I have a friend who works as a waiter, in a large hotel dining room. Sometimes, people don't show up for work, and the other wait staff have to cover--which means that they must do twice or even three times as much work, and suffer verbal abuse because the service is slow--

A lot of us American Mudcatters feel like that about now--we have been put upon severely by an oppressive leader, and one who stole the office, at that. And now, we are all taking regular hits about everything that the UK catters find annoying about us, our music, our leaders, and even the side of the road we drive on.

There are now two threads that are transparently snide America-baiting threads--the Britain Reposessing States" one having quickly moved from a discussion of a rather old bit of comedy to and equally tired old discussion about American guns--and there have been others recently.

The acrimony has been evident for a long time, and it keeps getting worse. One gets the impression that some people are trying to drive the Americans off the site, and in fact, on a number of occassions, it has been said directly.

There was a time that I was eager to meet a lot of you "across the pond", but I am not sure that I, as an American, would be very welcome--and that's about where it stands.

So now you know.