On the Corner of Main Street and Kennedy Memorial Drive

We've just moved into our new apartment, a two bedroomed flat in St Bonifacius. St. Boni is Minnesota's version of Tatooine, as far from the bright centre of the universe as it's possible to get without being able to see Russia from your house, and it is gorgeously, ridiculously wonderful. Our house is a purple-brown pastel shade straight out of the '50s suburbia of Edward Scissorhands, with white wooden window frames, and a screen door. It is, in all honesty, an unlovely edifice, a squatting hump at the top of the hill, raised at the back over a slope but with the rooms spread only over a single floor. Yet there is a curious personal splendour to it; it's our first apartment, and thus it receives the kind of attention and love which it would never get from those less enamoured by the freshness of the experience.

Plus, it's on the corner of 'Main Street' and 'Kennedy Memorial Drive', an address as American as Sam Eagle, the Muppety embodiment of Americanism.

'Merica

Main Street and Kennedy Memorial Drive; it doesn't get more American than that. It's as American as remembering the Alamo, hearting New York, celebrating the 4th of July, or forgetting all about Canada. As American as root beer floats and warm apple pies at a diner, saluting the flag before a Superbowl game, and drone strikes on Pakistani children.

Even more American than that, maybe, because on the other corners of the cross roads stand a launderette, a whiteboard church and a cemetery. St Boni. has everything an American town needs; seven bars and liquor stores, two churches, a gunshop and a laundromat. Standing out front gives me a great view of the local water tower. It is so quintessentially, stereotypically American that I sometimes suspect that I'm in some weird, cross continental version of the Truman Show. Everything is too perfectly Americana, to the extent that it appears inauthentic.

Wednesday was our first day in the apartment, and also the day they tested the St Boni. tornado warning system, which is just a 5 minute siren. Presumably, in the event of an actual tornado, it would be just a five minute siren and then the sound of a cow being hurled through your house, because I've seen Twister, and this is what happens, you guys.

Seems legit.

Because I'm at home whilst Jalyss works long hours in two jobs, I've been responsible for setting everything up, by which I mean I arranged all my books on the shelf and then threw all of the clothes on the floors of the closets. Closets, plural. Walk in ones. Ridiculously American.

I've set up a work space, and a book case next to it. I've got it into my head that as I'm unemployed and currently unable to even look for work I may as well enjoy the life of dilettante writer; getting up for a coffee and a pastry at noon, drinking wine and eating cheese in the evening, and every now and then writing an incisive, witty and humorous article that earns me enough to continue buying myself coffee, pastries, cheese and wine.

Instead I get up around noon, eat a stale doughnut, look at Buzzfeed, wait for Jalyss to get home and write a weekly review of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D for GeekBinge that's rarely funny and never insightful, and for the kind of money that makes awful American cheese look pricey.

But, if you're going to be just married, without a job, and failing to succeed as a writer anywhere, St Boni. sure isn't the worst place in the world for it.

And guys, I'm fairly certain that could be the town motto; "St Boni. Not quite as bad as you would think to look at it."

On USCIS

It's 7:58am, and for one of the first times since I've arrived here there's a steady rain falling on me, and on the other few dozen people patiently stood waiting for the door to open. Even on an unusually grey day, this early in the morning, Minnesota hasn't yet got so cold that I bothered to pick up a jacket on my way out the door, so instead I balance a box of documents on my head until a Good Samaritanesque Rihanna invites me under their umbrella.

We are waiting for a USCIS (US Citizenship and Immigration Services) processing centre, where I've been summoned to go for my biometrics. In preparation for me staying in the US the Government wants to harvest and catalogue all of the most intimate aspects of myself; my fingerprints, DNA, and probably my soul. Ostensibly it's so that they have this on file should there ever be a problem, for instance, if I abscond with all the benefit money I'm not receiving from them.

It's the kind of post-9/11 state overreach that should make natural conservatives screech about the boundaries and limitations of what Government has a right to take; about privacy, about safeguarding, about presumption of innocence. But it's only being taken from immigrants, so the total amount of a damn that they actually give is somewhat less than none.

