I hate writing about the fact I am an American, but I just thought I’d point out, yes I am. And I’ve come to find there are many differences with the Christmas’ I’ve experienced growing up outside of Boston from that of a typical English Christmas:

1. There are no Christmas crackers in America (unless you have an English family member, like my friend Ryan, or have watched Bridget Jones way too many times). It may sound silly to many of you, but Christmas crackers have become my new favourite addition to celebrating Christmas. It can’t be the silly ‘gifts’ and jokes inside, or even the noise they make when popped open, but it definitely has to be the Christmas crowns themselves that make me feel very festive. And yes, I originally thought Christmas crackers contained crackers (that’s biscuits to all the English) rather then being name for the noise they make.

2. An English Christmas meal is basically an American Thanksgiving (minus the pumpkin pie!). And no, I don’t have turkey on Christmas. It’s hard to say what is a typical American Christmas meal, because from what I’ve come to learn, every family has its own tradition. The Keith family typically enjoys a delicious fillet mignon cooked medium rare along with a lot of sides and way too many desserts! I’m glad I’ve been able to have Christmas dinners here and tomorrow will have my third Thursday turkey dinner in a row!

3. Christmas music, although many of the songs are the same, there are a lot of Christmas ‘classics’ I’ve learned here (Wham! ‘Last Christmas’, Slade ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’ to name a few). And thankfully, I’ve introduced a few American classics (’Feliz Navidad’ and the entire Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack by the Vince Guaraldi Trio). In the Keith household, there was a lot of Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Amy Grant (please don’t ask) and my dad didn’t think it was Christmas until he heard the dogs barking ‘Jingle Bells’.

And finally, I leave with a picture of my Christmas tree here in Londontown.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanza, Happy Eid, and Happy New Year!!!

The idea of having 20/20 vision is something I’ve been pondering this past week and a half. Oh to wake up and be able to see the world, crystal clear on my own accord! I’ve taken after my father in having poor eye sight, starting back when I was 11, and things haven’t really gotten any better since then (quite the opposite, in fact).

I’ve been an avid contact wearer for the past ten years (wow!) and I’ve never really cared for glasses. So much so, that my lenses in my glasses are somewhere around two or three prescriptions behind. This is due to the fact I only wear them at night, from the bathroom to the bedroom, and not much else. And here’s the catch - what do you do when you get a mild case of conjunctivitis in your left eye, are on your last pair of contacts which must now be thrown out, your prescription has run out, and your glasses have to be worn 24/7?!

I was faced with this predicament. And I tell you what, I’m suddenly struck with the fact that life would have been a lot better if I had inherited my mother’s vision. I never really minded that I had to wear contacts all the time, but now that I can’t - and I can barely see with my glasses (imagine me squinting at you, only 25 meters away, trying to figure out WHO ARE YOU!!)

Aside from this, I’m unable to get a new contact prescription because, apparently in this country, I have to get fit for contacts and the eye check-up doesn’t count as the same thing… This means I have to wait until my infection has cleared and medicine is done (5 days!!!!). And even worse, I’m going to Portugal- BLIND! (Ok, I’m exaggerating, but I might as well be blind when I can’t even read the airport boarding screen!)

So what was my solution? Buy new frames, of course! I might as well look stylish and be able to see the beautiful people of Portugal while I’m on the beach. I wasn’t expecting to spend ~£200 on an eye appointment to get my infection sorted, but c’est la vie.

Until those come in on Wed, it’s all squinting for me.

Happy New Year to everyone! Many of you will know that I was in my hometown of Reading, Massachusetts (which is 15 mins north of Boston). It was bloody freezing and there was piles of snow when I landed. Of course, this is standard for a New England winter, however it was the snowiest December (or according to my father and the Boston Globe, second snowiest on record ever) and I’m pretty happy I missed all the snow storms. There’s nothing worse than being stuck at work and knowing you were going to be stuck in a nightmare traffic jam on the way home in a raging nor’easter (hurricane snow storm - look it up!).

