Trans-atlantic differences

It's funny how two cultures who are so similar are so different in many ways. I'm constantly being shocked in both ways by america. So before I head off to the wild i've decided to write a little guide to help any brits coming to america.

1. The craziest thing to me so far is 16 year old drivers, seeing someone smaller and with voice that hasn't broken yet step out of a car is definitely most surprising.
2. Beans on toast. I haven't yet spoken to an america who has tasted that meal, some even think it sounds horrible.
3. The way streets are set up is very different to England, all of the streets are set in blocks, which i guess makes a lot more sense. It's easier to explain.. Although I still don't think i'll be able to understand it for a while!
4. Remember the different laws, you can drive when you're 16, vote and smoke tobacco when you're 18 and drink when you're 21. Except in certain states, in some states you can drive at 14 but can't smoke until 21. And then remember that Americans need to protect themselves from those who "need to protect themselves". This means they can legally buy certain guns in certain states at 18. Oh, one more thing, don't a kinder egg, they're banned in america... And for good reason, I know someone who was once killed by a gun so we better ban the kinder eggs!
5. Americans have created this game (some even claim it's a sport) and have plagiarised the british word 'football' in this activity. Thus so, every time you say you play 'football' they will automatically assume you like running into people for 20 seconds, stopping for 5 minutes and carrying this on for about 2 hours.
6. The one dollar note is brilliant, it packs out your wallet so you look like you have more money than you actually do.. Although I do think the quarter dollar coin is pretty useful in a lot of situations.
7. My favourite piece of irony (click here for a definition if you live across the atlantic from England) is thanksgiving and independence day. They are two national holidays almost directly contradictory to each other, thanksgiving is the celebration of when the english arrived in America, we were then a bit horrible to the people living there at the time... So they also celebrate kicking us out. Confused yet?
8. They say nothing in life is constant, well in 'murica there seems to be an abundance of flags, churches, and old men in a competition to see who can pull their trousers up the highest, trust me, you go to any airport and there will be at least more than one man with trousers high enough to put even simon cowell to shame.

The list goes on, I don't want to bore you however so i'll do an English/American dictionary later on.
Off to poo in a hole for the next 3 days but keep checking and i'll update this with how it all went.

Jake