In a display of Governmental irony the USCIS centre is based in a solitary wing of the ground floor of a Chinese restaraunt. If ever one building was the picture of American policy, this is it; zealously guarding the frontiers of a nation that Capitalism has already sold out and overrun. It's a truly ugly building, but very clean. Kellie is singularly impressed by this. I'm not; if anyone has access to the vast pools of cheap labour from abroad that they can exploit to keep it tidy, these guys do.

As the rain starts to slacken into the misty drizzle, and the horde forms itself into a natural, orderly line, I find myself feeling quietly content.

Honestly. Rain and queues. It feels like I'm home.

At exactly eight, the doors are opened and the crowd moves through - there's enough space in the reception for everyone to comfortably fit in, and so we move up to allow the end of the line to get out of the wet. It's an unhomogenous collection, a real American melting pot of ethnicities. The lady in front of me tells me she's from an East Asian country whose 'real', non-English, name is unintelligible, so I nod politely. She's with her sister-in-law, who's there to enforce the weight of American citizen approval. This, I've learnt, seem to be very important. Having an American with you lends an air of authenticity; you are not simply some over-the-fence, fresh from the dock illegal. You have contacts, American contacts, and so, by association, the presumption of legitimacy to be here.

Kellie is with me for today, and once the queue has made its way in out of the rain she joins me. I wave her over.

"Is that your wife" asks the American.

"Err, no. That's my Mother in Law". I reply. I am starting to wonder just quite what age a woman needs to be for people not to assume she's my wife. It's a really awkward question to ask unless you're pretty sure of an affirmative answer, but apparently Americans don't feel shame in the same way as normal people.

The biometrics itself is disturbingly simple. No tissue, blood or saliva samples, no invasive procedure. I didn't even need to pee in a cup, which is unfortunate because I had already bought one from home.

Instead, I simply had to give fingerprints, a short written record of my height, weight and eye colour, and have a photo taken. I had been worried about this at first, as I seem to have a hereditary disorder, passed down from my Mother, that makes fingerprinting me difficult.

Whilst on our honeymoon in Flordia we went to Universal Studios, which in part offers lockers and ticketing based on a scan of your finger. I eventually gave up using this service, and simply put Jalyss' hand to the screen each time, as whilst I could open the lockers to put everything in, they never seemed to recognise the same fingerprint by the time I returned minutes later.

Apparently though, the Government has better equipment and systems than a big business, because my fingerprints read correctly every time. Turns out that I do have them, after all. Who knew.

On the Police

"Hello" says the policeman "we've had a complaint about a child driving a truck at this address".

"Oh, hello" I reply. "Yes, that would be Mina".

I've been left in charge of Mina for the afternoon whilst Jalyss goes to work and Jim has a nice lie down. I am beginning to regret my benevolent stance on child care; I remain happy to do it up to the point where the police arrive at the door.

Looking after Mina is usually fairly easy. He wants to do two things when he gets home - drive his wheelchair or drive one of the cars. Half an hour before Jim had put him out in the truck, where he happily sits in the drivers seat and turns the steering wheel. With a block behind the front tyre and no way to reach the pedals he's arguably safer in the truck than he is in his wheelchair.

A few days before, on our last trip down the road with him in his new electric wheelchair, he ended up being carried back home after driving into traffic and biting me when I tried getting him out of the path of oncoming vehicles. I'm wary of allowing him out in his new wheelchair. I still have the puncture wounds in my arm from where he sank his teeth into it. Fortunately I had a tetanus shot before I moved to America. It's genuinely amazing that they foresaw the possibility of me being bitten by my brother in law. Thanks NHS!

Whereas we used to be able to at least keep up with him when he started playing chicken with an eighteen wheeler, Mina has just received two new wheelchairs to test out. Both are too big to stop, too heavy to hold and too fast to catch. So, he's basically in the wheelchair equivalent of Gypsy Danger, making preventing him from doing what he wants fairly difficult. This is especially hard when what he mainly seems to want to do is drive into things as fast and as often as possible.

