Saturday 29th August 2009 - Meet Me at the Fair

I am now busy assembling my case to prove to the US Government that I am who I am, and  I'm doing what I'm doing.  I can see why I failed last time: one, it's all rather undignified, and a blow to one's pride and self-esteem (a bit like the famous old Goon Show joke "What are you doing in the bath, Henry?"  "I'm not doing anything in the bath, Min"); and two, it's all more trouble than is necessary.

For example, the lawyers think I ought to have a budget, to show I can afford to do this.  Didn't need a budget to prove I could do it for six months, need one to prove I can do it for a year.

I did, of course, being me, have a budget.  It was this: I'm going to spend much the same in the US as I spend in the UK, except for hotels.  I've let my apartment, so I only have to try to keep the hotel costs the same as the apartment rental, and I can go on forever.  I can check once a month, and judge whether I'm within budget, or have to consider a correction, or putting the excess down to an actual 'holiday' cost.  Any kit I buy I can separate into acquisitions, as assets I would have bought anyway, and will bring home with me.

Because I'm doing this once a month, and I am using only a UK credit and debit card, I can do the sums almost in my head in sterling.  Certainly back-of-an-envelope stuff; couldn't be simpler.

Now, of course, I'm in spreadsheet country.  So I'm pulling figures out of bank statements, to the exact penny, setting up columns to add up by themselves, putting in a conversion factor to convert it all to dollars.  And making sure the cells all have the correct formulas (no, dear, in English you make a plural by putting an 's' at the end) in them, so that when I try to drive myself mad by getting it to look 'pretty', at least I won't have to do all the sums again.

And all this information will tell me less than the original process.  Come to think of it, I suppose that proves every cloud does have a silver lining: perhaps it will tell the government less.  (Maybe that's why governments never seem to know what they're doing, or whether they've done it or not.)

 

I just had to escape to the wonderful  Minnesota State Fair, to re-establish contact with reality: farmers polishing pigs and sheep and cows, and corn and potatoes and beans, and and and and and and.  Real people doing real things; with tens of thousands of spectators; and food on a stick.

There were a couple of black spots. 

The beer actually cost more than I was prepared to pay.  There is a point where even the softest consumer has to show price resistance.  And this was well beyond it.

            The other black spot was a huge catapult-like device, fashioned from two of those telescopic cranes, which fired people about two hundred feet in the air.  Clearly, now the CIA has got it in the neck for waterboarding, etc., they are experimenting with new devices to instill fear into the heart of suspects.  Or perhaps the immigration service is trying out new ways of sending unwanted immigrants home.  I'd better get back to the budget.