Don't Know How To Take This

I've been tagged with a meme. It's an arrival of sorts: other bloggers admitting your little blog into their club. . .well, shucks and blush and I'll do anything to please. On the other hand, it also represents descent into the tediously self-referential (as opposed to the merely self-referential) worst of blogging.

But I'll take the dive. There may be important things happening in the world, but it's also Epiphany Eve & I've a closet full of presents to wrap as soon as the kids finish leaving goodies for the Kings (I think I successfully persuaded them that the Magi are all cookied out by this 14th day of Christmas and would appreciate a nice, cold beer) and fall asleep, so who's got time for deep thoughts?

The meme is to name five ways in which I am weird by UK standards. I choose instead to name five modes in which I am weird by UK standards.

1. Culture war mode: I'm weird in the UK because I can get a same-day appointment with my doctor if I need to. And my bursitis operation doesn't have to wait two years.
2. Cheap exploitation of American stereotypes about Brits mode: I'm weird in the UK because my teeth aren't the consistency of Roquefort cheese.
3. Deference to British stereotypes about Yanks mode: I'm weird in the UK because --although I am an American-- I lived two years in Rome and travelled througout Europe without ever wearing sneakers or jeans, or eating at a McDonald's, or complaining that things weren't like home, or needing two seats to accomodate my girth.
4. Chuckling over differences in colloquial expression mode: I'm weird in the UK because I am not eager for my children to outgrow their nappies --and I'd rather like one myself.
5. Back to culture war mode: I'm weird in the UK because while visiting, I enjoyed Glasgow & Edinburgh more than London.

Update:Looking at the way everyone else answered the question, it seems I was just supposed to say 5 odd things about myself. Oh.

1. I once accidentally attended --and narrowly (with a girlfriend) escaped-- a mafia luncheon in Enna, Sicily (we were the only "guests" w/o heavily armed body guards).

2. I turned down the opportunity to be baptized by John Paul II. (Just wasn't ready to "Pope" quite yet).

3. I'm distantly related to Walker Percy. Yes, the Walker Percy, but also two other Walker Percys. It was a family name, apparently.

4. I resent school almost more as a mom than I did as a kid.

5. I once spoke by phone with Irving Berlin, who was calling from Paris.