Pro & Con between life in UK & US

Now see, Balmerhon, I find the exact opposite! Maybe I'm a bit spoiled where I live? (Solihull) The family rooms have a toilet, sometimes a chair for feeding.....plenty of room for the stroller. Bottle warmer.....I'm talking about Touchwood in Solihull, the mall near where we live, right on the high street. I think it's the mall in Birmingham that has the disco lights. Also when traveling, the services have great changing rooms as well. Think I've seen neat lights in some of those as well. Even some places that have the koala thingy, are in a seperate bathroom, usually the handicap one. I just hated those in the US that are hanging out in the ladies right next to the sinks and such. I didn't use them, I'd change the baby in the car or something.

I think it must be a bit of an urban/country thing then. Here in the south west, especially the last town I lived in (Taunton) there were TWO places you could change the kid. And needless to say, they were always packed and always needed cleaning. Here in Exeter it's a bit better but not much. They are opening a new mall in the autumn so I have high hopes for that!!

Another UK pro --- The moors.... ponies and sheep with spray painted bottoms...
walking as the mists cling to the goarse and the sun shining first thing in the morning. 

US pro ---  The Blue Ridge Mountains, NYC and apple butter from a country store.

US pro ---   apple butter from a country store.

I LOVE apple butter, my mom's got a jar from Cracker Barrel she keeps promising to send me......can't WAIT!

I LOVE apple butter, my mom's got a jar from Cracker Barrel she keeps promising to send me......can't WAIT!

We get ours from a store up near where my dad was born and raised near Meadows of Dan,VA... unfortunately it's not as good as it was when they still had the little old granny making it every fall in her big old copper kettle over an open fire... but it's still lovely!  They sell apples (the ugly natural kind) and wonderful cabbage too.  It's one of my favorite things to do when I visit my parents.  I wish they still owned the 60 acres my grandfather sold up there.  It's much nicer than where my parents live now -though remote.

And all that water is sooo wet.  Ya know why that is? Because the seaweed. 
sorry I thought it was funny. At the time. Literally. Obviously I should go now. Quietly.

Definitely too wet!!!

I love to be near a beach, I love beach houses, I love beach towns and villages. I just don't want to sit or walk on one all day.

Gimme mountains any day!

Nothing wrong with a lake or that.  But I'm with Courtney, beaches are just to beachy n'sh*(.

Gimme mountains any day!

Oh, how I miss mountains.  I've considered piling up all the people who like to litter on our street (there are bins everywhere for goodness sake!), painting them gray, and calling them a mountain.     Two birds, one stone.

Aside from a brief period just after high school when I lived in NYC, this is the first time in my life that I've not lived in a valley surrounded by mountains.  I think it's probably the biggest con about the UK, for me.

Gimme mountains any day!

But ... they're so ... high 'n' sh*t. 

LOL!!!!!

I like it all - just everything in moderation!!

See that's where SoCal has it - you can go to the beach one day, and then the next, you can drive out to Big Bear and get lost in REAL MOUNTAINS (not these hills posing as mountains here), and then, if you fancy, you drive down the desert side of the mountain on your way back.

.... don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got til it's gone...

See that's where SoCal has it - you can go to the beach one day, and then the next, you can drive out to Big Bear and get lost in REAL MOUNTAINS (not these hills posing as mountains here), and then, if you fancy, you drive down the desert side of the mountain on your way back.

This is DH's big rationale for why we must move back to Oregon.  Where else can you go from mountains to beach to city all in one day?  He misses the mountains more than anything, I think.

... 'n' sh*t. 

There's a copyright on that and a nominal charge per usage.    

See that's where SoCal has it - you can go to the beach one day, and then the next, you can drive out to Big Bear and get lost in REAL MOUNTAINS (not these hills posing as mountains here), and then, if you fancy, you drive down the desert side of the mountain on your way back.

Indeed!

.... don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got til it's gone...

And that's why I'm going back!!  Had to be away to appreciate it all

Mountains and big sky. I think it's the curvature of the Earth that makes the sky seem more closed in up here.

(God I hate these threads and how they make me idealize home & get all homesick and stuff) lol

Mountains and big sky. I think it's the curvature of the Earth that makes the sky seem more closed in up here.

I think I'm the opposite! Whenever I'm around mountains (unless I'm up on top of them), I feel closed in and rather claustrophic. But looking out to sea from the beach, seeing the blue of the sea meet the blue of the sky at the far far far-off horizon ... now that's bliss.