I'm glad we have a holiday (shared with Canada) called Thanksgiving. The menu has become ritualized by region, and people tend to travel long distances (it's the most heavily traveled holiday in the US).
It's in a different month and day for Canadians (October and a Monday). But turkey and pumpkin pie are good any time. It's got more of a thankful for harvest feel. Arguments about what to stuff a turkey with is probably a tangent. I alternate between a bread stuffing and wild rice.
I'm glad we have a holiday (shared with Canada) called Thanksgiving. The menu has become ritualized by region, and people tend to travel long distances (it's the most heavily traveled holiday in the US).
Arguments about what to stuff a turkey with is probably a tangent. I alternate between a bread stuffing and wild rice.
When I lived in South Carolina, it was cornbread stuffing. Or oyster stuffing.
Jim Reeves, however, may well have believed that the plural possessive adjective was correct in the line "I've got a dream house, I'll build their one day."
Maybe he also knew that "their" is a pronoun, not an adjective.
Watching that Thanksgiving video nearly made me regret starting this thread ...
Bloody hell fire ...
Still, I now know that Canada celebrates Thanksgiving too. I didn't know that. Who said the Ship wasn't educational?
'Over the river and through the wood ...?'
What's this? Hansel and Gretel?
Bah humbug!
Not sure what you find so objectionable about something that has had a great deal of meaning for me and others. Have you no childhood songs you fondly remember?
Taking the mickey and j"ust teasing" are recurring excuses.
That song predates condos btw.We used to sing that song on the way to my grandparents' farm. Have a go at that, why not.
Next time you you want to start a thread about what's good about a country not your own, you might want to accept that people in that country might actually have memories you don't understand.
Why exactly did you start this thread again? Feels like a set up now.
You're still using the teasing excuse? Interesting. Continuing to claim that I refuse to be teased is a bit much. Does the teaser and the teaser only get to call the shot here? Interesting again.
Read your OP, then read your post about my memory.
I no longer feel this thread was started in good faith.
Your public and international radio stations do some very interesting programmes. I have learnt a lot from listening in occasionally and get a fresh perspective.
This was started as a positive thread and it would be great if it stayed that way. If the argument is worth having, take it to Hell. If it's not, drop it.
Fair do's, but I don't see how making fun of certain things constitutes a breach of good faith.
The OP is about good things to come out of America. Not everyone is going to agree on what those good things are.
Besides, I'd like to think that any gentle ribbing I've done on this thread is just that, gentle ribbing. I've also said plenty of positive things and applauded others for doing the same and I will continue to do so as long as this thread lasts.
I confess that there's always a chance that I could derail it and the comments I made to Sabine were probably the closest I came to doing so.
It's not a transatlantic chauvinism thing. If someone posted a twee video of some kiddies song from any Anglophone country I'd be tempted to have the same kind of reaction. I'm Welsh and pretty sentimental but find saccharine hard to take - but our respective milages will vary on that one.
If I saw a bunch of kids singing that song as they trudged through the snow to their Grandma's in the woods, I'd probably be moved by it.
It doesn't sound like an authentic US folk song to me, though but I'm probably wrong. It sounded too manufactured for that, but perhaps that was more a feature of the production values of the video clip itself. There are cultural differences, of course and I recognise that.
I'm certainly not cynical about nostalgia, family life and such - but I dunno, it sounded too much like something out of the Waltons rather than The Simpsons.
Now where have I heard that before?
I'm sure I could get dewy eyed on an Appalachian farm or way down in Dixie as much as anyone else though.
Seems it's from a poem published in 1844 and originally referred to Grandfather's house in the wood - singular, not plural.
'The New England Boys' Song about Thanksgiving.'
Some versions had Christmas rather than Thanksgiving but snow in November wasn't - or isn't - unknown in New England.
We very rarely get a white Christmas here. More Bing Crosby ...
The New England setting makes sense and it seems the woman who wrote it was an Abolitionist to boot.
Thinking about New England woods on a snowy evening, 'The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.'
I daresay mock cynical hard-bitten humour doesn't work on a thread like this.
"Tell me about things you really love, that are dear to your heart, so I may mock and revile them in jest" just isn't a good model for a friendly thread.
