To the citizens of the United States of America: In the light of your failure to elect a competent president and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The Right Honourable Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. The House of Representatives and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you 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". Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour', skipping the letter 'U' is nothing more than laziness on your part. Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters. You will end your love affair with the letter 'Z' (pronounced 'zed' not 'zee') and the suffix "ize" will be replaced by the suffix "ise". You will learn that the suffix 'burgh' is pronounced 'burra', as in Edinburgh. You are welcome to respell Pittsburgh as 'Pittsberg' if you can't cope with correct pronunciation. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary". Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up "interspersed". There will be no more 'bleeps' in the Jerry Springer Show. If you're not old enough to cope with bad language, then you shouldn't have chat shows. When you learn to develop your vocabulary, you won't have to use bad language so often.

2. There is no such thing as "US English". We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of "-ize".

3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn't that hard. English accents are not limited to cockney, upper-class twit, and Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier). You will also have to learn how to understand regional accents. Scottish dramas such as "Taggart" will no longer be broadcast with subtitles. While we're talking about regions, you must learn that there is no such place as Devonshire in England. The name of the county is "Devon". If you persist in calling it Devonshire, all American states will become "shires" (e.g., Texasshire, Floridashire, Louisianashire).

4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys. Hollywood will be required to cast English actors to play English characters. British sit-coms such as "Men Behaving Badly" or "Red Dwarf" will not be re-cast and watered down for a wishy-washy American audience who can't cope with the humour of occasional political incorrectness.

5. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen", but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.

6. You should stop playing American "football". There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American "football" is not a very good game. The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays "American" football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football. Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American "football", but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full Kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US Rugby sevens side by 2005. You should 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 2.15% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. Instead of baseball, you will be allowed to play a girls' game called "rounders" which is baseball without fancy team strip, oversized gloves, collector cards or hotdogs.

7. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous in public than a vegetable peeler. Because we don't believe you are sensible enough to handle potentially dangerous items, you will require a permit if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 2nd will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called "Indecisive Day".

9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap, and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean. All road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts. 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. Roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips. Fries aren't even French, they are Belgian though 97.85% of you (including the guy who discovered fries while in
Europe) are not aware of a country called Belgium. Those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called "crisps". Real chips are thick cut and fried in animal fat. The traditional accompaniment to chips is beer, which should be served warm and flat. Waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with customers.

11. As a sign of penance 5 grams of sea salt per cup will be added to all tea made within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, this quantity to be doubled for tea made within the city of Boston itself.

12. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. It is lager. From November 1st only proper British bitter will be referred to as "beer", and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as "lager". The substances formerly known as "American beer" will henceforth be referred to as "Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine", with the exception of the product of the American Budweiser company whose products will be referred to as "Weak Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine". This will allow true Budweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in Pilsen, Czech Republic) to be sold without risk of confusion.

13. From November 10th the UK will harmonise petrol (or "gasoline" as you will be permitted to keep calling it until April 1st 2007) prices with the former USA. The UK will harmonise its prices to those of the former USA and the former USA will, in return, adopt UK petrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it).

14. 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 be handled only 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.

15. Tax collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).

16. Last but not the least, and for heaven's sake.....it's Nuclear as in "clear" NOT Nucular.

"why o why can't I"

It's been a hoot, so much so I'm calling in sick. I suppose only four day after a vaca, but I have an excuse. I'm starting a part time thing with the Bills on Game Days. Gonna usher (No security, no sir) to make some extra scratch and meet some folks. Might actually be fun.

Actually started getting into my new position in earnest this week. It felt good to actually contribute a little. I feel like I;ve been in a bit of professional limbo as toward the end of July my marketing projects wound down. I've been slowly adding things back to my new repetoire but it's a little weird to be intellectually the new kid. The folks showing me stuff sometimes get a little daunted. I try to tell them not to worry, I'm about the learning. It's a lot to digest, but I could be writing the Time Warner Intranet page one moment, taking your bill the next, a veritable jerk of all trades

(e:joshua)'s most recent post got me thinking about the state of the electorate. Things are so polarized that a moderate has no place to look. Joe Lieberman is a decent guy who sticks to his principals so that makes him unworthy in the eyes of his own party. The party has no chance making a dent against Republicans for either congress or the white house when it's busy eating itself. Just once I'd like a candidate to tell me what he's going to do, why he or she should be elected, not party affiliation or why the other guy is bad. Straight party votes of all kinds have lead to this kind of campaigning and as a result few voters think for themselves. Blind faith in anything will kill you and it drives me nuts (as a long term, leftist, democrat and a long time human) that people don't realize that there are smart republicans and dumb democrats. Despite this, I do however remain convinced that Rumsfield and Cheney eats puppies for lunch and drink the life out of children who aren't of their faith.

My new work hours blow - sucked my Thursday at the Square energy right out of me.

Met a nice woman about my age tuesday and we talked about life the universe and everything over a drink outside the suburban Le Metro. We're both busy with work and kids and whatnot, but she wants to be seen again. Score one for this old fart.

• '

My ex has fleas. That shouldn't be funny, but it is. She dogsat the past two nights and the living room got swept up in them. My daughter told me tonight that I should see Mom scratch her ear with her foot. She's twelve and pretty clever, but now we are both in trouble.

Got the sprint version of the razor phone off ebay the other night so I should join the mobile estrippers as soon as I get it charged up and the code number registered with the sprint poobahs.

Thinkin of making the jaunt to the Transit drive in this weekend.

How was your week??

I need to brush up on my photoshop skills to keep up with this guy. This looks even more impressive on the digital press I had access to on Friday for awhile. Dopey, but good for a giggle.

I received this in an email this morning after exchanging emails with somebody from yahoo personals 3 days ago.

I'VE MET A MAN WHO IS PERFECT FOR ME RIGHT NOW........HE LIVES A FEW MILES AWAY..........AND IS VERY INTERESTED IN AN EXCLUSIVE RELATIONSHIP

Who the hell knows this in that time span? The one thing I can take from that is the sender is not somebody I need to be mixed up with. Not so much about Mr. Right, just Mr. Right-now. If you've been through the "fun" of divorce or epic break-ups, you get cautious, it's natural. Who make dinner plans one moment then plunges into something else entirely 36 hours later. That's crazy. That note (and I didn't edit anything out) is very telling. Guess some hearts move faster than mine. I do not believe or understand the world in which I live.

Guess I'm going stag for awhile longer.

In other news, Sprint is making me nuts. One of the new corporate perks is some hefty discounts with other conglomerates. Since Sprint is my mobile phone home, I was glad to see them on the list since it means $10 comes off my monthly bill and Sprint, being Sprint, fucked up the request. Two phone calls, 2 hours of my precious minutes and one "give me your supervisor!" moment, we be done.

Stuff you got to do to get an even break.

Just finished 54 holes of mini golf with number one son. I think we need to repair to the hotel pool once more.

Vaca winds down....sigh