Today, the Governor of South Dakota (just east of ‘where was that, now?’) signed the bill that banned abortion in the state. It is hoped by many right-wing pro-lifers that this will trigger a much larger, country-wide campaign that will end in Washington DC at the steps of the Supreme Court. It is believed that other states will follow South Dakota’s lead (heaven help us), and ultimately force a reversal of Roe vs Wade, the landmark 1973 case that saw abortion made legal in the US. Many think the movement will run out of steam before it gets that far, but they underestimate the religious right, and the fact that a certain Sammy Alito now sits at the head of that very Supreme Court, and he certainly believes that this particular law is ‘not settled’.

Well, it’s only South Dakota, I hear you say. If a Dakotan girl gets herself up the duff, all she has to do is pop across the border into abortion-friendly North Dakota and bob’s yer uncle, or whatever phrase is appropriate. The thing is, it’s not that easy, is it. What if this girl cannot afford the bus fare? What if she can’t take a few days off working at WalMart to go to Nebraska? There are lots of scenarios, far worse than this, that point to one thing – once more, it’s the poor that suffer. Not to mention the woman’s right of choice being taken away by zealous righteous men. I’m not going to debate the finer points of abortion here; I’m pro-choice where abortion is concerned, and we all know that it is far better that abortions are performed legally by doctors rather than by back-street Vera Drakes on kitchen tables. It may be challenged in court, but rich and powerful right-wing groups have already pledged millions to fight the pro-life cause in the courtroom. I just want to ask this: why do the neo-Con religious right want so many unwanted babies born into poverty?

What do they gain from it, other than an endless factory line of WalMart employees busting their guts for a dime a day, more pimple-faced brats to pack their groceries for them? I’ll tell you what they get – they get people who are faced with no other choice than to join the Army, wave the flag, and end up dead on the side of a road in Baghdad or Kabul. We’ve all seen that bit in Fahreneit 9/11, where the Army recruiters press-gang directionless kids at the mall into joining up, and I’ve seen them out and about here, too, on the university campus, going after the kids with direction (but offering to pay for their fees). even today, universities were told that they can no longer prevent the recruiters from coming onto campus with their sign-up sheets. They can complain, but it will fall upon deaf ears, or at least the ears of those who determine your funding budgets.

Now I am aware that joining the Army can be a noble thing, but when you see how the military target poor people to become their statistics, and when you see how corrupt governments abuse patriotism to send these same youngsters into wars based on lies and hidden corporate agendas, without sufficient equipment, you start to get a sick feeling in your stomach. they don’t like gays because…they cannot produce potential soldiers. They don’t like abortion because…it prevents potential soldiers form being born. They don’t like contraception because…it prevents potential soldiers from being conceived (States such as Ohio and Utah have been making it difficult for people to obtain contraceptives). It’s all about keeping the little tin soldiers churning out, and into the body-bags so that some greedy politician and his filthy-rich backers can cling onto power long enough to ensure that generations more remain in the poverty trap, thinking themselves lucky they live in a land where their leaders allow this to happen to them.

And if you end up in jail, those same rabid zealots are the ones watching you suffer in paralysis during lethal injection, and gloat at your death. Which brings this anger-tinted blog entry to a long-awaited conclusion – how come the people who say they are pro-life are actually the ones who are the most pro-death?

“You know the funny thing about America? It’s the little differences. I mean, they got the same shit over there as we got here, but there it’s a little different. Example – they got a chocolate bar called ‘Milky Way’, but it’s actually a Mars Bar. Almost no difference at all. Nothing like an actual Milky Way. And they have Snickers of course, but they have a variety of Snickers called ‘Marathon’. No lie! They probably don’t know that we used to call it that, once upon a time.”

When I was a young kid at Goldbeaters school, we had two Americans in our class, Bill and Sarah. We could not believe their outlandish stories about the products Stateside, particularly the breakfast cereals. Apparently, everything was different. Sure, they had Kelloggs and other recognisable brands, but completely different varieties. Now I am here, I understand some of the excitement. It takes time to get used to things in foreign grocery stores, and I still haven’t mastered the cereal aisle. I have learnt, though, that Frosted Flakes are the same as our Frosties, but that’s obvious.

However, some products baffle me. Ok, they don’t have Pepsi Max out here (sadly), but they do have Vanilla and Black Cherry Diet Coca-Cola. Is it necessary to have all those ingredients? at leats they don’t have cinnamon flavour Coke – yet. Cinnamon is, I think, the national flavour. You get Cinnamon Tic-Tacs and Cinnamon chewing-gum, fair enough, but also Cinnamon toothpaste, and Cinnamon mouthwash. Hmm. It doesn’t stop at cinnamon. You can even get Orange flavour toothpaste, and Vanilla, too – perhaps Crest are secretly developing a Black Cherry Diet Toothpaste?

