on missing England

I've been back in Houston for about 3 months now, and I am regularly asked what I miss about England. After giving it some time to settle in...I think the things I *still* miss at this point are the things I'll miss for a really long time.

Here we go with the top 6:

1. Walking for transportation. It's highly under-rated. And it's a handy way to keep you from over-spending on shopping sprees. When you know you're going to have to carry it around the rest of the day...you usually only buy things you can't live without. I passed up many would-be purchases for that very reason, and can't think of a single thing I regret not buying. Except this one pair of fabulous shoes at the Selfridges sale.
   
   
2. The "keep calm and carry on" attitude of the British. Long lines at the check-out? Ridiculously bad customer service? Annoying traveller on the train? Grocery out of baked beans? The English just deal with it. Every time. There's clearly a lot to be said for convenience and instant gratification, but it feels like we've taken it to the extreme in a lot of areas.
   
   
3. Trains. Traveling non-walk-able distances by train is fantastic for people like me who hate driving. Traveling by train also allows for a LOT more leisure reading time than I'm doing these days. Also, I hate driving. Yes, twice on the driving thing.
   
   
4. Proximity to Europe. Much harder to get a positive response to this question when posed from Houston: "Fancy a weekend in Barcelona?"
   
   
5. The "rawness" of life. Partly because because neither perfect teeth nor perfect hair occupy first position on the priority list for most and partly because most Londoners walk and/or take public transport for their daily commute, and in spite of the fact that the British are generally fashion forward...they just look more "raw". There's something about this that I find endearing.
   
   
6. Judgement calls. The English don't expect perfection in anyone, and they are pretty consistently good at withholding judgement based on first impressions and measure worth in a person from the ground upward, rather than from a standard of perfection downward.
   

For the record, there is a growing list of "reasons I'm glad to be back in the States", which I will share in due course.