Attention Colonists

AS OTHERS SEE US...

Regular readers of this blog (both of you) have heard me speak of my friends Angela and Fred Allan of Newcastle Upon Tyne, England.  Angela and I @mail back and forth just about every day.  I consider her thoughtful, funny and always-interesting @mails little Christmas presents from abroad throughout the year, and I send most of them on to my distribution list here in the Colonies.  She sends other (lady) stuff to Deb, who forwards them to her own list.  So the Serras and the Allans are kind of a little online United Nations, without the controversy.

Angela did not send me this little instant classic from John Cleese but probably only because I got to it first (thanks to my friend Nancy Cook in Santa Fe, an old program syndication pal, for sending it my way).  Perhaps Angela was merely exercising proper British reserve, as always. 

Anyway, lots of changes we'll have to accommodate.  First of all, the "u" keys on our keyboards will be getting more of a workout.  And my fellow Cardinal fan (pictured above) and I will really miss baseball season.

The favour of a reply is appreciated.    ; )

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To the Citizens of The United States of America:

In light of your failure in recent years to nominate
competent candidates for President of the USA and thus
to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the
revocation of your independence, effective
immediately.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume
monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and
territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).

Your new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a
Governor for America without the need for further
elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.

A questionnaire may be circulated next year to
determine whether any of you actually noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown
Dependency, the following rules are introduced with
immediate effect:

1. You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford
"English" Dictionary. Then look up aluminium, and
check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at
just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

2. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as
'colour', 'favour' and 'neighbour'. Likewise, you will
learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the
letters, and the suffix '-ize' will be replaced by the
suffix '-ise'. The Microsoft spell-checker will be
adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u'
and the elimination of -ize.

3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with
filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an
unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.
Generally, you will be expected to raise your
vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary')

4. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

5. You will learn to resolve personal issues without
using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you
need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're
not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only
be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to
sort things out without suing someone or speaking to
a therapist then you're not grown up enough to handle
a gun.

6. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or
carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable
peeler. A permit will be required if you wish to
carry a vegetable peeler in public.

7. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts
and you will start driving on the left with immediate
effect. At the same time, you will go metric with
immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion
tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you
understand the British sense of humour.

8. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol
(which you have been calling gasoline) - roughly $6/US
gallon. Get used to it.

9. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you
call French fries are not real chips, and those things
you insist on calling potato chips are properly called
crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat,
and dressed not with ketchup but with vinegar.

10. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling
beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only
proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer,
and European brews of known and accepted provenance
will be referred to as Lager. Australian beer is also
acceptable as they are pound for pound the greatest
sporting Nation on earth and it can only be due to the
beer. They are also part of British Commonwealth - see
what it did for them. American brands will be referred
to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be
sold without risk of further confusion.

11. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast
English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be
required to cast English actors to play English
characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English
dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an
experience akin to having one's ears removed with a
cheese grater.

12. You will cease playing American football. There is
only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer.
Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to
play rugby (which has some similarities to American
football, but does not involve stopping for a rest
every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body
armour like a bunch of nancies). Don't try Rugby -
the Australians and Kiwis will thrash you, like they
regularly thrash us. 

13. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not
reasonable to host an event called the World Series for
a game which is not played outside of America. Since
only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a world beyond
your borders, your error is understandable.
You will learn cricket, and we will let you face the
South Africans first to take the sting out of their
deliveries.

14. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving
us mad.

15. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector)
from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly
to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated
to 1776).

16. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper
cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality
biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with
cream) when in season.

God save the Queen.

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Note that the views expressed on this blog are mine alone and do not necessarily represent the views of Raycom Media or KPLC.  Please note that links frequently take the reader to third-party sites.  Raycom and KPLC are not responsible for content on these sites.   -Jim S.

Comments

Ok queenie, time to take the gloves off..

It appears America has decided not to bow down to Bush II so we certainly will not curtsy to a queen.. Yes we have our faults, but we are a good lot.. Our failure to elect a competent President has nothing to do with nominating one... You see I would nominate Jim Serra, Billy Jack, or even the Donald.. I would love to even nominate you, but in this country queens can't marry so I fear they wouldn't be allowed to hold an elected office.. Sorry, but now I feel compeled to address your rules..

