Dear America

I love America. I love that my kids can play outside while I sit inside and eat corn chips and green chile dip. This is the life! But since I've been gone for a while, I've noticed a few things that really ought to change.
- Use the metric system already!
Seriously, what's the deal with this 12 inches to a foot, 16 ounces to a pound, water freezing at 32 degrees and however-many pints, quarts, gallons, and whatnot? Meters. It's simple. Learn your height, and from there it's pretty simple. Kilograms. It's not that hard, since a half-kilo is about a pound anyway. And how about water freezing at 0 degrees and boiling at 100? Wouldn't that be simpler? Honestly, though, this is the one I had some trouble with at the beginning in China. When the weather said 23 degrees, I had no idea if that meant shorts, coats, or maybe a little of each. But eventually I learned how it felt, not the exact conversion, and it worked well for me. Anything in the 20s is perfect weather. 30 is getting warmer like summer, and 40 is too hot. I need a jacket at 15 degrees, and anything 10 and under, I need a coat. If it says -30, just stay inside.
- Football? Oh please.
Now this may make me un-American, but it's about time we called football football. After all, you use your feet. Soccer? It doesn't even mean anything! American football should come up with another name, since for every SINGLE country in the rest of the world, football is the one that uses your feet. Now, don't get me wrong-- I love American football! It's my absolute favorite sport to watch. But it needs a new name, people!
- Our diet
I can't point fingers at this one, since I eat American food, too. But really, do we have to turn everything into a dessert? There are so many recipes (if you need examples, go check pinterest for about 20 seconds) on how to add sugar to fruit. Caramel-filled apples. Chocolate filled strawberries and raspberries. Chocolate-dipped everything. Banana bread. Why not just eat fruit?!
So yeah. When I first got to China, the sugar annoyed me. They don't have dry granulated sugar by the 5-kilo bag (that would be 10 pounds, basically). The largest bags are these 1-kilo (2.2 pounds. Not hard to remember!) packets, and it's the texture of brown sugar. So when I was in my American habit of scooping out of my huge sugar bin and shoveling sugar into everything I made, I'd have to refill my sugar bin every time I used it. So I got into the habit of using less sugar. That was good!
But now I'm back in America. I love the rich chocolate, the nacho cheese, the general junk food. It's convenient. Once we're settled, though, we'll get back to cooking our own healthier food, and I hope to keep my habit of using less sugar.
- The great outdoors
In Shenyang, there are people everywhere you go. Despite the air pollution (and really because they have no alternative), people are walking, riding their bikes, and being out in the weather. It's not a pretty place to walk, because there is nothing but pavement-- no parks, no trees, no hiking trails. But people are out and about.
In America, there is practically no pollution, everyone's house has both a front AND a back yard. There are hiking trails and footpaths throughout the town, and we still hop into our SUVs and drive to everything we attend.
On a side note, I had this plan that once we got back in the USA, I'd go outside every day. We'd walk, hike, go to the park, and generally enjoy the great outdoors. Yesterday my friend, Heidi, and I took our kids to Rocketship Park. We pushed our kids on the swings, helped them climb on stuff, and then enjoyed sitting on the park bench and chatting. My nose kept running, and my eyes started itching and swelling. Eventually I was sneezing more than talking, even AFTER she'd given me some allergy medicine. It was bad! After Heidi pointed it out, I realized that the park was surrounded on three sides by a forest of juniper trees. With every gust of wind (and it was a fine, breezy spring morning), a huge, yellow cloud of pollen would poof up from each tree and make its way over to my histamine producers. By the time we decided to leave, my eyes were red, swollen, and generally scary looking. We spent the rest of our morning at the library. There wasn't as much pollen, but there also wasn't as much opportunity to chat, since our kids kept bringing us books for us to read them. Ugh! ;)
- In China, they used to have these big communist campaigns to eradicate things like birds, weeds, educated people, etc. I think we should have one in America, specifically in White Rock, to eradicate goatheads. I hate finding them in my shoes, and I hate that they pop my stroller tires. Down with goatheads!
- That's about it. America's really cool.