Snow in Pennsylvania

This winter we've had plenty of snow days, including yesterday and our last few days before Christmas in the UK.

Luckily I wear a number of professional hats, so it doesn't create too much turmoil for me. I currently work for a cute little country club in the ruralburbs, and I also do freelance work for a creative marketing agency. When I'm not doing one I'm doing the other, and a snow day gives me a chance to catch up with copywriting, reports, and walkies.

When Winston met Teddy

After Teddy met Winston, he wrote that he thought Winston was "a rather cheap character".

The only photographic evidence of their encounter in the year 1900

At $2.50 for a pumpkin in a store desperate to get rid of them, he wasn't wrong. 

With Sandy causing a ruckus outside, we stayed in for the most traditional of October activities: Pumpking carving.

We chose leaders from our respective countries: I did the Winston Churchill pumpkin, and my husband did the Teddy Roosevelt pumpkin.

When the storm kicked in and the power went out, we sat in their soft glow, checking the news on Twitter on our phones.

The director of Sixth Sense, M Night Shyamalan, sets his movies in Pennsylvania. The Sixth Sense is set in Philly, and the rest, including Signs and The Happening, are set in rural PA.

Sitting out here during the Frankenstorm felt a bit like an M Night Shyamalan movie: High winds, no power, fields of corn swaying in the darkness, no traffic lights at intersections, trees down and no traffic on the roads.

Luckily our corner of PA came out of the storm relatively unscathed, and we only lost power for a day. I hope the most affected areas can recover and rebuild quickly, especially Seaside Heights and Coney Island.

Pros and Air Cons: The US obsession with conditioned air

"too darn hot" - make sure you and your bulldogs are cool and hydrated

So I survived August. I say that because Mr was very intrigued to find out how I'd cope in a month characterized by humidity and heat; when locals take their summer vacations to escape the oppressive weather.

To be fair, I made like a true local and disappeared to the UK for a week. I've already waxed Olympyrical about the Games, but my UK trip also allowed me to catch up with friends and family, almost as if I'd never been away. The trip also allowed me to realize a few more of the subtle differences between US and UK culture.

The week I spent in London was wonderfully sunny. This meant I hardly slept the whole time I was there. Why? I, like many US residents, have become addicted to air conditioning, a comfort that is often elusive in UK accommodation.

Air conditioning was (kind of) invented 110 years ago in the now hipster village of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. I first experienced the ups and downs of the US love affair with conditioned air when I found myself in New York City during a heatwave. The mayor warned people not to go running in Central park, the news was filled with locations of 'chill centers' for the young, elderly and other vulnerable folks without air con, and stories of neighborhoods suffering from power outages or power surges. I visited a lot of museums, not only to enjoy their exhibits but also their frosty cool rooms. I learned the stifling discomfort of waiting on a subway platform, and the chilling relief of stepping into a conditioned subway car.

But when I moved over to the USA back in June, I found it hard to get a decent night of sleep: It was too darn cold.

This all brought to mind the stereotype of the wasteful American: During summer they crank up the air con and wear sweaters inside, and during winter they crank up the heating and lounge around in t-shirts. I wasn't used to it - I enjoyed the heat. I wasn't used to light summer bed sheets and cool indoor breezes. I wanted a heavy duvet (AKA a comforter in US English) to weigh me down and keep me cosy. I insisted on turning down the ceiling fan in our bedroom to the lowest setting.

It was lucky I did.

The very next day I stood up on the bed to reach for something and was totally head-decked. The ceiling fan smacked me right above the ear. Mr had to watch in horror as my body crumpled down onto the bed and started to shake.

I was laughing. Oh, I was in pain! I had a lump on my head for a week. But at least the fan had been going slowly enough not to slice my head clean off. This dumb Brit was so unaccustomed to air con that it literally hit her in the face.

But at some point in the past few months something happened to my internal thermostat. It was so subtle that I barely noticed what was happening: I am now fully addicted to flowing, cool air. I find the bedrooms of England stale and stuffy, the hotel duvets too heavy and warm. I still insist on having the ceiling fans on low settings, mostly out of fear, and I try not to stand on the bed anymore, but I sleep soundly, thankful for these artificially cool summer nights.

Easterly 5, decreasing 4 later (we're talking about the weather)

What do Brits love more than anything?

More than bacon sandwiches with brown sauce.

More than being offered a hot milky cup of tea during a crisis.

More than Terry Wogan, trains that run on time or winning the Ashes (that's a cricket reference, for all my US readers).

It's talking about the weather.

Brits love talking about the weather so much that they'll watch multiple weather reports to see which one is the best, they'll strike up conversations at the bus-stop or at the check-out to analyze the latest forecast, and I'll hazard a guess that some British friendships are almost entirely based on fleeting weather-themed interactions.

In the spookily accurate study of English behavior, Watching the English, anthropologist Kate Fox devotes her first chapter solely to the British love for weathertalk. She even covers Americans' bewilderment at this fascination, which is heightened by their perception that the UK "has no weather". I've experienced this bewilderment first-hand plenty of times; Kate Fox even acknowledges the misplaced offense that us Brits feel when someone does our weather down.

Mark's learned not to insult our weather now as it has a tendency to fight back. A few days before we got married he and his family almost died with the New Zealand All-Blacks. Hurricane-like winds caused their flight over to be re-routed twice and it had to make three attempts at landing. Mark said he screamed like a girl, but he also said that the large rugby players did the same. And then there was the time when his flight to see me was re-routed due to snow, and that other time with the wind. Yes, Mark learned his lesson alright.

Fox puts this obsession with the weather down to a specifically English brand of social awkwardness, where weather becomes our go-to smalltalk. I never really realized how true this is until I moved here. I use weathertalk constantly now when meeting or speaking to new people. It's actually brilliantly useful.

New Person: Hey, welcome to America. How are you finding it so far?

Me: Hot. And what's that big yellow thing in the sky? I never saw that when I lived in Scotland.

New Person: (laughter). Yes, you need to be careful, you're so fair-skinned!

Me: Oh, this is actually me with a tan! You should have seen me before, I was practically reflective.

New Person: (more laughter).

Then we can have jovial conversation about my problems understanding temperature in Fahrenheit, talk about how last month was the wettest June in Scotland since the 1910s, talk about how much I'm going to struggle with the humidity come August, feel glad I don't live in the deep south…and I could go on…

So far, I love it. Pennsylvania is especially great because it gets four seasons, unlike Scotland where it rains for six months, followed by six months of rain. This week the temperature's about 100F, we've had fabulous rolling thunderstorms, and the sunshine is wonderfully uplifting. I can bask in the morning warmth for breakfast, pop back into the cool breeze of inside, and step out for bitesize chunks of sunshine and vitamin D throughout the day.

But Mark hates it. He hates summer. He's longing for fall/autumn. He doesn't understand that a Brit's idea of a summer vacation involves anywhere that guarantees sun, sea and sand, and at least eight hours of horizontal roasting on a sun-lounger by the pool. Brits get their summer sunshine in one large accelerated dose to boost them through the dull short days from October - March. That's not an issue here. Sun is readily available. Even 100% chance of rain doesn't actually mean it's going to rain. The grass is scorched And Mark is fed up.

So when it reaches 100F, Mark and family make a bee-line for a large, dark, refrigerated room…

The movie theater. Where it's so cold you need layers.

When we went to see Brave my hair decided to play along.

There's just one little thing about this weather: Heat and humidity plays havoc with my hair! Luckily I have some great secret weapons that I'll share soon; I just hope that they work for the August onslaught.

PS, when I wrote this, we were experiencing a light thunder and lightning storm. It was a bit more severe in NY.