In a moment of pure inspiration and boredom Fabs has compiled a list of things we have seen which can be considered "Only in America......", plus a few general comments on the culture that is prevalent in the US of A.

Some crazy things that happen in the US include

1) 3 girls getting it on in a club at 3am in the morning. Turns out the girls were part of a swingers group, which makes me wonder what the hell the guys were doing!

2) 2 african americans playing fisticuffs on the corner near our hotel in Reno. After circling each other for a few moments and throwing some loose punches, one of the men retreated to where a bicycle was resting against a wall and promptly picked it up and threw it at his enemy, who then picked up the bike and rode away....

3) Upon a visit to one of the many casinos in Reno, I checked out a poker game being played between the dealer and about 5 patrons. One of the players, whilst the dealer was shuffling the cards and dealing the next hand, began marking exam papers....nothing like bringing work home is there?

4) A bar in Vegas, located within one of the casinos is actually called the "Coyote Ugly". It is exactly like the movie, really busy, 90% male, and hot girls dancing on the bars - whilst we couldnt afford to go in back then, Steve and I will hopefully frequent this establishment next time we visit.

5) A man tried to sell me ecstacy in the hotel elevator in Reno. Enough said.

6) At a great bar in Reno, called Knuckleheads, every Tuesday and Thursday is college night. This means that for cover charge (free for laides of course!) you get 50c beers and bottom shelf from 9-10, then 75c from 10-11 and $1 from 11-12. Following this there is a wet t-shirt competition which is great fun and people in the audience are given supersoakers. Fabs would like to go on record as saying that the competition is degrading to women and should not be attempted by people at home. Having said that I am currently dating the contestant who came second. No bull.

7) Went and saw the Wailers (Bob Marley's old band) in Incline Village at the Hyatt. I use the term "saw" loosely as the cloud of pot smoke over the crowd made visibility poor.

8) On that note, at various mornings going up in the Funitel(a cable car with each car holding up to 28 people) to my place of work (which is half way up the mountain) the Squaw Valley Lift Operators sometimes pass around a peacepipe (at about 8am in the morning). This is not a comforting thought considering they are responsible for machinery with ther ability to kill people. Hmmm......

9) American people seem to be a very indifferent people. Their response to any question requiring yes or no as an answer is "sure". An example may be "Do you mind if I beat the shit out of you with a 2 by 4?" "Sure." It is enfuriating.

10) Hitch-hiking is popular practice in the Lake Tahoe area. But it can be difficult for a group of 3 to get a ride. One night we were hitching and Tina was out thumbing a ride whilst Steve and I were leaning against a wall, in the shadows. Finally a car pulled over and as Steve and I ran from the shadows to join Tina the car sped off quickly, most likely the driver was in fear of their life.

11) Having said that, I have hitched a ride from a pro snowboarder (the type you see on the gnarly videos set to punk music), a vice-president from Tyco Corporation (Fortune 500 Toy Company)and a handful of hippies and locals from the Tahoe area. The region is obsessed with karma. If they help you now they believe they will be looked after in the future. If and when Steve and I get a car when we do our big tour of the US we will pay back the karma, especially if the hitch-hiker is a hot chick.

12) America, although advanced in so many ways, is remarkably barbaric in others. Not only do they still use the Imperial system of measurments (feet, yards, pounds etc) but they still use pennies (1 cent pieces). This is incredibly shit because state tax (eg CA 7.25%) is added on after sub-totalling a bill, leading to really shitty change for everyone. To counter this, cashiers in the US (such as myself) have a bucket of pennies which have accumulated over time through peoples spare change being tossed into the tip jar, and are used to balance the till such that the customer gets decent change - nothing smaller than a nickel (5c).

13) The TV here is unbelievable! There are so many reality TV shows it is hard to watch them all. Examples inlcude...

Joe Millionaire - a dumb construction worker is made out to be a dollar heir and 25 girls have to try and marry him. At the end he tells them he makes ,000 a year and doenst own shit.

Taildaters - 2 people go on a blind date and their friends, watching the date on tv, send them sms messages with advice.

Blind Date - another dating show but the shows produces put funny captions on the screen, making fun of the inadequacies of the two contestants. It is excellent.

Meet my Folks - One guy has 5 hot chicks move inot his house and he has to date them all (manuy hot tub scenes) but his parents can see everything he is doing, which leads to some....."awkward" moments.

With all this quality programming it is difficult to see how Americans can find time to get any work done!

14) Popular cuisine here includes New England Clam Chowder and Ice Tea. Unfortunately Vegemite and Fosters are frowned upon and foodstuffs.

15) Although not a surprise, of the majority of Yanks I have asked, hardly any had ever heard of Bali, let alone what happened there last October.
16) Cars tend to be extremely couteous to pedetrians who almost always have right of way. This is good for us because we dont have a car and therefore are almost aways peds.

Ok, that will do for now, hope to keep with list slowly crawling along with fascinating facts about the US - well, facts at least.

Fabs