Toni:
Five Ways to Piss Off Americans
1. Americans, it appears, have a pathological fear of flies and other things that come in through open windows and doors. As someone who gets bitten alive by mozzies, I share the disdain for them, but flies? In most parts of the States, bug screens are placed over windows, and screen doors are everywhere.
American Screen Door
Screen Door after Toni has entered.
One of the quickest ways to irritate an American is to forget to close a screen door on your way into a house. If, like me, you haven't grown up with screen doors, it takes a while for it to become a habit.
2. The other door thing that winds Americans up is leaving them open in the summer when the air conditioning is on. I understand why it shouldn't be done—letting warm air in forces the air conditioning to work even harder to cool rooms down—but this again isn't intuitive to Brits. Cut us some slack would ya?
3. After twenty years here, I still put out forks AND knives at dinner time. My kids roll their eyes and tell me you don't need a knife to eat pasta. It's even worse when it's "finger food" apparently. At least I don't make them eat pizza with cutlery/silverware though.
4. Insisting that an audible "H" at the front of "herb" is the only way to pronounce it. I have to say, while there are a few words I can pronounce the American way (basil and oregano I can handle), I just can't bring myself to drop the "H" in "herb. I was told last week that if Americans pronounced the "h", it would be the man's name Herb. "So what?" I replied, "Basil (not Bayzil) is also a man's name". For some reason the Americans in the room burst out laughing.
5. Fruitcake. To be fair, fruitcake is more a source of laughter and derision that irritation but I had to mention it. There's a joke in the States that there's one fruitcake being re-gifted and wending its way around the country. Unfortunately the fruitcake that I've had here isn't anything like the moist, boozy cake I grew up with, and you wouldn't dream of having a wedding cake made of it. When I tell of friends and relatives who make their fruit cakes six months before they plan to eat it, Americans just can't believe it!
But understand, any Americans reading, that I don't go out of my way to piss you off - it just comes naturally. I'm trying!
Mike:
Five Ways to Piss Off the British
1. Tell them that the only reason they won The War was because the Americans came and bailed them out. This is, without a doubt, the single best way to piss off a Brit, especially one aged 60 plus. I recommend it, though. No, seriously; if you say it to the proper person, you’ll receive a sterling lecture on European history and you just might learn a thing or two, such as the movie “U-571,” wherein the gallant Americans heroically capture a NAZI Enigma machine to help out the British isn’t exactly based on fact.
Given the annoyance factor of the above, it really isn’t necessary for me to continue, but in the interest of evening out the sides, I’ll press on.
2. Say “a LUM’ eh num.” Really, that’s all you need to do to make them cringe. Plus the entertainment value of listening to Brits tying to pronounce it the way Americans do is almost as great as listening to Americans trying to say, “al u MIN’ e um.”
3. When they show you any national landmark—Tower Bridge, Stonehenge, the White Cliffs of Dover—regard it silently for a moment, then say, “I thought it would be bigger.”
4. Tell them that the US has qualified for the World Cup more times than England. I’ve been getting great mileage out of this tidbit for years and, although I have just now discovered (via a quick Google search) that it isn’t technically true, most Brits don’t know that so I see no reason to stop annoying them with this “fact.”
5. Correct their spelling.
Like Toni, I desire to assure the Brits that I don’t go out of my way to annoy, it just comes naturally. Except of course for number 4; they’re just so sensitive about their “footie” it’s hard not to take the opportunity when it arises.
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