Friday 6th Jan- day 0

So I wake up in a strange bed, strange house, strange everything. My body clock is not very helpful- it just reads V,V:TIRED. My English cold seems to have made it across the pond with me. Ann has got up and gone out rowing (that's rowing as in Steve Redgrave, not Jerry Springer). It's still dark. I cobble together a breakfast of cereal, muffin and tea, and try to feel human. Ann is very trusting, having let a total stranger have the run of her house. I take a look around. It's a nice place, comfortable but not flashy. The kitchen is stocked with every implement imaginable, and a few unimaginable ones too. The fridge is as big as a caravan. Ann seems to have a penchant for chickens, as there are rooster mugs, rooster pictures, rooster knick knacks, you name it. There are also many photos of her son, Krishna, and (presumably) her parents. Plus the Christmas tree and cards and still up. I guess it is only Jan 6th. Mine have been known to see February...

I find a large wooden cabinet in the living room, and flip on the TV and watch the news. Something about rain.... Judge Alito... Seahawks play-off game... The newsreaders strike me as grotesque. Styled to within an inch of their lives, slick as an oily sea bird taking a corner on wet-weather tyres, perfect teeth, light-hearted banter. Better get used to it, I suppose. More comforting are the episodes of "Frasier" (US sitcom- Frasier Crane, once of "Cheers", is a radio-show host in Seattle) featuring his infinitely competitive brother Niles and hangdog Dad. These are followed by "Divorce Court" where people wash their incredibly dirty linen in public. In fact, you have to wonder if they will ever get their linen clean at all. Things get worse though. Next up is "Judge Mathis" where an avuncular judge rules on, for example, friends who have fallen out over a loan (or was it a gift?) which was never paid back. To top it off, Jerry Springer lurches on screen, and there are screaming women who seem to be encouraged to catfight on stage over the affections of some geezer. Enough is enough, and I head out into the gloomy drizzle of morning.

I decide to make my way to the University. My first task is to decide in which direction to walk. Ann has left a map of the area, but I don't know which way is up! I decide to walk downhill, and soon work out which Avenue and Street I am on. The roads are laid out on the block system, with Avenues running North-South, and Streets running East-West. I figure out where I need to be and begin walking.

We are in suburbia. Houses are decent sized, with wooden exteriors and porches, basketball hoops hanging over garage doors. Some are scruffy, some are twee. But each house is totally different from the last. It is very quiet, an occasional car rumbling past. Houses seem to be empty, so I guess most peope round here are in work. It feels like a safe neighbourhood, one where not much appears to be happening. Maybe that is why David Lynch chose this part of America for his "Twin Peaks", a surreal look below the surface of all this apparent normality.

I am not a natural with a map, but after some trial and error, I find myself on the edge of the campus. It's big. Very big. I go over to the Department of Communication to see if Barbara, my supervisor person, is in. She isn't, so I leave her a note, and continue my wanderings. On the way back towards home, I go through the University Mall. Americans love shopping malls, and this one's a doozy. There is a Barnes and Nobles bookstore which looks like an aircraft hanger. There is a Blue C Sushi restaurant (trying saying that in a hurry). There is even an Apple Store. I go to a store called Sephora and buy a bottle of stuff which is coconut flavoured bubble bath, shower gel and shampoo, ALL IN ONE! Unbelievable- just shows how advanced they are over here! I pay with a traveller's cheque which bemuses the staff a bit. When I have left, I realise I spelled the store's name wrong when I signed the cheque, so I go back in to point out my mistake, but there's a big queue. One of the assistants is watching me, and I think she thinks I am some kind of stalker, so I go on my way, and hope the store aren't out of pocket.

It is getting dark by 4 pm, and I am done in, so I stumble home and back up 29th Avenue. There are some great Christmas lights still up, and a couple of stars n stripes fluttering in the gloom. Back at 6041, Ann has some friends coming over for food- she is part of a book group, and they meet at different houses in turn. She is cooking "Aff-ganny" food for them as the novel ("The Kite Hunter") is set in Afghanistan. She says they will be having sorbet and blueberries for desert, and I suggest (perhaps inadvisably) that this isn't typical food of the region. She doesn't seem to mind my impudence. Maybe it's the cold. I can't seem to think straight. I slip out for some food- Ann recommends a street with some nice restaurants on. I go for Sushi at Osaka. The Japanese staff bring back many memories of my holidays in Japan visiting Mr Roughley, and I waste no time in ordering a seaweed salad, miso soup, sushi plate and Kirin "Ichiban" ("number one") beer. As dining alone is something of an art form (what do you do in between mouthfuls?), I write a letter to Rosy whilst I eat, and entertain myself with descriptions of the cutomers who come in. Llike the couple behind me who are busying discussing "the type of tonguing needed to do justice to Mozart", and the guy in front of me with his Morrissey T-shirt and NHS specs (possibly genuine).

Back at the ranch, I meet the ladies. It's like walking onto the set of "The Golden Girls" as 6 cheery 50 or 60 somethings are keen to welcome me. Their hospitality is touching, but I am not quite up to much more than a polite hello and a chat about the weather. So it's off to my rather short bed. Maybe I will dream about Liverpool FC tonight- "He's big, he's red, his feet stick out the bed, Chrissy B, Chrissy B". Or maybe it will be "Who's the w***er with the cold?"