Besides, I'd like to think that any gentle ribbing I've done on this thread is just that, gentle ribbing.
I’m sure you’d like to think that. But when others tell you it’s not coming across that way, it might be a good idea to rethink. It also might be a good idea to stop digging the hole.
May we refocus back to the noble possibilities of this thread, and also considering that, yes, I have been critical of the USA as it pursues national policies. Away from that, and focussing on the goodness, my thoughts from over night are these:
Historically, the pursuit and support of scientific investigation for its own sake and because we're curious has been sponsored by American government agencies. National Institutes of Mental Health and Health, National Science Foundation, Forest Service are the ones I can name right off.
In my consulting work, probably 80% of what I look to for evidence base comes from America (not sure the proportion but it is certainly high) . When Americans aren't actually funding Americans to do the research, they're co-funding with other scientists in other places, doing team work and collaborating. Science has been one of those things under attack because it endeavours not to be an opinion and preference based undertaking, and even in the current political climate, the course is basically been held. Which is a credit to the foundations of science in the USA, and, to the people who are doing the work.
Another thing: when we contact people in the USA who are doing the work and ask questions, we usually get responses from the actual person doing the work. Occasionally a graduate student who is focussed on the relevant project, but the communication is most often quick, direct and friendly. This is not the same everywhere.
Which brings me to the general geniality of Americans. You get friendliness, conversation, and often, help, just because and for no reason except friendliness. Yes, opinion is frequently not far behind (Americans love sports and politics it seems), but the foundation is friendly. (I don't have a wide sample: the western seaboard states, some of the the ones along their northern border to Canada, and a few in the middle and on the east coast, maybe 15 states)
All right, much of the scenery is magnificent, and of course it's on a much bigger scale than Europeans are used to; and the National Parks are superb, though they seem to be under attack by the current administration. And most Americans I've met have been fine on a personal level, even those whose politics seem to be way more extreme than - let's say - Attila the Hun.
In addition, there's been some grand music written by Americans, and some fine literature as well (though I've yet to quite forgive Robert Frost for his The Road Not Taken, which led indirectly to the death of Edward Thomas, who took it all too seriously and decided to enlist in the First World War and then got killed at Arras. He was, famously, on his way to meet Frost when the train was held up briefly at Adlestrop).
But - and it's not a cheap jibe, whatever some may think - the whole nation was founded on a blatant hypocrisy; and if you think that doesn't matter, consider the vile racial problems that the country still has, and which are directly derived from that fatal Original Sin.
I’ll try too, because I also wanted to add (being a fan of musical theatre): Rodgers and Hammerstein, George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, and Stephen Sondheim.
Ah musicals! Fiddler on the Roof. South Pacific. Book of Mormon, King and I. Though I'm overloaded on Sound of Music, its music is great. I like almost all musicals. A well developed American genre.
The deserts of the south-west. The only place outside Derbyshire where I could live. They are complete opposites in terms of weather and terrain, but I love both.
The Grand Canyon - There is a sense of anti-climax when you finally get to see something famous, but the Grand Canyon is the one exception.
The music - Blues, country, Rock and Roll, all of it. Wonderful.
Less "essential" for me, but still a good thing is The Big Bang Theory - a genuinely funny, well acted, well scripted, adult sitcom. How the hell has it survived eleven series?
Hollywood - yes, they have been responsible for some great films. I like escapist action films such as Star Wars, Die Hard... well you get the picture. Of course some are rubbish but there are loads I love.
So on the whole it's a reasonably hearty "well done".
I love stadium food. Give me a brat and a beer and 9 innings on a Sunday afternoon, and I'm happy.
I also like small towns even though I'm a city gal...parades when the local team wins the tournament, volunteer fire department fish fries, harvest stands by the side of the road, signs that say "fresh eggs" or "goat's milk fudge."
And I love county fairs and state fairs....already started a thread on this.
On the city side, I love the hum of life always in the background. I love Italian ices (shaved ice with flavored syrup) Snow cones are similar but not the same. I love coming in from out of town to see the tall cityscape against a setting sun. I love exploring the many unique neighborhoods.
Not much if this is specific to the US, but that's where I experience it, and it all makes me feel at home.
M*A*S*H (TV series) - I don't know about the film; I've never seen it.