Anyways, here’s a picture of just how much snow there was on the ground when I landed. It’s in my friend’s driveway a few streets from my house. I’m just sad that I didn’t get a chance to go skiing…

Being the massive dork that I am, I felt I needed to write a post recommending some good books I’ve recently gotten through. I find that my time on the tube is better spent reading anything other than a free tabloid displaying the latest disaster Britney Spears has gone through or whether Amy Winehouse has OD’ed yet. I’m not Oliver Scott, so I won’t sound too intellectual, but I’ll try my best to sound convincing.

First up, I just finished reading Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafron. Yes, he’s Spanish, and yes, the book is based in Barcelona (my favourite European city). I received this book on my birthday from my Spanish friend Edu, proclaiming that it was his favourite book and that Spanish authors could indeed write. He was not wrong about this. The book is a thick one, but it’s worth every page. It falls into the categories of ‘mystery’, ’suspense’, ‘drama’, and ‘romance’, and was more than I could have imagined. Set after the Spanish Civil War, it also has a bit of history, which I must admit I had no previous knowledge of. This book is a MUST!

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini - if you haven’t yet heard the hype on this book, well, here’s your chance to hop on board. The book is an emotional roller coaster, and you’ll find yourself wrapped up in the characters as though you know them. I had recently read No God But God, as I felt I needed to learn about Islam, and this really helped me as a precursor to this book. Still, you can read The Kite Runner without any previous knowledge of Islam and fall in love with it all the same. If you get into it like I did, you’ll probably finish the book in a few days time. Or on a lazy Sunday in one go.

I’m sure you can find better book reviews on the Guardian or even Amazon, but I need to push that both these books were amazing. I would love to hear that I’ve changed someone’s life with this post - because these books are life changing, I swear!!

This is coming a few days late, but I just wanted to share my enthusiasm of Big Brother’s finale. I figured from the start Brian would win, but you obviously can never count on anything. Especially since I’m slowly learning the ways of the English mentality and feelings on what makes good television (as it’s a whole lot different in America). I have this feeling that the twins would never have made it very far in America, as they were just so annoying, and, well, PINK! Anyways, that’s besides the point of this.

He was so thick, but oh so lovable. The very fact that he called Shakespeare, ‘Some geezer who directed some movie called Romeo and Juliet,’ made me (for some unexplainable reason) love him more. I had no idea people, especially anyone English, didn’t know who Shakespeare was. Well, at least he knew who The Streets were. I loved him running around the house after he was left alone to soak in the glory of his win. So classically Brian - always pacing (just this time, at a much more rapid speed!).

This was my first time watching any Big Brother, so I’ve been recently broken in, but I loved it.

And on another note, I lament with all those in London having to deal with the Metronet strike. My friend summed it up best: ‘It was an absolute nightmare this morning. I’d rather stick a dull fork in my eye then deal with this ever again.’ Me too. Here’s hoping it gets sorted sooner than Friday morning…

This Sat I’m going to one of the 21 concerts Prince is putting on at the O2 Centre - and I seriously couldn’t be more amped about it! I wouldn’t particularly say I’m a Prince fanatic, but I do enjoy his hits and would never pass up the opportunity to see him live. Come on, he’s a legend, and at £31 for a ticket, how could I say ‘no’??

The amazing thing I find here in this country, tickets aren’t all that expensive (disregarding the USD to GBP ratio - as it’s all bad for me). I think the most I’ve paid for tickets in this country (out of the three shows I’ve paid for since Oct last year) was £50 for Justin Timberlake. Ok, I probably sound like a teeny-bopper for putting up $100 USD of my student loan money to see him - but it was all worth it - every single penny of it. Serious entertainer, heart-throb, dancer, AND he can play the guitar and piano. Who knew? AND Timbaland and Fergie graced us with their presence as well, so it was (as they love to say in this office) ‘groove-tastic’.

But seriously, Prince for only £31? I really don’t get it (but really, I don’t need or want to). In the States, they total exploit us, and I’m gonna have to double check, but for someone as LEGENDARY as Prince, I’m willing to bet you couldn’t pay less than $80 for the nose-bleed seats. I’m going to embrace this bit completely and take advantage of all the cheap-o concerts and shows I can go to in London. Plus, for the rest of my life, I get to be like, “Oh, Prince? Yeah, I saw him in London back in the day. He was amazing. Yeah. I’m kind of a big deal.”  Rock on.