Even away from the grocery store, things that are the same are still different. At the bookstore, I found that Corelli (he of the Mandolin) is not a Captain here. The popular board game Cluedo is known simply as ‘Clue’ here (or, the way I play it, ‘Cluedon’t’), and in California, 50 degrees Fahrenheit is considered ‘cold’. What’s more, in the US, Craig Ferguson is considered to be an actual celebrity. Oh my god, it’s a completely different world.

In a week’s time, I officially Turn Thirty. I’m not looking forward to it. Especially since, I am told, it’s actually the law here that when you hit 30, you have to grow a goatee. Now I’ve been telling people that it aint gonna happen, I went through my ‘beards’ phase years ago, as all who rememeber me can attest. “Oh you say that now,” people tell me. Yes I do say it now, and I’ll be saying it next week too – the beards aint coming back! However, as if to prove the goatee-law, while watching the golf we noticed that Tiger Woods is now sporting a recently-hairy chin, and a quick google-search revealed that he turned thirty exactly a month ago. Insert golf-related joke here if you must, but it’s got me worried. Can you get fined if you don’t have one?

Of course, there are other phenomena related to turning thirty Stateside. For one thing, you no longer have to prove your age when buying beer. Oh yes, if you are under 30, you get carded – even though the legal drinking age is 21. It is pretty ridiculous to say the least, especially in the supermarket when you know the person selling it to you is at least eight years younger than you and has no idea there was more than one President George Bush. Maybe people grow goatees as a social sign to prove their thirtigenarian status. Thirtigenarian, that is surely not a word? Well, it is now. I’m Turning Thirty, I say so.

If ‘twenty’ rhymed with ‘plenty’, ‘thirty’ rhymes with ‘dirty’, which is not good. Well, it’s better than ‘warty’, which rhymes with ‘forty’ – no disrespect to fortigenarians, of course. Thirty also rhymes with ‘flirty’, which I certainly am not, and ‘shirty’, which I kind of am. But the worst part about Turning Thirty is, and I’m serious here, that it is the name of a truly awful book by Mike Gayle (the former agony-uncle turned agony-inducing-author). I’d prefer to say I turning thirty-one than be identified with that absolute bum-wipe of a novel. In a one-line book review I’d write: Don’t Ever Read This Dire Book, EVER. But that’s just the Thirty-year-old Grumpy Old Man coming out, and he’s always been there.

So what can I expect from my thirties? The plans are to start a family with my wife, to have a career with my MA, and maybe who knows even finally learn to drive… Other than that, who can tell? I don’t even know what to expect from my birthday itself – my wife has a surprise planned, which involves going somewhere the weekend before, and that’s all I know. I’m intrigued! I love surprises – unless the surprise involves me waking up next Tuesday and deciding, “hmm, i think I’ll only shave some of my face today…”

Last week, in the Post Office, I was mailing a job application when the lady behind the counter told me that I needed to pay 23 cents more for postage than I had thought. I only had enough money for the single stamp, so she told me I would not be able to mail my letter. Suddenly there appeared next to me a man with a handful of small coins, offering to pay for the rest of my postage. “Oh, er, thank you,” I mumbled apologetically. “No problem!” He beamed. “Someone else lent me some money today, so I’m repaying the favor! Have a nice day!” The cashier lady, not to be outdone for kindness, told me that she would even lick the stamp for me. Don’t push it, I thought to myself, but smiled, and went off and actually Had a Nice Day.

Despite all the vitriolic politics, despite the death sentences, despite the crazy right-wing media, you cannot deny that America is a friendly place. When someone says “Have a Nice Day” I think they really mean it. The first time I heard it over here, from an otherwise grumpy old lady in a Seven-Eleven, I thought they were having me on, just as if a Londoner would say “cheerio guv’nor, mind the apples and pears!” But I really don’t think so. I’m sure that the Post Office incident would not happen in London (well, it never happened to me in nearly thirty years, anyhow). People here are generally more openly friendly. I usually notice it in stores like Target, when middle aged women come up to me in the Monopoly section and offer advice on which board games are the best family fun. My mind is saying, Who Asked You? But I find myself actually being nice back. It’s unnerving. I’m from London! People don’t talk to each other there!

The big culture shock of niceness has been on the buses. On one of our first days here, we got onto a bus and the driver actually asked the passengers if the air-conditioning made them too cold, or did they need it turned up at all. I nearly fell off my seat, trying to imagine that happening on a draughty double-decker in London. Here in Davis, I didn’t have the correct change for the bus once, but rather than leave me by the side of the road, they let me on for free, with a smile and a Have a Nice Day to boot. And I have to admit, in the face of Bush’s march towards Unitarian Executive (aka, ‘dictatorship’) and the zealots marching in the streets to ban abortions (presumably so more poor children can grow up without prospects and be sent to die in financial wars), in the face of all this craziness, a friendly gesture really can make the Day a whole lot Nicer.