The TV series was much better than the film. And IMHO, it got better as the years went on and the cast changed.
Eh. I like the movie better, and I think the earlier years of the series were generally better than the later years. It got too preachy for me.
The first few years was mostly about married doctors (Trapper John, Frank Burns, Henry Blake) sleeping with nurses. They were replaced by two faithful married men and a bachelor. "Hotlips" Houlihan became better known as Margaret. Hawkeye Pierce mellowed; even Klinger did. (How many jokes can you make about a soldier wearing a dress?) It went, IMHO, from a fraternity party show to a more serious protest against war, but still with some very funny, sometimes dark, humor. YMMV, etc.
Free pouring rather than measures.
The friendliness even if the servers outside restaurants were intimidating.
How easy it is to navigate/drive around cities without one way systems, pedestrian areas, roundabouts, lights, crossings etc. I took to driving in Arizona very easily. But I was appalled with public transport outside of city centres & how astonished people were about the idea of not driving (“I think they have buses in Phoenix”).
Another vote for the Grand Canyon though.
I also didn’t like how you have to pay loads to enter nationally acclaimed galleries and museums. Here in the U.K. most are free.
But I was appalled with public transport outside of city centres & how astonished people were about the idea of not driving (“I think they have buses in Phoenix”).
So I've heard!
I've lived in the Phoenix metropolitan area for almost 40 years and have never taken a bus. (I have taken our Light Rail.)
The movie was a satirical black comedy that is as much about the Vietnam War as the Korean War. The early seasons of the TV show, while admittedly being something of a fraternity party—not that there’s anything necessarily wrong with that (nods to Animal House)—kept at least some sense of the movie’s comedic, satirical take on things.
I’d agree that the show became in later seasons a more serious protest against war. I just don’t think it did that particularly well; it always came across as too heavy handed to me, too preachy, as I said above. And rarely funny. I stopped watching it.
As you say, mileage will vary. Trying to steer the Jeep back toward the OP, regardless of feelings about the movie vs. the TV show, or the early seasons vs. the later seasons, I don’t think there’s any question that M*A*S*H was a landmark TV show that was highly influential.
Americans being delighted to hear cute British accents is naturally, to a True Brit, comforting evidence that, at heart, all our ex-colonies would really prefer to have us back . . . no, I'm only joking, folks.
Comments
It's in a different month and day for Canadians (October and a Monday). But turkey and pumpkin pie are good any time. It's got more of a thankful for harvest feel. Arguments about what to stuff a turkey with is probably a tangent. I alternate between a bread stuffing and wild rice.
I am grateful for the CIA's direction on how to carve a turkey.
When I lived in South Carolina, it was cornbread stuffing. Or oyster stuffing.
Or oyster stew as a side dish.
Bloody hell fire ...
Still, I now know that Canada celebrates Thanksgiving too. I didn't know that. Who said the Ship wasn't educational?
'Over the river and through the wood ...?'
What's this? Hansel and Gretel?
Bah humbug!
Not sure what you find so objectionable about something that has had a great deal of meaning for me and others. Have you no childhood songs you fondly remember?
So sorry to have spoiled your thread for you.
Don't you do that at times?
It reminded me of the sort of thing the wholesome staff at the kids camp in the movie 'Adams Family Values' would be into ...
Oh, never mind ...
I daresay mock cynical hard-bitten humour doesn't work on a thread like this.
Yes, yes, lovely Sabine. I'm sure most US grandmas live in a condo three blocks from Main Street but that wouldn't work so well in a song.
'Over the sidewalk and second block after the fire hydrant ...'
Thigh deep snow sounds fun though. I can only remember snow that deep about 3 or 4 times.
Bless your heart, I was teasing. But the song did remind me of a 1950s Disney Christmas special ...
That song predates condos btw.We used to sing that song on the way to my grandparents' farm. Have a go at that, why not.
Next time you you want to start a thread about what's good about a country not your own, you might want to accept that people in that country might actually have memories you don't understand.
Why exactly did you start this thread again? Feels like a set up now.
Perhaps some people have senses of humour you don't understand.
No, I'm not going to take the mickey out of your grandparents' farm. Chestnuts roasting by an open fire, Jack Frost nipping at your toes ...
Sounds idyllic. I'm sure had a wonderful childhood.
