U-S-A part2

What else does USA stand for ?

2. Ugly Stupid Automobile

The queue at the Dollar car rental was pretty short, albeit still slow and somewhat irritating, but there was no major hitch. As usual, they tried to suggest we upgrade from our already large vehicle and as always we declined.

Our vehicle was a "full size saloon". This turned out to be a Mercury Grand Marquis. I have to assume that this model was manufactured specifically to sell to hire companies so that they could benefit from stupendous discounts for buying up cars that no one else would buy.

The thing is astonishingly unattractive. It is easy to understand why European or Japanese cars are seen as so stylish by the more sophisticated US buyer.

The car was undoubtedly modern in some respects, but in looks and layout it made you wonder if it can been deliberately designed to be bad. On the plus side, it was indeed comfortable (as you would expect when sitting in seats the size of a sofa).

We did grow used to it, and if one didn't know better then it would seem perfectly normal for the "gas" to be guzzled at a rate so fast that the needle moved towards empty at a speed that was discernible to the naked eye.

As for the chioce of colour - no doubt dreary beige was specified by Dollar to achieve maximum price discounts.


3. Unusual: Service Absent

Something that one can usually count on in America is excellent service (even if it is a little sickly). Disappointingly, we were let down time after time in restaurants (with just a couple of welcome exceptions).

We're at a bit of a loss to explain this, except for the fact that it must be difficult to find enough good quality staff for the vast number of places where they're needed.



4. Upcoming: Scary Action

Harry loves rollercoasters and is now big enough to try any that he wants to. Even he balked at one or two of them - especially the one in Busch Gardens with two vertical drops.

One that seemed scary last time but felt more benign, now that we have been immunised by trips to Alton Towers and previous visits to Orlando, was Return to Atlantis at Seaworld.

This is a log-flume type of ride and is unusual in that instead of having one large drop, it actually has one large drop on display and another one hidden on the blind side.

In a log flume, the usual set-up is that there are lots of fake drops along the way - Disney's Splash Mountain is the classic. By the time we come to the real drop we've had some extra fun along the way.

Well in Return to Atlantis, there won't so many false alarms but the real peculiarity was that before each slide there was LITERALLY a big sign warning us of the upcoming drop and in case we had our eyes closed, there was a voice recording to the same effect !

I am perplexed by this. Why would they do it ? There can't be a law requiring it (such a law would really spoil a lot of rides) and if there were, then such notices would be in place on all the other rides surely ?


5. Unhelpfully Signposted Attraction

Dollar offered us a SatNav ($13 a day, plus tax). This would have been spectactularly unnecessary - partly because we had brought our own TomTom but also because the roads around the Disney/Universal/I-Drive area are really easy to work with. Not only are they quite logical, but the signposting to the attractions is so thorough that any wrong turns are easily corrected by following the next sign.

So, I was surprised by the completely different scenario when Harry and I drove to Tampa to visit Busch Gardens (highly recommended by the way). I had a look on the map and could see it should be very easy - drive South on the I4 for about 80 miles then follow signs.

Well, this was basically correct but the signs took me completely by surprise - there were hardly any !

There was one sign about 12 miles from the Jct between the I4 and the I75 indicating that I need to take the I75 North. There was no repeater sign, not even right at the junction, nor when I turned off. On the I75 itself, there was no indication that we were going in the right direction until there was just one small sign at the required junction. Even on the final approach roads, there was one sign and one only for each turning.

Luckily we had been before a few years ago so I was somewhat prepared.

I am puzzled by this, given the size and economic importance of the attraction. I can only assume there must be local by-laws preventing them from "advertising" with roadsigns.

Meanwhile the signage inside the park was first rate. If the poor directions kept a few people away, then I guess we benefitted from that !

Happy Binary Day !

The 1st January 2010, and I couldn't help noticing that the date 01/01/10 can be written with just ones and zeros - a binary date of a sort.

It's quite a while since this happened before - November 2001. After November next year, it will be a very long time until it happens again (another 90 years or so).

11:11 on Armistice Day this year will be a pretty significant moment numerologically speaking, I suppose.

Of course, we could argue that this year and (20)00 and (20)01 etc don't really count if we want to use the full year. In that case we need to go back to around the time of the Battle of Hastings - the start of the 2nd millennium was of course rich in binary dates. And we will have to wait another 8,000 years or so to get the next occurrences.

I wondered whether anyone else was having these thoughts and a quick web search revealed that apparently there is much chatter about it in the Twittersphere. Likewise there's the debate about what to call this new decade. My vote would go to "the twenty tens".

Happy Twenty Ten !