Back in London Town, nothing much has changed....five new vintage clothes shops have opened up around my flat, but apart from that everything is much the same. Pubs are very nice things. As is a Sunday spent getting up very late, going for a long walk and watching the football in a pub with friends. At the risk of sounding like an outtake from a Working Title film, I've also braved Christmas shopping in the West End, gotten really soaking wet in the rain, taken an old-fashioned Routemaster bus and worn high heels while sipping champagne. Four months of dirty jeans and muddy boots have really brought out a slightly alarming girlish side to me now I'm back in 'civilisation'.

I'm also inevitably struggling with how to describe Alabama to my English friends. It's such a world apart from what they expect America to be. The usual cliches about right-wing Christians, race relations and George W come up again and again and it's hard to explain how they may be on one level true but also how much more infinitely complex the whole thing is. At the end of the day, despite often holding problematic views, the people I meet may also still be fantastically kind, interesting, and instinctively smart despite their cripplingly bad education. Not for a moment do I want to excuse some of the opinions espoused by the denizens of Club 28 or the radio preachers, but listening to them, staying judgement for a little while, is important.

So often I try to avoid these difficulties by focusing on the landscape, the work I'm doing and the culture of catfish and bluegrass.