At first there was the beginning:

My longest flight of my life so far was good. Taking off at 2.30pm and due to land at 4.20pm, Western seaboard time, I was expecting us to chase the sunset the whole way. But soon after take off it was pretty dark outside and then pitch black. How could this be? I thought. One quick look at the in flight interactive map thingy (bloody brilliant for a novice long hauler like myself) told me the answer. We were heading directly towards Iceland. Silly me forgot that the quickest route to the US of A was over Greenland and that at that Northern latitude it was probably dark for bloody ages.

Approaching Seattle from the frozen wastelends of Canada was great. Huge areas of frozen seas and snowy peaks were easy to make out in the fading light. I kept an eye out for drowning polar bears but they must have had their paws in front of their noses coz I didn't see any.

Watched Night in the Museum 2. Really s***. Watched the odd 5 mins of the most recent Harry Potter (and the Testicle of the Wizard of Um Galah). Really dark and hard to make out what was going on. Hermione didn't seem to be getting her barely legal t*** out any time soon so I switched over.

The bloody woman in the seat in front wasted no time in reclining her seat back as far as it would go so I was watching these things about 5 inches in front of my face. f***ing b****. Literally nobody else in the cabin had their seats back that far. Blatently inconsiderate in my opinion. That was the only downside to the whole flight so can't complain. Oh and the Diazepam taken before take off worked a treat. Good old drugs.

US passport control were chirpy and welcoming, not a cold hard steel nozzle up my arse anywhere. Mildly disappointed.

We were collected at the airport by Chloe's 2nd cousin (we think?) Carole and her husband John. Welcomed with a bottle of cranberry juice and a tub of cranberry oatmeal cookies, this could only be America.

They live outside Seattle in a lovely area called Kenmore. It's incredibly green, loads of evergreen trees, space, views of Lake Washington. Every house is detached, big, wooden, 2 cars. The deciduous trees in amongst the green are all golden or red with the colurs of 'Fall'. It really is beautiful. We've both decided it would be a really lovely plce to live, if only it wasn't in the States.

Went into a few shops yesterday to look for some walking gear and I loved how friendly the staff were. And genuinely so too. I've never heard anyone talk so passionately and animatedly about walking socks before. I had to ask him for advice just so i could listen to him for ten minutes.Didn't buy anything of course, more for the entertainment factor.

Today is Thanksgiving (26th Nov) and we woke to watch a little of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York on TV. It's pretty weird and perfectly American. Massive gaudily decorated and some downright creepy looking carnival floats crawl their way along the streets, pausing in front of Macy's department store to give some kind of performance to the cameras. They're all vaguely familiar personalities but I couldn't tell you any of their names. Besides the Yo Gabba Gabba float that is.

There's also a lot of sport (try reading it without a big exaggerated American 'r' in there, go on, try it) fixtures on this day so i watched a lot of Green Bay Shelf Stackers against the Detroit Napkin Folders NFL game. John taught me what the hell 2nd and 12 meant and now I think I understand the game a bit. It's still ridiculously stop/start and the fact that such obviously overweight and unfit men can be considered sportsmen is laughable. I'm not saying they all are of course, some of them are properly ripped. But there are some pretty wobbly guts on display and that just isn't cricket. Unless we're talking Shane Warne.

I type this as we await the arrival of Carole's brother and some other family members for Thanksgiving dinner. A big turkey and all that.

We'll stick some snaps of the area and the dinner up soon.

Hope you've all had a good Thanksgiving yourselves.

Bodge and Chloe