Ice hockey is my sport of choice.

They say that baseball is America's pastime.  As a Fake American, I've never liked baseball.  I was never into sports as a kid, attending my first professional sport event in high school when I went to a Washington Senators' game vs. the Kansas City Royals.  I thought it was the most boring thing I had ever seen.  In fact I think I fell asleep.  But Real Americans love baseball and I was the child of Real Americans though I began to suspect that they both possessed the recessive Fake American gene.

Other than the occasional Superbowl party,  it wasn't until the birth Fake American Child #2 (who shall be referred to as FAC#2), that I began to pay a little more attention to the world of professional sports.  You see FAC#2 was a colicky baby and one night the hubster was desperately trying to find something to quiet the incessant crying. While flipping through the cable channels, he discovered that the crying stopped when he came across a hockey game on ESPN.  This remedy was proven successful on a number of occasions.  It sort of became a family joke.  I mean hockey?  That isn't even an American sport! 

Fast forward a few years when FAC#2 had his first pair of Fisher-Price roller skates.  We'd hear him in the basement skating back and forth for literally hours!  We knew that this behavior required an intervention so we signed him up for baseball with the local boys and girls club which was a learning experience to be sure.  Yet FAC#2 clearly wasn't satisfied with being in the outfield and wanted to try ice skating so we had his next birthday party at a local ice rink which also happened to be the practice facility for the Washington Capitals.  That was it.  He'd found his niche.  Clearly the Fake American gene was being passed to another generation.  As luck would have it,  Fake American Child #1 also caught the hockey bug and she was added to the list of skaters in the family.

Like any devoted parent, I decided to see what this hockey fever was all about.  I, too, got hooked and our family became die hard Caps fans.  There was good and bad in this.  First of all, it was good as it provided something that we could share as a family.  It was bad because we were in DC which is a city full of Real Americans and our local team was the Wasington Capitals.  Perhaps being in a city that has been dominated by Real Americans for most of the teams' existence is why the Caps had struggled every year, except the one year they were able to make it to the league finals.  I mean, why would Real Americans want to watch a bunch of guys that weren't even from America play a game that originated in Canada?

At any rate, both of our Fake American children continued to play hockey on high school teams and travel teams where we enjoyed the company of other Fake American families.  As the new millennium took hold this hockey insanity continued which became a real challenge in DC because we now had a Real American occupying the White House.  As a result, the Caps didn't make the playoffs for a couple of years.

Then as luck would have it, the midterm election of 2006 put a lot of Fake Americans in the House and the Senate.  The next year the Caps were in first place in their division where they have remained ever since.  Lo and behold in October 2008, we learned from a Real American that Fake Americans were trying to take over the country.

It turns out that the Caps started selling out their games and hockey fever took over the city.  Surely it must be all the Fake Americans!  With the election of 2008, things got better.  In fact the Caps topped the league in points in the 2009-10 season, however the Stanley Cup remained elusive to them.

Now I'm worried.  The recent midterm election will be bringing more Real Americans back to DC.  How will this affect my beloved Capitals? Will this blow their chances of winning the Stanley Cup? How will the presence of these new power brokers affect my team?  I mean we're talking about a team whose first line is comprised of two Russians, a Swede, a Canadian and a guy from Massachusetts.  Most of those places have some form of socialized medicine for Pete's sake. How American can that be?   Surely the Real Americans will have them banished or at least require some sort of test to determine the degree of "American-ness" before allowing them to compete in the Nation's Capital.   It appears that the team owner is on top of the situation and is trying to present a more positive front to the Real Americans with the new slogan:

Do you think the Real Americans will fall for it?  Who knows!  It appears that they are infiltrating the sport as expansion teams have been added to Real American cities like Nashville, Atlanta and Columbus.  But the most telling sign is the some of the new goalie helmet artwork featuring two of the most Real Americans currently in the public eye. 

My Fake American Children are now grown and no longer play hockey.  FAC#1, however, is engaging in a new sport which is revealing that she has inherited a bit of the Real American gene.  Roller Derby!  I mean what can be more Real American than women with tattoos acting like this:
 

I don't wear an American flag.

Real Americans are easy to spot in a crowd which is a good thing given all the photo ops in recent times. Wearing flag apparel is not limited to one political party. However wearing a flag is considered a requirement in some circles of Real Americans--particularly in situations where they will be in a large crowd that may also contain Fake Americans. They need to have a way to distinguish themselves from the "other," also known as, Fake Americans. I mean nothing says "Real American" more than having Old Glory draped across one's naughty parts! This is why Real Americans are expected to own attire like this:






Of course the actual Real American is more likely to look like this:

But flag attire isn't limited to street wear. Some Real Americans take the flag to the beach and the boudoir:














And let's not forget the Real American Halloween costume:

The less flamboyant Real Americans or those who must dress for a more professional environment prefer to show their Real American status by wearing a simple flag lapel pin.

