MOANING BRIT

ENGLISHNESS

It's a strange phenomena but living abroad it's normal that you become more English. It's certainly happened to me and I suppose it's part and parcel of the expat experience. By being a foreigner people are obviously more aware of your different nationality and all the cultural differences that implies. It is also relevant that the World Cup is fast approaching, the designated time for all things patriotic and jingositic. Outside the World Cup if you painted your face red and white and walked around with a St George cape you'd get arrested for being a National Front memeber. In fact, I have booked my ticket back to the UK to conincide with the whole tournament as the thought of watching it in a smoke free American pub at six in the morning fills me with dread. I know it's always true, but this time England really do have a chance and I would like to be there if it happens.

I was out in Huntington Beach the other night on a Saturday sipping Jack and Diet Cokes at Gallaghers, our local 'Irish' bar that shows Amerian football, basket ball and baseball on 24 inch plasma screens. I turns out there is quite a vocal English contingent in Huntington Beach as I managed to meet them that night. One of them - James from Shepherds Bush - complained of how fake it is here because people latch onto you because you are English. Being English is deemed 'cool' - the music, attitude, the accent, history, standing beside them in the Gulf, yada yada. We are also the motherland really so I guess there is some reverance from that too. They speak our language. It's that 'special relationship' Regan and Thatcher talked about which has since been used as a prop to justify helping each other out when we pointlessly invade oil rich Middle Eastern countries. All this means that we're really quite popular here, despite the fact that Hollywood frequently casts us the weird, eccentric bad guy characters.

James carried on demoaning the fact that he thought it was fake that Americans liked him just because of his language. He even admitted he used it as a tool to get chicks, so this kind of undermined his whole argument. Later that night I saw him holding court to a group of American's. He was acting all over the top English, cheeky chappy gestures and an overemphasis on the Cockney vowels. 'Aigght Geezer, ahs it goin? You're avin' a Giraffe, in't ya?' The Yanks were lapping it up. Who was being fake here then?

BACTERIA BEACH

There were some recent news stories in Southern California about high levels of bacteria on our beaches. Maybe toddlers building sand castles wasn't such a great idea after all. Or not, as is probably the case as this is no doubt another pointless scare story with absolutely no value or interest whatsoever. Another in a long line of things to worry about that you shouldn't worry about.

It's also probably another example of American over-the-top-ness - anything posing any miniscule threat or danger is seized upon as being potentially hazardous. Even when it's not. Don't they realise that bacteria are everywhere and in many situations are useful? Why don't they do news stories on how many bacteria live in our gut breaking down our foods. Millions.

It's like those stories about never eating food like peanuts or crisps which are served in restaurants. That was an old wives tale from a few years ago probably with it's origins in a bogus news story like the beach one. I remember hearing how they did tests on these types of open foods served and they had traces of urine and fecal matter from other people touching them. Proabably true, but I think here it's a case of what you can't see doesn't harm you. Why don't they do other tests on other food prepared by the chef who picks his nose, mops his sweaty brow and scratches his itchy arse.

MADONNA GOES JIVEBUNNY

Madge was in town so I thought I'd pay homage to an ageing icon and caught a glimpse of her at the Forum in Inglewood on the second night of her Confessions Tour. We had nosebleed seats high in the arena and due to the fact that heat rises, it was also very hot from the thousands of bopping housewifes, 80s washups and gay fans.

I have never really been a big fan musically of Madonna. Of course, I stole adolescent snogs to the sound of Isla Bonita and strutted my stuff at school discos to Holiday. Like all pop icons, she soundtracked some key moments in my life. But I never really thought she had an outstanding voice or did anything spectacular musically. She had a knack for reinvention, playing with iconography and attaching herselves to the hippest musical producers of the moment. Step forward Shep Pettibone, William Orbit, Mirwais and Jaques Le Cont to name a few.

She opened up dramatically, in character as a dominatrix diva emerging from her hole in the stage, with a cane and black tights, muscled men writhing at her feet. Banks of huge TV screens beamed morphing images of colourful fractals. Amazonian types breakdanced and roller skated around the large stage. On one song, Madonna road a metal pony on a pole, whilst images of jockeys falling of their horses flashed behind her. No doubt a sniggering reference to her own recent accident in her adopted Albion.

