September 17, 2008 - What is more American than Fox News? No?... Okay, how about CNN? Morgan Stanley? NBC? Reality Television? When others think of things American they don't always think of the things that Americans think about when they think of things American. Ask an American what is American and you might get Baseball (even though Baseball is a modification on the original English Rounders), Basketball (invented in Canada by Canadian James Naismith at McGill University) or Apple Pie (an old English recipe from early 1300's). The trouble is, neither America or Canada are really cultures unto themselves. We are a blend of all the things our fore fathers brought with them, or imported to alleviate their home sickness or boredom. After all, CNN was decades away, and Electronic Arts was still working on the charcoal drawings for Cricket '87 (1787 that is).
Boredom may actually be the oft forgotten forefather of American culture. Now THAT can be considered American. After all, the more that was invented to save time, the more time we had to fill.
Today, though maybe not as American as pie, we celebrate Apple Dumpling Day. Heck, the Apple Dumpling Gang was pretty American. Maybe today is all about Don Knotts, Tim Conway, Bill Bixby and Slim Pickens. That is surely more American than the dumpling - which is most certainly a European thing. Today is Citizenship Day. Maybe there are a few questions on the Citizenship test about baseball and apple dumplings. My friend will be writing that test one day... wonder if I can influence his study material choices?
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