So putting him in his wheelchair without containment procedures firmly in place is out. The neighbourhood kids playing across the road from us wouldn't stand a chance beneath the bone breaking wheels of the iron chariot. As I'm unemployed and sitting around the house all day, I've made friends with a few of the stay at home Moms. I don't want to jeopardize that by letting Mina crush their children into the lawn.

Instead then, we put Mina in the truck, and leave him to play at driving. Today, I had just bought him back in, and fixed him a drink.

A knock on the door, and through the screen, on the porch, a cop. His car is pulled up at the bottom of the drive. A passing neighbour has reported a child is in the truck, and the police have come to check it out.

As I'm currently here reliant purely on the patience of the Government, it's slightly worrying to deal with law enforcement at this point. I still haven't quite got over the idea that they may just rescind my stay, and send me home. Having the police appear on your doorstep is not what you ideally want under these circumstances.

"Are you in charge here?" he asks. Currently I am, but only by virtue of the fact that Jim is in bed, and I suspect would be even less pleased to see the police at his door than I am. I am, nominally in charge here, I suppose. For a house that's usually so full of people it suddenly seems the rest of the Zapfs have deserted me. Only Mina has dragged himself over to the door. He's heard the word truck and thinks the policeman is going to take him outside to continue driving, which is going to be a difficult moment for everyone.

I explain that I'm his brother in law and that whilst we do let him in the truck, he's unable to reach the pedal and drive. I'm asked who I am. His brother in law, I explain.

The policeman asks for my details. I AM ABOUT TO BE DEPORTED. I give them numbly, and then things take a downhill turn. "What's Mina's full name?" I have absolutely no idea. I know his first name, and his last name, but I am drawing a total blank. "What's your middle name" I ask Mina. Unsurprisingly, he doesn't answer me. He doesn't know his middle name either. The cop looks incredulous at our lack of knowledge.  

Still, as it turns out me not knowing my brother in laws middle name isn't actually a crime. And isn't even, in fact, the most concerning lack of knowledge. He asks me for my dates of birth, I give it, and totally confused him because it's in the wrong order. Despite me clarifying that when I say 22/12 I mean the 22nd of December, he writes 22 for the month. I am beginning to get less worried about whether or not I'll get arrested. A policeman who doesn't know that there are only twelve months in the year; he's probably not inclined to launch a wider investigation.

Transferring dates between English and American is an ongoing battle. For some reason whilst I can adequately translate that when the month and day is out of order, I just need to switch them for it to make sense to me, this is beyond many Americans. Every time I tell them my date of birth, and lead with 22, their eyebrows descend into a frown and start to smoke as their brain flails for the extra processing capacity needed to overcome the complexity of reversing a pair of two digit numbers. It is apparently a national failing; confronted with calendars that don't work America gives in. It's fortunate that the wars on drugs and terrorism haven't been joined by a War on Unexpected Dates, because it would be a short and unsuccessful one.

Confronted with a round birthdate for his square hole the policeman gives in and leaves with some unspecific warnings about letting children drive into the garage door, and an earnest reminder that if I do let Mina drive, I will end up being killed by him. I find it unlikely that I will, but as a middle class white guy, I trust that this policeman is there to do good, thank him and watch him leave.

As he pulls away, Mina tug on my trouser leg. He wants to go outside and drive. I close the door and decide that maybe we'll put him in his wheelchair instead.

On Running

I'm running home from Crown College, the local University that Jalyss, and virtually her entire family, graduated from, and which her Dad teaches at. The day is hot; as hot as it ever gets in England. It's the kind of heat that is best explained outside of the conventional binary of Celsius-Fahrenheit. It's more the kind of day which can best be measured in Katy Perry lyrics, a day hot enough to melt your popsicle.

We've been exploiting the post-wedding calm and nearly empty University facilities to work out. I've very swiftly realised that being able to run, and having a generally good level of fitness means nothing when exercising with the Zapfs.

Working out with Jalyss's family is like playing Cluedo with Batman. The humiliation is near total. Still, I'm faster than them, so I've been taking the opportunity to run home afterwards. But because I'm doing this after an hour in the weight room, by run I actually mean limp. It's a dragging, wheezing lope; unglamorous, and unhappily completed. The gym is not my friend, and it ruins me for my run.