At times the music felt like Madonna remixed. It was Madonna meets Jive Bunny as all her hits segued into the next one in a megamix style and fashion. The versions were all different - beefed up bass, more disco-fied and with four four beats. She even did a Saturday Night fever skit, replete in white suit, tails and cane, to the sounds of Disco Inferno which them morhped into Music. Her last album was produced by Stuart Price who is also her musical director on the tour and he clearly left his mark. I remember Price as Jaques Lu Cont and Les Rhythmes Digitales - filtered house with an electro pop lilt in the late 90s. The boy from Reading clearly did good.

That's the thing with Madonna. She's Madonna. She can get away with murder. On one of the songs she rose to the stage on a huge cross covered in light bulbs. Madonna crucified. Thankfully not by the crowd, which was surprising as the audience was probably 40 % Mexican Catholic. That's Madonna's whole thing, trying to shock and twist our perceptions of music, sexuality and religion. On other songs she got political, chiding Bush, making claims for the environment, images of world leaders and Osama Bin Laden flashing on the screens in random sequences as the audience whooped and cheered. The messages where meaningless, empty calls to action, pop ephemera forgotten by the crowd the next morning. It's like when Madonna was at London's Live 8 gig last summer and she urged the audience to 'make poverty history'. That message rang in my ears as I sat in my $90 seat and scanned the huge 15,000 capacity arena. Whose poverty are we making history here Madonna? I don't think it's yours.

HOW BIZARRE

They had a special discount on lazer whitened teeth at my gym the other day. It was $130 to get your Hampstead Heaths bleached up. I contemplated having it done. It would be amusing to go back to the UK with dazzling gnashers. They also have tanning salon at our gym. I also find this hard to fathom as it's nearly always sunny here.

It's also not illegal to talk on your mobile phones whilst driving here. I also find that bizarre in a place which is so uptight about anything that could be vaguely linked to death, injury or being sued. Young mothers yack into their Sony Ericssons and gang bangers sneer into their Motorolas whilst veering at speed. Perhaps the mobile phone networks have a strong lobbyist who is doing a good job in Washington. More people talking all of the time means more revenues and as people spend so much time in their cars here and they are a natural place to talk whilst stuck in traffic jams, then, well, that's a lot of potential dough. Phone revenues would probably drop by 60% if they banned it. It's like the car lobby here. The car and mobile phone companies are mutually beneficially. Perhaps they work hand in hand, a vicious circle of revenue, a feedback loop of call time and gas. Gosh, I am turning into a hardened cynic, but then I sometimes think it's difficult not to in the good old US of Eh?

I just bought some Neuro PS pills which you take with food and they are supposed to help improve your memory. I keep forgetting to take them though.

AMERICAN INVENTOR

Simon Cowell is a one man media megalith out here. American Idol swamps the ratings and Mr Belt Halfway Up His Chest Cowell is watching the Bucks stack. Cowell is always in the media, grinning swarmily and playing the honest-but-brutal Brit card. Now it seems like he has a new pretender to the throne.

There's a new show out here called American Inventor, a Pop Idol for Yank Clive Sinclairs and on the judging panel (and also one of the creators of the show along with Cowell) is Peter Jones. Peter Jones is an entrepreneur who I had never heard of. He didn't invent the eponymous department store. He ran some telecommunications company and it looks like he's trying to usurp Cowell's Mr Bad Guy image. He does blunt put downs without blinking. Contestants who have invested life savings and years into their dreams are reduced to blubbering wrecks in a flash. Peter Jones has that nasaly drawl and brutality that Americans love. I suppose it must be refreshing as Americans are reknowed for hyperbole and being over the top. Everything is talked up, given a glean and over hyped beyond it's worth so that unhesitated reality checks delivered in a Home Counties lilt are welcomed. Perhaps the biggest irony is that American Inventor is a British invention.

I haven't had time to check but on one episode a young Latino was about to be ejected from the panel. Peter Jones had an earnest look in his eye and the viewers felt on a threshold of a moment.  "I know what it feels like to come from nothing.." Peter urged to the boy. I bet you Peter didn't come from nothing.

FEELING GASSY?

Gas. Or as we know it petrol. I'm not sure what the current price is per gallon in the UK but here its around $3.30 a gallon in the more expensive garages and this is causing a major stir amongst Americans. Gas prices is one of the biggest bones of contention for US voters as they feel it is their divine right to consume it greedily and pollute the planet. Bush was right when he said America is addicted to oil and the addiction will surely prove to be fatal.

I have environmental nightmares when driving on the freeways here as everyone drives such big cars. SUVs, pickups with wheels the size of small houses, trucks and other gas guzzlers. They have car pool lanes where you can drive if there is more than one of you and frequently they are empty as everyone drives solo. It's crazy, dog gone it!

