are tunnels that allow access to the platforms from the wrong end which is great for me as they exit just two blocks from my office.

Now, ask me what they sell in these French fry tunnels?

Beer and liquor. There are several concession stands selling a variety of beers as well as whiskey and vodka to commuters. You can buy a can of beer or a miniature bottle of liquor, unopened from a man behind a cart, in a tunnel, in a station.

Just knowing I can buy a couple of shots of gin on the journey home makes the working day seem a much more pleasant prospect.