Still, running the few miles home is a unique view of America. A continent spanning nation, virtually every trip out is by car, and consequently everything is at one space removed. I recently leafed through a friends copy of 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance', which puts it perfectly that:

"In a car you're always in a compartment, and because you're used to it you don't realise that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You're a passive observer and it is all moving by you."

There's a self imposed disconnect between people and nature that's in part to do with the fact that travelling cocoons us from the outside. We are swaddled in steel and plastic, perpetually air conditioned and temperate, wrapped in layers of habit and convenience that keeps us away from the reality of life outside our houses and offices, and the vehicles we use to travel between them.

But as I run, I do not simply pass by this world, but through it. I run, and the steady tramp of my shoes, the low impact vibration of sole on kerbside, disturbs the life that exists on the periphery of our own.

The side of the road is scrabble. A top layer of sandy dirt and gritty pebbles, broken up with the choke-weeds and wild grasses that thrive in the dust and sun. As I kick through it, the floor around me comes alive with crickets, their movement akin to running within the Gallimimus herd in Jurassic Park.

Every step disturbs another, and they leap heedlessly into my legs, beneath my feet and away. Bounding and rebounding from me and into the long grass. They're big, bigger than any grasshopper's I've seen before this, as long as my thumb. Their movement carries them in a quick arc over a few feet, and they routinely smack straight into anything in their path, their ascent interrupted by whatever unmoving feature they failed to take into account before launch.

It's glorious, and serene, and so quintessentially foreign, to be running through this swarm of leaping, kicking nature as its most unheeding and unheeded. Everything about America still has the freshness to it for me, that sense of wonder at the everyday. Birds and insects that are totally commonplace here are a source of real excitement. Every day is different, everything is new.

I'm enjoying it, I suppose you could say, That's new too - but the real enthusiasm here is contagious. I guess I'm becoming one of them already. This is what assimilation feels like.

On Zapfletts

When my kids grow up I've decided I'm going to talk to them about the decisions I made about getting married. I have what I feel are good pieces of advice for them, mainly around exactly what 'tulle' is, and the coma inducing pointlessness of spending loads of money on chairs for the service. But above all there are two decision that I'm going to want to be able to point to without any hesitation and say that these were good things.

The first is in my choice of wife. I hope that she's their mother, because otherwise it's an awkward conversation to be starting with them. I hope that she's around still, I hope that they see her not just as their mother, but as a person. I want them to know Jalyss not just as a role, like their teachers or their pet, but as the individual she is. I hope they'll know her as someone I love and respect, who makes me happy, pushes me, teaches me, steadies and comforts me, and who can cook up a mean homemade pizza.

The second thing though is that I want them to know that they are part of a family that wanted them, values and loves them for who they are, and that they will be respected and cherished whatever they do. Unless they're a vampire, because then they're on their own.

I'm being quite serious here. If they ever start living in a coffin, adopting a range of, admittedly rad, capes with high collars, and rise only at dusk to go and feed on the still warm blood of virginal 19th century women as part of a dubious allegory for sexual awakening, I am disinheriting the heck out of them.

I have very strong feelings about vampires, you guys.

But, so long as they steer clear of vampirism, I also want them to know that they are part of a family that spans two continents and three immediate family names. Because as well as being a Willetts and a Zapf, they will also be a Zapfletts.

I've always been pretty adamant that I didn't want Jalyss taking my name. Much like asking permission from her father to marry, I see it as an outdated way of codifying women as property. My wife isn't an object, she isn't defined by me or her father.

Giving her surname up to take mine is denying her the agency to exist as a being separate from myself or her father. To me it suggests that her identity is conditional upon whichever man has responsibility for her, and whilst that works fine in a society or culture which denies women their own identity and agency, I didn't really want the first act of our marriage to be the transfer of ownership from Jalyss' father to me.

Jalyss, whilst not wanting to take my name, would have been quite happy to hyphenate her surname or just keep Zapf.

