Holibobs
Today is a holibobs in the USA (Memorial Weekend), and the UK has its May bank holibobs too today so there was no need to feel jelly about anything, especially when we get to spend time here in Southern Maryland…..
Tiki Bar
South Maryland beaches
Harbor/harbour
Gorgeousness innit?
We wondered, as we were driving down to our destination, what the traffic on the M5 and M4 would be like back in the UK for the bank holiday weekend as everyone bundled up their cars and headed off to Devon and Cornwall. Hellish, we suspected. And we thought the same as we breezed through on the roads on the way back. Driving in the USA is much easier, because of the big ole roads and the massive amounts of space, plus not everyone was going where we were going! 🙂
Comments that grate
We have season passes this year to a water park near DC. We’ve paid up and we can go whenever we jolly well please, which is faberooni.
But, I’ve heard some comments from folks in the community who state they wouldn’t go there, and some newbies in the area have been advised that they shouldn’t bother going. Is it that the rides suck? Is it that its way too expensive? Is it that the the drive is long? Is it that the queues are a nightmare?
None of the above. The reason? Because it’s ‘quite black.’
Yes, read that again. Some people have been advising others not to go to a water park in Maryland because ‘many of the people who go there are black’.
I was totally gobsmacked by that ‘advice’, and confused, and very, very offended.
American politics
I still love me a bit of American politics, and spent the last few weeks organising an event for my buddy Tom Coale who is running for a seat in the Maryland House of Delegates in 2014, representing the newly formed District 9B in Ellicott City.
This is that totally glamorous event wot I organised, hosted by my lovely #hocohomo chums 🙂
Tom Coale’s event at Dale & Jeff’s house, Manor Lane
Me and host Dale
Tom with hosts Dale and Jeff and Carrie from Equality Maryland
Doesn’t it look classy and fancy and wotnot? I commented that in the UK such events might just be held in a poky old church hall with the wind whistling through and a urn of tea on the go….
Well, that was the marvellous event – and this was the after-party 😉
Pool party! 🙂
I wrote a piece about Tom too, which you can read here over a nice cup of tea.
And yes, to the woman who asked me this weekend if we Brits still drink hot tea in 90 degrees, the answer is ‘of course we do!’ 🙂
ukdesperatehousewifeusa 
Well you are in a southern state and I don’t care who tries to deny it. The attitude doesn’t surprise me. I’m guessing you’re speaking of Six Flags?
Yep. Sad innit?
Being pretentious, condescending, arrogant and judgmental is just another form of ignorance, naivety and irony…and ego is blinding. If you’re willing to judge an entire people based on a few negative people…or even judge a place you’ve probably never even been too, then this is true ignorance at it’s best. If you’re willing to stereotype southerners…then you must be willing to stereotype African Americans, especially since many of them are southerners…African Americans have an overall crime and poverty rate multiple times the national average, have a graduation rate of only 65%, overall test scores in math, reading and science lag far behind the national average and have an obesity rate significantly higher than the national average…So in your eyes, are African Americans a bunch of idiotic, obese, violent and poverty stricken dropouts? Or is this not surprising to you? But why stop there? Let’s stereotype EVERYBODY! Germans, in general, are Nazis and hate foreigners, Italians are a bunch of effeminate womanizers, the Dutch are a bunch of drugged up perverts, the Irish are a bunch of drunken Catholic potato terrorists, Jews are a bunch of morally corrupt money-hungry businessmen, and the list goes on…Here, let me explain it in a way you would understand by stooping to your level…Can you believe the U.K. can consider itself to be progressive in 2014 when it has the class-consciousness and caste system of the feudal era? Thank God I live in the U.S. where I won’t be judge by my socioeconomic status or by the way I walk, talk, or dress in public or by the car I drive or the house I live in…Or be forced into high density apartment housing with virtually no property or personal space…now let me retire to my unecessarily oversized suburban home with a pool and spacious backyard and front lawn lest I be attacked by a group of angry and drunken Burberry wearing British hooligan youth…Can you comprehend the simple point I am trying to make? I mean, you are a woman and clearly incapable of basic reasoning and logic…(hint: I’m being ironic). This attitude doesn’t surprise me. 😉
-Christian
I should also like to point out that the governors of South Carolina (Nikki Haley) and Louisiana (Bobby Jindal) are Indian Americans…Indian Americans only make up 1% of the U.S. population (based upon the 2010 U.S. Census) and most of this population lives in major cities in New York and California…So how is it that a young female Indian American like Nikki Haley, can make it so far up the Republican ranks and become elected governor of a state in which not only do Indian Americans make up less than 0.5% of South Carolina’s population, but a state with such a horribly racist and segregationist past? A state in which that was not only the first state to secede from the Union over slavery, but at one point in history, had a population that was 66% slave? The same with Louisiana in which Republican governor Bobby Jindal was elected in 2007 and then re-elected by an overwhelming majority in 2011? Is this some kind of racial phenomenon or is it just a big conspiracy? I can tell you it is neither phenomenon or a conspiracy…Facts are stranger than fiction, nothing is ever as it seems and reality is not so black and white (pun intended)…Remember, there is the way you view and judge things and reality through a subjective perspective and there is the way you believe things to be, then there is the objective reality that exists true independent of your subjective reality, perspectives, judgements and beliefs…This is why I suggest you never judge, but rather observe events and people objectively…It’s 2014, not 1954…the South is not what it once was.
On a lighter note, here is a rare color video of Ella Fitzgerald singing along with Dinah Shore about southern culture, people and hospitality on The Dinah Show Show in January of 1960:
This northerner wouldn’t get caught dead at that water park either, but for none of the mentioned reasons. None of my kayaking, biking, swimming, hiking, water skiing, sailing and lovers of nature friends would ever speak to me again, and I wouldn’t blame them. So many better and healthier outdoor things to do….
Oh we did all of the above this weekend. But let’s not get snobby about water parks and who cares what other people think?! Swimming and sliding down rides is FUN and when you have a six year old boy they are bloody brilliant.
I’m still amazed at how stupid people can be.
Get out of town. That is nothing short of terrible. I’m glad you shared it with us though. You don’t read that in the guidebooks!
Crazy stuff, hey?
Perplexing.
Wow! Kudos to you. Six Flags. My stomache can’t do that anymore. I can barely go on a roundabout in a playground without feeling sick. My pace is that tots’ amusement park Dutch Wonderland in Pennsylvania – have you guys been?
Wow! Kudos to you. Six Flags. My stomach can’t take that pace anymore. I can barely go on a roundabout in a playground without feeling sick. My pace is that tots’ amusement park in Pennsylvania Dutch Wonderland. You should go!
Oooh, I want to go there too!
So sad that people in one of the best educated counties in the USA would hold such opinions! Am quite shocked!
You say you heard comments about Six Flags being “too black” from multiple people?! I’ve lived in Maryland for about 10 years now and have never heard or heard of such overt racism. I have heard it couched as “lower income” however. I hope you don’t think we’re all a bunch of racists! And I’m not sure what’s unhealthy about a waterpark while we’re on the topic!
Ah, no, the folks I know in Maryland would not comment as such, but the comment came to my attention three times in the space of a couple of weeks and it really bothered me.
On the other topic – yes, I agree with you – waterparks are fun and healthy! What’s not healthy about swimming, sliding and running around enjoying yourself with your family?!