There are some things I find hard to take seriously though, on whatever side of the Atlantic.
But please, don't mind me, carry on. I'm glad people aren't all cynical old gits like me.
You may not find an old fashioned American folk song hard to take seriously, but you don't have to go at it here.
I'm not claiming that my sense of humour is one few people will understand. Plenty of people over here would get it, particularly northerners.
But that's another issue.
If we tease someone it's a sign of friendliness, not antipathy.
I used to go to a barber in Leeds who was spectacularly rude. The second time I visited he said, 'Hey up, it's that Welsh git again ...'
What did I do? Turn round and walk out or see the funny side? It's a form of hyperbolic humour.
But sure, poking fun at your childhood memories is a bit crap. It's not the snow and the Thanksgiving nor the farms and all - that's all cool.
Read your OP, then read your post about my memory.
I no longer feel this thread was started in good faith.
Back to the positives...
Your public and international radio stations do some very interesting programmes. I have learnt a lot from listening in occasionally and get a fresh perspective.
Trudy, Heavenly Host
The OP is about good things to come out of America. Not everyone is going to agree on what those good things are.
Besides, I'd like to think that any gentle ribbing I've done on this thread is just that, gentle ribbing. I've also said plenty of positive things and applauded others for doing the same and I will continue to do so as long as this thread lasts.
I confess that there's always a chance that I could derail it and the comments I made to Sabine were probably the closest I came to doing so.
It's not a transatlantic chauvinism thing. If someone posted a twee video of some kiddies song from any Anglophone country I'd be tempted to have the same kind of reaction. I'm Welsh and pretty sentimental but find saccharine hard to take - but our respective milages will vary on that one.
If I saw a bunch of kids singing that song as they trudged through the snow to their Grandma's in the woods, I'd probably be moved by it.
It doesn't sound like an authentic US folk song to me, though but I'm probably wrong. It sounded too manufactured for that, but perhaps that was more a feature of the production values of the video clip itself. There are cultural differences, of course and I recognise that.
I'm certainly not cynical about nostalgia, family life and such - but I dunno, it sounded too much like something out of the Waltons rather than The Simpsons.
Now where have I heard that before?
I'm sure I could get dewy eyed on an Appalachian farm or way down in Dixie as much as anyone else though.
'The New England Boys' Song about Thanksgiving.'
Some versions had Christmas rather than Thanksgiving but snow in November wasn't - or isn't - unknown in New England.
We very rarely get a white Christmas here. More Bing Crosby ...
The New England setting makes sense and it seems the woman who wrote it was an Abolitionist to boot.
Thinking about New England woods on a snowy evening, 'The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.'
There. Something else excellent and praiseworthy.
Well, Ernest Hemingway, for one...
My own sense of humor has led me to resuscitate the thread in Hell with your name on it.
I did try some Robert Frost to fill in the hole I'd dug but I guess I'd dug it too deeply for that to have any effect.
For the record, I did start with good intentions. I wasn't setting up an ambush, although I can see why Sabine and others might see it that way.
Perhaps it's Original Sin? An inbuilt bias to over-ride the best intentions with mischievous and unhelpful behaviour?
Who knows?
But fair calls, folks.
Probably best for me to lie low for a while ...
Please, carry on with this thread. Don't let me spoil it.
Historically, the pursuit and support of scientific investigation for its own sake and because we're curious has been sponsored by American government agencies. National Institutes of Mental Health and Health, National Science Foundation, Forest Service are the ones I can name right off.
In my consulting work, probably 80% of what I look to for evidence base comes from America (not sure the proportion but it is certainly high) . When Americans aren't actually funding Americans to do the research, they're co-funding with other scientists in other places, doing team work and collaborating. Science has been one of those things under attack because it endeavours not to be an opinion and preference based undertaking, and even in the current political climate, the course is basically been held. Which is a credit to the foundations of science in the USA, and, to the people who are doing the work.
Another thing: when we contact people in the USA who are doing the work and ask questions, we usually get responses from the actual person doing the work. Occasionally a graduate student who is focussed on the relevant project, but the communication is most often quick, direct and friendly. This is not the same everywhere.