Any Real American who fails to display the Stars and Stripes somewhere on his/her person is immediately suspected of being a secret Muslim. Some, like this man however, have managed to disavow wearing the flag while still apparently maintaining Real American status. Perhaps being an old white guy helps identify him as one of the chosen.

The hubster and I attend many patriotic events as secret Fake Americans. Sometimes we are instructed to wear something like a patriotic tie or scarf to show our status. Needless to say, ths presents a bit of a conundrum as we are put in a position of revealing our true identities. So far I've managed to put red, white and blue beads on my Trollbeads bracelet.

What's interesting to me, as an educated Fake American, is that the Real Americans seem to be unaware of how the American flag should actually be treated. The United States Code Title 4, Chapter 1--The Flag, Article 8 d. (the section entitled Respect for the Flag) states the following:

"The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. It should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds, but always allowed to fall free. Bunting of blue, white, and red, always arranged with the blue above, the white in the middle, and the red below, should be used for covering a speaker's desk, draping the front of the platform, and for decoration in general."

It also appears that the Mother of all Real Americans should obtain a pocket-sized copy of the US Code to keep in her purse with her pocket Constitution.

I'm not sure what we Fake Americans can do to educate the Real Americans. Perhaps they will just have to learn the hard way like this guy did!

I have a dictionary and I know how to use it!

One of the "joys" of living in the DC suburbs is that I get to witness political rallies up close. I know that I can certainly turn on FOX News or MSNBC to get commentary, but I typically see these rallies on the local news channels which appear to be pretty neutral in their reporting of such events. Basically they just put the info out there so us locals know why it's taking twice as long to get to the Caps game on the metro or why Aunt Susie can't find a hotel room for Cousin Tom's wedding. But I digress.

I attended my very first rally last week when I went to the Rally to Restore Sanity/Fear. It was great seeing such a huge gathering of fairly like-minded people. However one thing stood out immediately. All the signs I saw were very clever and none of them contained misspelled words! Wow! Jon Stewart's rally was attended by a lot of Fake Americans! This was immediately apparent because the signs I saw didn't look like these signs which were displayed by Real Americans at other rallies:






But dictionaries aren't only useful to help us with spelling. They come in handy for actually teaching us the meanings of different words. Consider the following words as defined by my dictionary:

Socialism: A political and economic theory of social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole. Policy or practice based on this theory.

Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization; (in general use) extreme right-wing, authoritarian, or intolerant views or practice.

Nazi: A member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party; a member of an organization with similar ideology; (derogatory) a person who holds or acts brutally in accordance with extreme racist or authoritarian views.

While I can see a similarity between Nazi and fascism, I fail to see the similarity between socialism and Nazi--two words that are often seen (and misspelled!) on rally signs to describe this man and his policies:

I just don't get it.

Introduction--What this blog is about

"We believe that the best of America is not all in Washington, D.C. ... We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard working very patriotic, um, very, um, pro-America areas of this great nation." --Sarah Palin, speaking at a fundraiser in Greensoboro, N.C., Oct. 16, 2008

This is my new project. I need an outlet for my frustration with the current political discourse. The title of this blog comes from a thread in one of the discussion forums on Ravelry that I participate in. You see, those of us in the discussion group were rather depressed after the recent midterm election--particularly whenever one of the newly elected GOP leaders said, "The American people have spoken!" Wait a minute! I'm one of the American people and I didn't say what you said I did! Actually over the last two years, I've learned that I'm not a "real" American at all. I'm most certain that my Mayflower passenger, Revolutionary War fighting ancestors are rolling in their graves knowing that they have begotten generations of descendants that are Fake Americans.

It seems that one must possess certain characteristics or follow a certain set of beliefs to qualify as a Real American--at least according to the Real Americans. So someone on Ravelry started a thread where everyone listed the things that made them a Fake American. I figure that the words "Fake American" are better than being "Un American!"

So on this blog I will explore those things that make some of us Fake Americans in the eyes of the Real Americans.

Some thoughts about comments: I am currently not moderating comments. Please feel free to share your thoughts in a civil manner. Do understand that I am sharing opinions and while I welcome opinions different than my own, I don't welcome rude or obscene comments that denigrate my opinions. Suggestions for future posts are always welcome!