Things I want to know about the US (but was afraid to ask!)

These tests are taken toward the end of the undergraduate university years, as is the general grad school admissions test.

Thanks, Piffka. There's a lot of info there I still need time to digest, but you have been very generous.

Thanks also Osso. What batchelor's degree would someone who intended on becoming a doctor/lawyer actually do? The UK system is so different that I'm having trouble getting my head around all this!

And finally, thanks fishin'. I did suspect that the police wouldn't screech to a halt at the border - I think I got that idea from the Dukes of Hazard! That last point about 'taking the piss' came from a book I read by an American author Bill Bryson, who writes what may be loosely described as humorous travel books.

Lots of degrees, really, as long as certain prerequisites were taken, I think, in the case of med school. For law school, I would assume quite a range could prepare you and be acceptable - Political Science, Psychology, English, Philosophy, Sociology, History, Business.. I am not sure any major subjects are frowned on. Some people go to both medical and law school.

Med school - Zoology, Microbiology, Molecular Biology, Chemistry, Math, Engineering, Physics, Psychology, Sociology, and no doubt many others. I worked with a hematologist once who had been an English major in his college years before med school.

= I'm just yanking your chain.

dissin'
raggin' on
etc etc etc

Can you get the WHOLE 9 YARDS, A 6 SHOOTER AND A 2 TIMING SIDEWINDER INTO A 10 GALLON HAT ????????????????????????

10 GALLON HAT = would be a 45 liter hat in European measures (and 9 yards = 8.22 meter) :wink:

Walter ---- are you avoiding the question ?
have you been tainted by brussels ?

No, just waiting for this response

OAK, The six-shooter and the sidewinder would fit. As for the whole nine yards--not likely.

Okay, I know what a Sidewinder is...Crotalus cerastes



But a two-timing one? I'm thinking they're a lot bigger and have two legs. You could probably get either a six-shooter in *or* a two-timing Sidewinder under a ten-gallon hat.

[size=8]The venomous Sidewinder is also called the "Horned Rattlesnake." It is unique because of its sideways form of locomotion with its body moving in an S-shaped curve.

Range
Mojave and Sonoran deserts of southeastern California, western Arizona, southern Nevada and extreme southwestern Utah to Mexico.

Habitat
Often found in arid desert flatlands, loose, sandy washes, hard pan flats and rocky areas below 5,000 feet. Also common among hummocks topped with creosote where Kangaroo Rats and other rodents burrow.

Description
This Sidewinder is light in color -- tan, cream, pink, gray or sandy, with darker patches on its back of gray, yellow or tan. Mature adults grow 18 to 32 inches in length. It also has a dark eye strip extending back along its head.

The Sidewinder has rough, keeled scales, which aid in its unique sidewinding locomotion. Its supraoculars (triangular projections over each eye) are pointed and upturned giving them a horn-like appearance --thus its nickname, the Horned Rattlesnake.

Behavior

The Sidewinder travels quickly over desert surfaces using its unique "side winding" locomotion to prey on Pocket Mice, Kangaroo Rats, lizards and sometimes birds. Young Sidewinders prefer lizards while older ones prefer rodents. Rodents are bitten, released and tracked down, while lizards are held until the venom takes effect..

Life Cycle
Sidewinders mate April through May, sometimes in the fall. Females give birth to 5-18 young late summer to early fall. The young are born 6 to 8" long.

Subspecies
Mojave Desert Sidewinder (C. c. cerastes) has the bottom segment of its rattle brown. It ranges from extreme southwestern Utah, southern Nevada and the Mojave Desert of California.

Sonoran Sidewinder (C.c. cercobombus) has the bottom segment of its rattle black. It ranges from south-central Arizona into Sonora, Mexico.

Colorado Desert Sidewinder (C.c. laterorepens) has the basal rattle segment black. Ranges from southwestern Arizona and southeastern California into Mexico.

-- A.R Royo[/size]

bm

piffka -------- them thar 2 legged sidewinders always seemed to dry gulch the posse in the cowboy movies. Pretty deadly hombres, Kemo Sabe

For medical school admission, the test is the MCAT. Pretty difficult.

For law school, the LSAT.

It's all done by the same company, ETS. (what a racket, but I can't complain since I do well on those types of tests).

Universities here waste tons on money funding sports programs. The investment rarely pays off. Even when it does, money generated from sports stays in sports and does not find its way to supporting academic programs.

My father-in-law, who suffers from emphysema, was dropped from his company's health plan (he still works) when he turned 65, since that is the age at which Medicare (the program for all seniors) kicks in. But you have to file paperwork and he did not know that so for several months he had no insurance.

OAK -- Them gol-durned two-bit, three-fingered, four-eyed flimflams will always turn on ya when the chips are down, 'specially in a spaghetti western.

Thanks to all. Here's some more (please still bear in mind that most of this comes from TV & films):

7) No-one locks their car, and the ignition key is kept under the sun-visor.

8) Nobody walks anywhere, apart from indoors. Everyone drives/flies anywhere.

9) Even people on low income can afford an enormous, (usually) wooden house. Perhaps you have to have been to the UK to appreciate the apparent difference in average house-sizes, and that no-one here lives in a wooden house.

Cheers!

Yes, people lock their cars, except perhaps for certain isolated rural areas--but that is a thing of the past in most places, even rural.

Few people walk anywhere, and, especially in rural and suburban areas, there often are not sidewalks. A lot of people, however, for reasons of fitness and health, "jog"--a form of running designed to so exhaust one as to convince them its good, while doing a good deal of unnecessary damage to the leg joints and lower back.

Most houses are wooden framed, although some have false brick siding--and no, most people do not own a home, although perhaps a higher proportion than elsewhere, i really couldn't say. If the poor own a house, they likely inherited it. They're not cheap. I've noticed that American houses are roomier than those in Canadian cities, let alone Europe, but i've also noticed that houses in small towns in Ontario seem to be about the same size.

Is it true that 6% of Americans own practically the whole country (>99%)?

It's also true that the richest 5-10% pay 80%+ of the taxes.

I can't think of any context (i.e. land ownership, personal property ownership, control of corporations, money, etc..) that this would hold true for.