I've seen haggard housewives outside supermarkets collecting signatures for a petition against gas prices. I always tell them there's too many cars on the road and that gas prices should be higher, plus it's not a bottomless barrel, its gonna run out soon and then what will they do?

LITTLE MEXICO

Sometimes it feels like I'm living in Mexico. Indeed California used to be Mexico so it there is a poetic justice as slowly but surely Mexicans take back the land that used to be theirs. The US Senate is trying to push through a bill that makes it illegal to be an illegal immigrant. They also want to build a big wall on the Mexican border. It's an interesting and volatile time to be living here. Some people have likened the uprising as akin to the Civil Rights movement. Two weeks ago there were massive demonstrations all over the country. On May 1st there was a mass boycott - A Day Without Immigrants - that was designed as a way of showing how important immigrants are to the economy. It's one of those apparently irresolvable issues. Mexicans and Latinos want to come here and make a better life for themselves, even if it means skulking across the border illegally. Some American citizens object to paying taxes for illegals who may become a drain on the shooling, health and other social security budgets. Some of the Mexicans carried Mexican flags on the demonstrations which really irked some Americans. It has created tensions across different communities. Some African Americans object to Mexicans coming here and taking jobs illegally they could be doing. It's a postmodern nightmare.

I live near Santa Anna and Costa Mesa which are very Mexican areas. That's the bizarre thing here as everything seems to be less mixed up ethnically than perhaps in the UK. Newport Beach is very rich and white, Range Rover mums and million dollar condos on the marina with phat yachts parked on the water. Two miles inland and it's a low rent contrast, strip malls and run down neighbourhoods with immigrants slaving for less than the minimum wage. It is a land of contrasts here, perhaps most exemplified by the Tijuana border where the First World meets the Third (or is it Second). Smiling brown Mexicanas sell sweets to the day tripping white Southern Californians who grin down from their gas happy SUVs. Bizarre.

LAND OF THE FREE (BUT NOT HEALTH CARE)

Thankfully we were covered by insurance for Tristan's birth. If not the bill would have set us back 26 K in $ - a lot of Benjamins. It was money well spent. The healthcare was incredible in a new hospital that was very luxurious with marble floors and a ubiquitous Starbucks in the basement.

I was also very surprised to get a bill from the ambulance land on our door matt. We called the emergency services as it was all a major panic giving birth (please see previous story). At the time I didn't know this wasn't free like in England. When I first saw the bill which was for around $1100 I didn't think our insurance covered it and I was pissed off. The bill was even itemised. $60 for the IV drip. $900 for labour (I never asked for five members of the emergency service to come to our gaff). They had even listed down 'Use of blanket - $8' - we had never kept this blanket, why were we getting charged for it? The mind boggles over here.

It was incredible. What happens if you are uninsured or can't afford it? It does make me miss Europe and socialised health care. Everything is about money here and if you haven't got it your fucked.

Actually the amusing codicil to this story is the only thing the insurance didn't cover us for was Tristan's circumcision. This was deemed 'non-essential' so we had to pay for it. Everything, including the anasethetic, came to $470. So I had to pay nearly five hundred bucks to get half my sons nob lopped off. It was a perverse irony, perhaps one that I will never be forgiven for.

MACHO CULTURE

I was watching a reality TV show the other day called 'Cops' where they trail various 'law enforcement operatives' tackling crime in the drug and gun ridden hinterlands. I was struck by how brutal they were. They were basically entrapping drug dealers by setting up a fake deal then they would spring on the dealer. I saw one guy literally rugby tackle a frail looking female crack head and then they all jump on her and put her in cuffs. Now I know she'd broken the law but the force they used seemed to really outweight the situation. The waif like 'tweaker' (drug abuser, normally crystal meth) would have had problems wrestling a mouse, let alone a gang of 200 pound burly policemen.

Time and time again they showed different dealers being jumped and then cuffed and bungled into the back of a van. I get the sense out here that the police are over forceful and that this is endemic in a culture that is basically quite macho. It's the same culture that leads to the gung ho attitude in Iraq, over bearing and brutal.

