Foreigner in my home land

I went back to England this weekend, for the first time since February and it felt wierd. I was surprised by:

New twenty pound notes, which have been introduced since I was away and look like fake money. They are bigger notes, with a lot of "designery" white space, purple pictures and something about the industrial process of pin manufacturing on them.

Pubs, restaurants, airports, train stations and bus shelters (all businesses) are now all completely smoke free. The no-smoking laws came into the UK on 1st July and already the restaurants are cleaner, fresher and more enjoyable.

Friday night was the 9th eviction night on Big Brother, and I hadn't seen or heard anything about this series at all. That would have been totally impossible to avoid if I were in the UK, but without any Channel 4 or E4 TV channels, I'm BB-less.

The English football season started again yesterday - 11th August - Crazy!!

Next (clothes shop) has become really really cheap and nasty. I was looking at suits for work in there this afternoon, and there wasn't a suit in there that cost more than 100 pounds. Five years ago that would have been the other way round. Next obviously facing tough competition and is heading towards the prices (and quality) of Primark and New Look.


Things change fast.