demagogue on 5/1/2013 at 06:03

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As the only one in here that's ever nailed a nun, I'm qualified to say none of you know what you're talking about when it comes to nun control.

Al_B on 5/1/2013 at 13:44

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Weird - I always called it "noughts and crosses" as a kid.

Vivian on 5/1/2013 at 16:47

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Yeah. That's true. Where is photophobic snake plissken getting his information from?

demagogue on 6/1/2013 at 14:15

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I don't think what you're saying even applies to normal women heh. There's no sex taboo but good look convincing anybody that that means handling them is suddenly a cakewalk. Add religion to the mix and it only gets weirder.

But she wasn't a real nun anyway, just an acolyte or whatever, so I shouldn't be talking anyway.

demagogue on 7/1/2013 at 07:40

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Pshaw, I'm not nearly so one-dimensional. There were crazy Asians, artistic Asians, bookish Asians, activist Asians...

To at least have the veneer of being on topic though, if the issue of romance is up... I seriously dated a British woman (well she moved to England very young and grew up there) and an American, and I found that ritual (or the proper way of doing things) was maybe more important to the Brit and the American was more informal about everything. I realized there were certain things that just had to be done on occasions -- "putting the kettle on" being a key one, and you'd just develop a 6th sense when it was time for it.

There are countless little differences that come out in the use of language. I think there's a refined since of what's "lovely" in an English way of thinking... people biking around in early autumn beside a well-kept grass commons, or a child politely saying "not at all" when you say "oh thank you" for something kind they did. Things are "nice" to Americans, but there isn't like a definite sensibility to it that I ever noticed; it's just like their personal feelings of what happens to be nice, like going to some nice restaurant, "oh, well, this is a nice place".

And there was something funny about the way you'd say things to an English sensibility, above what you're actually saying... Whereas to an American, they just say what they mean -- it's either funny or it isn't -- and there's not really any more to it, however you said it. Like reading an Gorey comic is funny with a Brit because the use of language is "awfully clever" ("Beware of this and that," warns a droopy raven in The Epiplectic Bicycle.); but to an American -- well first I don't know what comic you'd read together -- but like some romantic movie, hmm, here's a maybe exaggerated example. At the end of the Sex in the City movie, Big finally sends a "love email" to express himself most intimately, and (after attaching like 100 famous love letters that other people wrote) it's "I know I screwed up - but I will love you forever." Ok, it's a touching sentiment, but come the fuck on. I thought it was a cop out. Could you say it with any less eloquence, or put in any less effort considering the hell you put her through? He just says what he means and means what he says, but there's nothing lovely about how he says it.

So I'm sure my bias is coming out. I found chatting with the English sensibility in the air a lot more entertaining & charming, and with an American it ... you can still have fun conversations, but it doesn't have that charm.

Edit: Good American poetry can sometimes get across an American sensibility that I think plays well in language. The poems of E.E. Cummings are like that, like (http://www.gvsu.edu/english/cummings/Miller6.htm) this poem about fumbling with a woman like a car... It's consumerist, technical / mechanical, all about rolling up your sleeves and getting the job done, with gears and gizmos whirling and sort of shrugging with a sheepish smile at the chaos. So I don't say we have it so bad in the American mind-set... Unfortunately I don't think near enough people in the US play with our own sensibility enough. It's there, but people don't play off of it much.