1.. Lie-bary (Library), tamater (Tomato), tater (potato), y'all (you all), and you're worried about a piece of tin foil?? Time for you to get back to your telle (television)

2.. The letter U has been dropped from those words as proof that we are American, rather than British.. As for doughnuts spelled out it would take to much time filling out a police report, hence the shortened word became a necessity.. as for Ize to ise, I have no objections..

3.. Hey we know our words, we have Dubya making up new ones everyday.. Also we have a hierarchy of communicators, starting with master wordsmith's such as Mr Serra, then we have the valley girls (well, like,you know, for sure) then we have the get r done crowd (throw em a roll of duct tape an some WD-40 and they'll be entertained for hours). And of course there's the bottom of the ladder Those hard core Dallas Cowboy fans whose judgement has been impaired by some head injury at birth. They have trouble with the phrase, We Lost, it comes out a type of gibberish sounding like Jessica did it..

4.. Oh yes it will!!! However our Government is placing restrictions on the way we express it.. Fireworks are a form of expression, so if we have to give up a freedom, maybe we will let you have that one..

5.. Again my apologies, but i would rather be beat about the head and kidneys by a cop carrying a gun than by a Bobby.. Where'd that come from, short for Roberta?? If this country became unarmed our Constitution would stand for nothing, because we could not defend it.. Lawyers are a part of that system.. Therapist are needed to console Bush and Cowboy fans..

6.. As long as that peeler is named after a guy named Bowie, I have no objections.. Permits are required for profit anyway..

7.. You misspelled humor..

8... That's why our President can only serve two terms.. Another eight years of Bush we'll have our own $6.00 gas...

9.. That just makes your arteries harder than our.. Thanks but we love our fries and chips..

10... A big pip, pip hooray on this one.. Gnat Urine and bitter beer face go together.. Next time you're in town drop off a few truckloads of European brews..

11.. Hollywood did cast Ringo as a blue eyed Mexican gardener with an English accent in Candy.. Also Sir Richard Burton was the professor in the same film.. Peter Sellers and Ringo in the Magic Christian, and of course Malcolm McDowell in Clockwork Orange, what better classics for British actors??? We wanted a Brit to play the spies, but had to go to Scotland to find the proper 007 and of course the incredible Austin Powers is played by a Canadian.. Go figure.

12.. Oh yeah... Our Eli can whip your Beckham's butt..

13.. We call it the World Series because our steroid sluggers will soon be able to hit that tiny ball out of this world.. Right Barry? As for being aware of a world beyond our borders I would have to ask what borders???

14... JFK,, idk, but now we know what drives you mad..

15.. Sorry about that, but you can't get blood from a turnip... There are no monies available for back taxes, Dubya has already spent any surplus this nation has.. it will take many years to recover.. Maybe you could float us a loan..

16.. Charles "Lewis Carroll" Dodgson one of your great British authors wrote about one of your tea parties.. I must say I thoroughly enjoyed it ;)

I do, however, want to thank you for your second British invasion.. Mick and the boys, along with Sir Elton and Mr. Clapton have stood far longer than our King.. sorry but we could put Elvis' rock in roll on one record, but the hits put out by these Brits will never be surpassed.. So in closing I'll say thanks for Beer, Tea time and Rock n roll... Pete

[Fiona Mowbry]

Although this classic Cleese piece is hopefully tongue-in-cheek, it brings up an interesting thought. As a nation working hard to perpetuate this grand experiment called democracy, we're at a crossroads. We're under-educated, over-indulged and generally suffering from physical, spiritual and mental bloat of one form or other. This does not make us the young, brash, willing to do anything to make it work nation anymore. Too many of our native born citizens know little of the struggles it took to birth the nation and develop our governmental and industrial backbone. Our newer citizens do not have the background or frankly the interest in our heritage to pay attention to how the development of a maturing democracy should play out in a global economy. Frankly, we're floundering and in danger of blowing it. This being said, it might be a good thing to see Cleese's idea come to fruition. If we become a colony again, losing our rights (although many of our rights have now been lost to us possibly forever under the Patriot Act) we may resurrect a latent sense of urgency to develop an educated populace, an informed electorate, a socially conscious corporate scene and reclaim the principles of democracy we have lost through abject disinterest and self-indulgence. God Save the Queen.