Status Quo: the existing state of affairs; specifically : the last actual and uncontested state of affairs that preceded a controversy and that is to be preserved by preliminary injunction
(source: dictionary.com)

Part of my culture shock has always been here. Like many ex-pats, part of attraction to the Other has to do with a profound sense of misplacement in the place of origin.

No, I don't do things like other people. I have owned a home, in fact I helped build it. I insisted that the now-ex take it to the architecture prof neighbor (duh! why waste THAT resource!) and had deep input on the design. I built the gable ends, laid the slate floor, helped pound in the tongue and groove floor, and plastered all the walls. Texturing is FUN. I really enjoyed painting and then dry brushing to bring it out. I've owned five cars. I've had a dog, and two cats. I'm divorced from one cat, as it were, and the other is my stepkitty. I went through a rather amicable divorce, which seems unusual.

This is all so boring and prosaic! Wait! what have I done differently?

I taught myself about money, and have not bought into the Debt Culture.

I do not enjoy children. I did not like children when I was a child. I make occasional exceptions, but they are rare. My husband does not like them either. It's much like the problem with dogs. Dogs are okay, if their owners make them that way. It is the laxity or even over-restriction of the environment, creating awful screaming children, maniacally, monotonously barking dogs, and miserable, confused grownups.

I can't eat like other folks do. Allergies mean that I have to avoid sugar, white wheat flour, and most refined products.

I don't care for fashion. It doesn't care to fit me, or please me, so I have simply ignored it for years. If it's not jeans-based, or something that would look good on Grace Kelly, I'm not interested. I get what I want, that makes me look good.

No Manolo Blahniks. I do like Levis, but there's a brand which has wormed its way into our national iconography.
I fell for a Blackberry, but T-Online is so lax about spam, that 90% of the messages I got on it were, yes, spam. The thing drove me nuts. I'm tempted by an Apple I-phone to go with my MacBook, but didn't buy the Mac.com membership because I already have this blog, and my own website. Maybe after I buy stock in Apple..

I don't work for anyone, thanks to cg's gummint job, I can take my time and be choosy about how I work. Hopefully we can "leapfrog" one another from retirement to retirement, or endeavour to endeavour.

I had a British kindergarten teacher. American spell check is not the colour for me.

Normally, we don't watch television, but we seem to accidentally still have cable, so what the hell.. meanwhile, I am re-cultivating the special glee I take, in screwing up the status quo.