It seems like its easy to break the law here. I feel like the law are sniffing over your shoulder whatever you do, it's like a police state. You can't do this. You can't do that. You're not allowed to drink in public. It's illegal to smoke on the beach. I sometimes sneak a crafty fag on the beach and all the time I get paranoid that a police helicopter will come to the scene and shout at me with a loud speaker:

'PUT THE CIGARETTE DOWN. SMOKING IS A FEDERAL CRIME. PUT THE SMOKE DOWN AND PUT YOUR HANDS WHERE WE CAN SEE THEM'

and while I'm looking up with my hands down I'm knocked off my feet with a force I haven't felt since playing rugby at school eons ago.

JONESY'S DUKEBOX

I found some good English company in the form of ex-Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones. Not that we've been hanging out over a cold pint whilst we talked of home and I got some 70s punk gossip. That would be cool, but alas his company is in the form of his daily two hour show on Indie FM. Well I don't mean alas, as it's a really good show.

At first I didn't realise it was the real Jonesy - but then I clicked. On the website. Not least as every day they have competitions and Jonesy plays the guitar and whistles the tune to songs you have to guess. And I thought punks couldn't play instruments. So, if you ever wondered what happened to all the punks, they moved to LA and got jobs spinning CDs on daytime radio. Actually Johnny Rotten also lives in LA. Maybe it's a bit of a punk haven, the Kings Road moving way out West. Way Out West. I remember them, vaguely, I can't remember if they were an 80s synth rock outfit or a 90s synth prog house duo, I think they were the latter.

Back to Jonesy. It's a very good show, especially since being deprived of all fings Inglish it's nice to ear a real Landan geezer speak tha trufff. Na wa I mean? All the other radio stations feature annoyingly positive dull as piss Californian presenters with white teeth and serious sense of humour bypasses. Jonesy tells it how it is. And he plays nice tunes.

LOAD OF OLD GARBAGE

I've come to the conclusion that 80% of everything here is total garbabge, particularly the media. Every day I get the LA Times delivered to my door and most of it is adverts, circulars, coupons, offers, and other junk mail as inserts. On Sunday it looks like four trees have been chopped to make one edition and 80% of it is advertising gumph as I strain my back to pick it up. I shudder at the thought of all that ink as a lot of them are very glossy, well produced brochures. Oh how I miss the Sunday Times, Observer and News of the World.

Everyday I have to wade through mountains of adveristing circulars to get my post (mail). When I go to the gym to run on the treadmill I turn on the TV and flip through the 80 odd channels and find nothing decent to watch. Not least, there are commercial breaks every three minutes. Then its the crap you have to plough through; infomercials, Billy Graham type evangelist preachers, the same in Spanish, dross soap operas and more infomercial channels for fitness machines straddled by 70s looking bikini babes with white teeth. You know with those bikini bottoms that have a ridiculously long front like a VW Beetle bonnet.

That's the thing here the quality quantity ratio is seriously skewered but I'm not even sure most people notice or mind.

ST PADDY'S DAY

American's like any excuse for an event. Halloween gets a lot of hype with half of the aisles in supermarkets dedicated to orange plastic junk and scary masks months before October. Then there's Valentines Day, the 4th of July, Thanksgiving and of course St Patricks Day. I found it weird that supermarkets and card stores sold St Patricks Days cards. How weird. You can't even buy those in London which has a higher percentage of Irish people there. I wonder if you can buy them in Ireland.

Thats the thing with Americans. Any vague whiff of ancestory and they go all gooey. 'Oh my second cousins, great aunts, ex-husbands best friend is from Galway, therfore I have a claim to Oirishness' It's typical Americana that anything, whatever it is, can be turned into crass commercialism and hence you can buy your cards, green T-shirts, special edition Guinness cans on March 19th.

The Irish disapora always interests me. Notions of nationality and how they change once you are out of that country. It's the Irish Bar phenomena, the Irish experience and craic on tap, judging from the amount of 'Irish' bars there are everywhere. Everyone loves the Irish and wants to drink and party like them.

Thus, I went into Huntington Beach on St Patrick's Day with my sister. Town was extra busy teeming with Southern Californians out for a good time. The queue - or line as they say here - was too big for the one Irish in town. We went to a Sushi Restaurant Bar and saw a procession of people wearing emerald green tops. I met a couple from Chicago who's surname was Kennedy so they had genuine Irish stakes. We drank a shot consisting of a a Guiness which you drop a shot glass of something else into and then down it. I can't remember much about the rest of the night.

APPEARANCE IS EVERYTHING

People here are very conscious of their appearance. Incidentally, hen I make judgements and observations here they are about Californians, who I suppose are a race to their own and not really representative of Americans. Californians are very image obsessed. I guess that's an extension of it being quite - on the surface - a superficial society. It's the white teeth, fake tits, plastic surgery culture. People are very clean and orderly. The neighbourhoods stretch out for miles, white picket fences and trim lawns, desparate housewives twitching their starched curtains.