But I want us to share a name, to be a team, so having us just keep our own names didn't seem a good option. I want us to be linked by that thread of commonality, the unequivocal connectedness of having a shared identity.

I'm going to be honest here; writing this. I find myself getting uncomfortably close to expressing myself in such a way as to make it seem like it was solely my decision that Jalyss change her name. Which would be a betrayal of much of the sentiment behind the name change, as it means her actions were still based on my desire to not have her becomes Mrs Willetts. And so whilst it may look like this is just a groovy, granola eating left wing version of the same white, cis, male privilege showing through, I'd like to really make it clear that this was not the case of me simply coercing Jalyss into taking a new name so I could get my way.

I love Jalyss' maiden name, mainly, it has to be admitted, because it sounds like the noise of a futuristic weapon discharging into the vacuum of space.  So we wanted to maintain it, but I was also really keen that we do so through a gesture; a resolving commitment to one another that as we got married we each became part of a new family.

From Zapf and Willetts came Zapfletts,

Because that, for me, is what marriage is; a commitment to a new family. It's what Jalyss and I are, or at least what I hope we are. And part of that is sharing not just our lives, experiences, joy, frustration, money, passions, hobbies, illnesses, annoyances and mundanities with one another, but setting ourselves apart and distinguishing ourselves by name.

When I married Jalyss I did so knowing that it meant leaving behind a lot of what I had grown up with. I left my culture, my country, my job, friends and family. And I did so to form a new life, and a new family. It won't be the same as the life I had before, and my family will be new too. I've gained brothers and sisters in Jalyss' siblings.

And I've gained a wife, too.

But there's a part of me that also sees myself as having lost something, as well. I won't get to see my nephew grow up. I won't be there for birthdays, holidays, or weekends. I won't get to hang out with my Dad and watch the football, or go out for a cup of tea with my Mom after work. I won't get to irritate my Sister, or hang out with my cousins.

So, part of marrying Jalyss is me getting the opportunity to extend what it means to have a family, and who my family are. I love the grand gesture, and the radical deed. And the most obvious commitment we could make to one another, and to our new family replacing our old, is for a name change that represents that. From the distant, separate lines of Zapfs and Willetts', a brand new one. A joining of two families that creates a third.

I love that. What better way of signalling this new union, this new family than a distinct new break. And what better way of defining ourselves than a new name; one which speaks of where we came from whilst also placing us together.

And so, Zapfletts. I'm looking forward to explaining that to my kids.

On the DMV

"Is this your wife?"

The lady is pointing at my 16 year old Sister-in-law, who looks exactly as young as she is, and thus makes the very obvious age gap between the two of us more than a little too wide for comfort. Jaidyn is going very red.

"This is my sister in law, she just drove me here" I explain. This isn't 'To Catch a Predator'.

"Oh, I just thought, when you said you were together" the lady continues, oblivious to the embarrassment she's causing Jaidyn. I'm forced to cut her off to clarify, "No, we just came here together. We came here together in a car."

We're at the DMV, to register me for an American licence and for me to sit my theory test. The DMV, I'm realising, is where bureaucracy goes to die. You go in to speak to the greeter, who assigns you a ticket to talk to someone else, who gives you a form to take to a third. I'm pleased that I can do my bit for the stuttering US economy by providing employment for the population of a small town, but maybe one of them could do a little more towards the process, rather than pass responsibility on to the next in line.

Applying for anything in the US as a British citizen is a chore; routinely carrying a packet of documents containing my passport, my birth certificate and my VISA entry form, which are pored over, analysed and remarked upon at every stage. Today I've also brought my counterpart driving licence with me. This will turn out to be a mistake.

The lady taking my documents has never seen a counterpart driving licence before. The lady she is working with hasn't either. Nobody in the building has seen it before. My counterpart licence is the Turin Shroud of the DMV; people like it, but to quote In Bloom, they 'know not what it means'.

I only want to get on a computer so that I can sit the theory part of the test, 40 multiple choice questions about driving laws in Minnesota. There are some excellent bits of knowledge on there. One of the actions it suggests could increase road rage in others is forcing their car off the road. Presumably that's not the only reason to not force people off the road; just the most important one.