Which brings me to the general geniality of Americans. You get friendliness, conversation, and often, help, just because and for no reason except friendliness. Yes, opinion is frequently not far behind (Americans love sports and politics it seems), but the foundation is friendly. (I don't have a wide sample: the western seaboard states, some of the the ones along their northern border to Canada, and a few in the middle and on the east coast, maybe 15 states)
In addition, there's been some grand music written by Americans, and some fine literature as well (though I've yet to quite forgive Robert Frost for his The Road Not Taken, which led indirectly to the death of Edward Thomas, who took it all too seriously and decided to enlist in the First World War and then got killed at Arras. He was, famously, on his way to meet Frost when the train was held up briefly at Adlestrop).
But - and it's not a cheap jibe, whatever some may think - the whole nation was founded on a blatant hypocrisy; and if you think that doesn't matter, consider the vile racial problems that the country still has, and which are directly derived from that fatal Original Sin.
I tried.
He was a piece of work long before that.
The Grand Canyon - There is a sense of anti-climax when you finally get to see something famous, but the Grand Canyon is the one exception.
The music - Blues, country, Rock and Roll, all of it. Wonderful.
Less "essential" for me, but still a good thing is The Big Bang Theory - a genuinely funny, well acted, well scripted, adult sitcom. How the hell has it survived eleven series?
Hollywood - yes, they have been responsible for some great films. I like escapist action films such as Star Wars, Die Hard... well you get the picture. Of course some are rubbish but there are loads I love.
So on the whole it's a reasonably hearty "well done".
Ha, I deliberately didn’t include him in my post about great American literature - glad I’m not the only one with this opinion!
Hill Street Blues
Bluegrass music
Jazz
I also like small towns even though I'm a city gal...parades when the local team wins the tournament, volunteer fire department fish fries, harvest stands by the side of the road, signs that say "fresh eggs" or "goat's milk fudge."
And I love county fairs and state fairs....already started a thread on this.
On the city side, I love the hum of life always in the background. I love Italian ices (shaved ice with flavored syrup) Snow cones are similar but not the same. I love coming in from out of town to see the tall cityscape against a setting sun. I love exploring the many unique neighborhoods.
Not much if this is specific to the US, but that's where I experience it, and it all makes me feel at home.
All the regular flavours plus ones like praline and Wedding Cake that tastes like cake!
Must get one soon, sooner than soon!!!!
The TV series was much better than the film. And IMHO, it got better as the years went on and the cast changed.
The first few years was mostly about married doctors (Trapper John, Frank Burns, Henry Blake) sleeping with nurses. They were replaced by two faithful married men and a bachelor. "Hotlips" Houlihan became better known as Margaret. Hawkeye Pierce mellowed; even Klinger did. (How many jokes can you make about a soldier wearing a dress?) It went, IMHO, from a fraternity party show to a more serious protest against war, but still with some very funny, sometimes dark, humor. YMMV, etc.
The friendliness even if the servers outside restaurants were intimidating.
How easy it is to navigate/drive around cities without one way systems, pedestrian areas, roundabouts, lights, crossings etc. I took to driving in Arizona very easily. But I was appalled with public transport outside of city centres & how astonished people were about the idea of not driving (“I think they have buses in Phoenix”).
Another vote for the Grand Canyon though.
I also didn’t like how you have to pay loads to enter nationally acclaimed galleries and museums. Here in the U.K. most are free.
So I've heard!
I've lived in the Phoenix metropolitan area for almost 40 years and have never taken a bus. (I have taken our Light Rail.)
The movie was a satirical black comedy that is as much about the Vietnam War as the Korean War. The early seasons of the TV show, while admittedly being something of a fraternity party—not that there’s anything necessarily wrong with that (nods to Animal House)—kept at least some sense of the movie’s comedic, satirical take on things.
I’d agree that the show became in later seasons a more serious protest against war. I just don’t think it did that particularly well; it always came across as too heavy handed to me, too preachy, as I said above. And rarely funny. I stopped watching it.
As you say, mileage will vary. Trying to steer the Jeep back toward the OP, regardless of feelings about the movie vs. the TV show, or the early seasons vs. the later seasons, I don’t think there’s any question that M*A*S*H was a landmark TV show that was highly influential.
(Is there a hypocrite emoji?)
Nice to see the thread continuing.