All of the cars are very clean. People work out and strive for that perfect body. Appearances are very important.

People often comment to me on how people from England and Europe have bad teeth. They ask me if it's because our healthcare is bad. I don't think that's the reason, rather, people over there - for now anyway - are less obsessed with how they look. If their teeth are slightly crooked or browning then that's part of their personality, like a mole or freckles, and they are happy to live with it.

PATRIOTIC GAMES

You see a lot of American flags out here, as would be predicted for a country that is very patriotic. Also those 'Support Our Troops' car stickers are a common sight. As would be expected of a superpower who is, in historical terms, a young nation, there is also that unbridalled optimism and naiveity that goes hand in hand with patrioticism.

In America's self appointed role as the worlds policeman, most people here genuinely believe that America's crusade is one of promoting democracy and freedom. Hmm. And it is so easy to take snipes at America's real role and how that is so closely linked to oil and control of other natural resources. America is the superpower, and, just like the school playground bully, will make sure it is first in line for all the best things.

That's what happens when you are the superpower. You become an easy target for other countries, some of whom may be jealous of the advantages you gain. Britain was the largest Empire the world has seen. We cloaked our right to invade and rule other lands in the name of civilisation and bringing the 'natives' out of what were perceived to be their dark ages. We built railways. American builds oil pipelines. We used the railways to transport raw materials like sugar, spices and tea. America uses the pipes to pump oil. American is addicted to oil, as Mr Bush said in his State of the Nation address.

In Britain people are not really - apart from at sporting moments, especially the football World Cup - that patriotic. If you hung a Union Jack outside your house you're either a member of the BNP or a mad old colonel.

2 B JAMIE BLUNT

I know Jame Blunt was last years biggest selling album in the UK and I hear his muzak seeping through over here now. Browsing in Borders with my skinny soy latte I hear him piped through the tinny sounding speakers. He is the male Dido. He is Dildo. Coffee table dross for the latte masses, a soundtrack to Gap commercials and car ads everywhere.

And then there's his lyrics;

"And I saw her face,
Across a crowded place,
And I don't know what to do."

Is a couplet (or should that be triplet?) that really stands out, but there are plenty other examples. It's the sort of trite that a love anguished 13 year old would be embarrased at putting down on paper, let alone record on an album as a professional. I'm sure it has an emotional directness but how many times have we hear those words rhymed? It's like a rapper singing 'just throw your hands in the air and wave them like you just dont care' or a blues singer singing 'woke up this morning'. Cliched, ridiculous but popular for many - unkown to me - reasons.

LAID BACK MYTH

I think the belief that Californians are laid back is myth. In fact I think that most Americans are pretty uptight and hung up. I love making sweeping generalisations so will attempt to validate my claim with some observations.

Germs are a big fear here. I find it amusing that every toilet seat has one of those covers to stop germs invading your ass, sorry, arse. As if they would want to go there. Sometimes the covers are automatic in posher establishments. I know this is becoming more common in the UK now but I find it ironic. Surely the main recipient of germs is the door handle as a high percentage of toilet users don't wash their hands? I wonder why they don't have a little machine on the door issuing disposable door handle covers? That would make much more sense in my book and eradicate germ transmission.

Californians are uptight about a lot of things and overidden with anxiety; health, war, terrorism, personal space, health, germs, drugs...etc. I know we all share these worries but there is a sense I get out here that Californians more so. Sometimes I just want to sit down over a good bottle of wine and a packet of Benson and Hedges and tell them everything is going to be alright.

That's also the problem once you have lived in more than one country, you become very pinickity in your observations about the character of your host nations characters, and in the process prone to sweeping generalisations.

HAVE FUN!

There are a lot of American expressions people here say in various different situations, all of which loosely carry that sense of unbridalled optimism and positivity that seems to be common currency here. Expressions like:

You betcha! (all with an expression mark for added emphasis)
Way to go!
Neat!
Swell!
Alrighty!

But my favourite has to be the old chestnut; 'have fun!'. This can be used in various different situations and contexts, normally as a farewell salutation wishing you luck on your next endeavour. The last time I had it said to me was whilst at Home Depot when a shop assitant had asked me if I needed help and I told them I was just looking.

'Well have fun,' they urged.

