Hi Everyone,

OK quite a lot has happened since my last update which I think terminated 
with the story about my Mom and Dad who don't understand English and
the Londoner who didn't understand American.

Last year, to the almost complete amazment of Noreen and I, no one 
celebrated the 4th of July. So we decided to rectify an obvious 
oversight and celebrate the 4th by inviting as much of the United States
and England that we knew to our house.  I called the
home office and they couldn't understand why there should be an additional
bank holiday around this time. So it was very good of the U.S. 
to cooperate and put the 4th on a Saturday this year.

Noreen has been active in the "Newcomer's club" which is an organization
for the spouses of foreigners who are studying or working at the University
especially if they don't have a college, so that they will have some 
social things to do and so they will meet people and better enjoy their
time at Oxford. Notice that I was careful to say 'spouses', but the simple
fact is that the club is almost all made up of the wives of visiting professors
and graduate students from other countries. A lot of these people are 
Americans, and Noreen invited all of them as far as I can tell.

By the time she got the neighbors invited and I invited people from 
the physics department we had over 40 guests (because they had to bring
families too). Now some of you may remember that Hawaiian party that 
we had at our house back in the States. Imagine twice as many people
in a space twice as small....and I didn't even have a fence to burn down
to keep the physicists occupied!  

To do this right we needed US flags and lots of Stars & Stripes bunting,
napkins, and paper plates. And we needed fireworks. Mom, Dad, and Troy
came through with some really big flags, for some strange reason, perhaps
related to the oversight of the holiday, you just can't get a big US
flag here. 

Believe it or not, we found the rest here! Noreen found a place in
Oxford that sold party favors. We walked in, appologetically asked the 
woman behind the counter if there was any 4th of July stuff, and we 
were ushered into a good sized section of the store that would have 
brought a tear to Uncle Sam's eye, or at least J. P. Souza's. 
I guess we're not the only American X-pats in Oxford who celebrate the 4th.
They even had fireworks...much better fireworks, I might add, than the ones
Joe Steele was able to get at the 4th party we had at his place the year
before we left. (Oh come on Joe...sparklers and black snakes???)

The English weather cooperated with one of the 3 sunny days we had in
July and one of the 4 days that it got up above 75 degrees (It never
got up above 85 degress in July. For those of you in the US...I feel 
for you...no really, I do. HAH!) Noreen and I ended up cooking, everyone 
else socialised.  This is what happens when you have a barbeque and invite 
too many guests. 

Noreen managed to come up with a brilliant meal, I just had
to do the grilling. And completely American: Teryaki chicken
sticks, Turkey burgers, Brautwurst, Namasu, and corn-bake.
(Noreen refused to make sushi cones...now now people, she
worked very hard, you have no buisness calling her unpatriotic!)

Noreen even managed to replicate corn-bread. Surprisingly,
this is a real novelty in the UK. First off, they don't 
call 'corn' what we call 'corn'. To them, 'corn' is 'any kind
of grain' like wheat, barley, oats...which can all be used to
make bread. So saying 'corn-bread' doesn't mean anything. 
They call 'corn', 'maize'...which is what we call indian corn.
It took quite a while to convince our English guests that 
it was, in fact, possible to make bread from Maize, and that
it was edible, and that what they had been wolfing down the 
last hour was, in fact, the self-same 'corn-bread'. But 
they really liked it once they understood it. Real Kudos
go to Noreen for puzzling out how to make it without 
having to grind it from scratch on the patio cement. 

Red, White, and Blue was everywhere. 
One thing about spending time doing all the cooking, you have a good excuse
to explode all of the fireworks. We didn't get any explosive ones (but 
we could have, Joe, including exploding bottle-rockets) they were all
showers of sparks and Roman candles. One of them didn't go off, and one of
the 9 year-olds amoung the guests decided to announce his candidacy for
the Darwin awards by running up to it to see why it hadn't gone off. 
Another of the Roman candles fired the first star, and then fell over,
and of course, shot the next star toward the open front door. Notice 
how it couldn't have shot the star toward the street or a guest?
Most of the fireworks generated very pretty displays and singularly foul
smoke which drifted through the crowd and blocked visibility in the
road by our house...all great fun! Our house, and the guests, survived. 
But the kids were sorely disappointed that their parents wouldn't let 
them light any of the fireworks. I wasn't.

And, of course, no Huffman party can be complete without the ritual
Unicylce Riding (as opposed to the Unicycle Spelling...which is
much harder).

As important as the actual riding of the beast, is the build-up.
First comes the Passing Mention, during light conversation, the 
topic of unicycles in general and the theory of riding them. 
No reference should be made, at this stage, to one's own minor talents.

Then comes the Showing of the Implements. During an unrelated
conversation, it will become necessary to open the garage door, where
the unicycle has been cleverly placed in full view the day before. 
The topic will naturally arise again about the beast, it's care, 
and feeding.  "why does this rather ordinary fellow actually own a 
unicycle?" is no doubt running through some people's minds.
It is inevitable at this stage that someone will make the
connection and ask if I can ride it. 

Those of us who carefully plan these little rituals live for moments
like this next one. Upon replying that I could, in fact, ride the 
animal, there was general Scoffing and much Disbelief. After 
calmly assuring the crowd that I could ride. and after further cordially 
inviting any and everyone to make the attempt, I Mounted and 
Slipped once, tried to look a little scared; and then, about the
time someone started tittering in the crowd, took off and Rode
about 30 yards out into the street and back. 

The Jaws did Drop, and the Ritual was Completed. 

Tony Weidberg's daughter, Fiona (9 or 10), tried it several 
times but spent way too much effort giggling and not enough trying 
to stay on the unicycle. The Gods did not favor her efforts. 
I managed to actually get on the thing unassisted once in front of 
Tony and Fiona. Tony insisted that I'd violated some sort of 
physical law to do it (you guessed it, he's one of the people I work with). 

I introduced all the ATLAS graduate students to "The Tick". It was
"The Tick vs. Proto-Clown" where they journey into the Tick's inner mind?
They particularly liked the sequence:

Tick: "Oh, wow! what's this?"

Tick's Mind: " This is your Escalator of Enlightenment."

Tick: "Really?!.....What do I need one of those for?"
<Escalator immediately stops and starts going DOWN.>

Christ that was a funny cartoon, and it was a big hit with the grad-students.

Noreen is rolling her eyes now, so I have to quit. 
So I'll leave everyone with the thought for the day.

Just remember that, come fall, I get to start being the Moral Tutor for 
whole generations of bright young people. 

Cheers,
Todd