I must have looked a bit puzzled. I tried to think back to the last time I had 'had fun' and whether it was it the nuts and bolts section at Home Depot (like B&Q). I tried doing a silly walk down the aisle to show them I was really having fun. Did they laugh? You betcha.

That's it here, people are really friendly out and about, sometimes to the point of being annoying. I guess it's my Northern European hostility coupled with having lived in Barcelona for two years surrounded by unfriendly Catalans. People here always say hi or try to enter in conversations about the weather or whatever. I always get suspicious. What do they want from me? I need to engrain in myself the open, obligation-free friendliness that is the norm out here and stop being a stinking old curmudgeon.

WHEN DISASTER STRIKES

I'm thinking of creating an emergency disaster kit. Tins of canned food, gallons of water, a first aid kit, torch and other items to help when the earth moves and the shite hits the fan. Post Katrina people are a bit edgy about disasters and the governments ability to cope. The main thing here is of course earthquakes.

In keeping up with the Jones' (or Hernandez's) I have been thinking of purchasing a gun. When disaster strikes anywhere it's obviously, well, a complete diaster. But here it would quickly turn into the end of the world. Mayhem on the freeways, everyone shooting each other, murders over petrol, slayings over water. Looting.

The more I live here the more I hope England stays gun free. I read about the woman police officer in Bradford who was shot dead recently and I know that was big news. Over here its a normal working week. Cops get shot all the time. And so does everyone else, judging by the news on TV. There was one incident recently when a meth crazed dude took a 2 year old baby hostage in a shoot out with the police. The baby was shot dead. It's logical that in a country where it is so easy to buy a gun there will be more shootings. They also love a live on TV, multi-angled car chase a la OJ Simpson here, and these seem to a be a nightly form of entertainment on Channel 97.

I'm often seeing and hearing the police helicopters as they search for 'insurgents'. At night they use searchlights that splices through the dark illuminating crooks skulking in peoples yard, sorry gardens. One time, even though we live in a good area, it looked like the police were searching in our complex. I buckled up the door and took the safety catch off my Glock.

BUSH SAY NO MORE

'We'll smoke em out...' and other Wild West cowboy rants..

It's not nice to knock a man when he's down, and at the moment, Bush is certainly down. Not that he wasn't always an easy target. Bush hating is a global sport. US hating is a global sport. I often get asked my opinion of Bush here. I don't bother going into the yada yada Iraq, oil, terrorist territory as it's worn out, over familiar ground. I give a simple answer. Is that the best America can do?

The President is the leader of the US. By extension he should be the most intelligent, articulate, inspirational person - or at least close to that - that America has. The President is America's advert to the rest of the world. It's US citizens saying 'look this is the man we have chosen to lead our country'. Well if that's the best they can do, then something really is amiss.

Having Bush as the nations head is a PR disaster. Okay, he speaks the gun ho language that Middle America computes, the  whole 'we're going to smoke em out' cow boy vernacular. But to the rest of the world he looks and sounds like a turnip headed dunce.

That's the one thing you can say about Blair. You might not agree with what he says and does. But no one can deny he's obviously a bright, articulate sort of chap. He's not a bad PR head for Great Britain.

US OF Eh?

Flying into Los Angeles it was hard not to jettison my pre-conceptions of California as we hugged the sparkling Pacific coastline. The last time I had been here I was 12 years old. From above LA looked like the sprawling urban mass that it is; an endless network of freeways, neighbourhoods and more concrete. On the ground it's no different, an urban loop, replicating itself as it moves into the desert. Subway, Starbucks, McDonalds, Dennys, Del Taco, symbols of Americana metastasising the land.

It's also hard to separate the real West Coast from the multitude of images we are presented through film and TV. People who haven't been here probably feel like they know it. Whether it's Pamela Anderson cavorting on Santa Monica Beach in Baywatch, or the Chips duo throttling it along LAs freeways, or the millions of other images we could use as references, Southern California lives through a lens.

For me California always held a special place in my imagination as most of the sports I like - and still like - originiated here. Surfing, skateboarding, BMXing..in fact a pretty healthy proportion of most extreme sports. I remember as a spotty youth poring over magazines with reverence as Eddie Fiola (early BMX star if anyone remembers!) pulled an aerial against a Redondo Beach backdrop. Venice Beach, Huntington Beach, Manhattan Beach, Torrance...all these places had a mythological resonance with me and now, here I was, 20 years later about to call this part of the world home. I have never grown up so it seemed fitting.