I've been studying for the last few days and am pretty confident. Jaidyn uses the drive over to test me. We get lost, leaving us plenty of time of study. Her main advice is to remember that Minnesota state law means I have to leave six feet of space when I pass a cyclist. Six feet, I mentally file that one away.

After nearly twenty minutes of investigation, I'm told that I can't get a licence today and will have to take the permit test. That's what I'm here for. I'm relieved to find that the licence I voluntarily provided to them won't disqualify me from starting the whole process.

The test begins with a routine example question asking me to identify the capital of Minnesota. I get it wrong. An inauspicious start.

The remainder of the test is routine. I have to get 90% of the answers right. Most are obvious, a few require actual thought to answer. One is a straight up true or false. Some have the fourth answer as 'All of the above'. In any situation where all of the above is an option, answer all of the above. It's always the correct answer. This is one of the ironclad rules of testing, along with 'read the question carefully' and 'if you don't know just guess'.

I read the questions carefully, I don't know but guess (correctly as it turns out), and finally I reach a question about the distance to keep from a cyclist. I know this one. Jaidyn's advice is going to pay off. I confidently enter the answer. Six feet of space. Wrong. It's wrong.

I mind-swear profusely.

Disbelief. Crushing, wincing disbelief. Jaidyn has lied to me. I am overcome with doubt. Can I complete this? Are all the answers she gave false? How do I even know what's ... oh, wait, never mind, the test is over. I've passed.

I reenter the casual flow of senseless paper moving. The nice lady who was so confused about my UK licence sends me back to the initial greeter with some papers, which I fill out, hand over and have returned along with a new ticket, to go see a new staff member. She takes my papers, then takes my photo and administers an eye test. I pass that one too, and I'm free to go drive.

In three months I can come back and get tested for a full licence. Jaidyn reminds me that this will be just in time for the infamous Minnesotan Winter, a perpetually capitalised event distinct from regular winter in both the length and severity of the season and the sheer amount of time everyone spends discussing it.

It's like living with the Starks, and I wouldn't be entirely shocked to learn that somewhere around Duluth there may well be a giant ice wall manned by grim, black clad watchers, defending the US from all the wild men, mammoths and ice zombies Canada throws at them.

In the meantime we leave. I'll have a licence sent to me soon, and won't have to carry my customary ID bundle. We set off, and I start to tell Jaidyn about exactly how far from a cyclist you have to be.

Because it definitely isn't six feet.

On IT Reform

This post was written before my Wedding, which went ahead a week ago. Sorry to lower the tension.

Following the VISA interview, I had seven to ten days to wait for my VISA and Passport for be returned to me by courier. Unfortunately, two days before my interview, it turns out that the US State Department decided to upgrade all of their VISA systems, a task that I like to imagine involved them haphazardly nailing floppy discs to a sparking central server with one hand whilst focusing the majority of their attention on a breeze-blown leaf, or an especially interesting formation of cloud.

IT projects seem to be some form of generic governmental Achilles heel, and so it should come as no surprise that this particular endeavour took the embassy's computers from a system capable of processing 450,000 applications every ten days, and upgraded them to shiny black paperweights.

Of course, because this is a far reaching problem that directly impacts me, I found out about it by accident. I had stayed in all day every day since the VISA interview to avoid missing the courier, and just happened to go back onto a corollary of the London embassy main page, and found a tiny caveat that delays were possible on all VISAs to be issued between the 20th and 29th, but that nearly half had been processed.

That still leaves 200,000 that haven't been, in case that makes it sound like they've been in some way successfully engaged in their jobs. There are very few occasions where being able to do roughly half of what is expected of you is sufficient.

It has been, I think it's fair to say, a bit of a cock up. Unless their IT process is run by Dennis Nedry, and this is the first step in an attempt to smuggle DNA samples inside a can of shaving foam, in which case everything is going to plan except that he's about to be eaten by a really scientifically-inaccurate Dilophosaurus.

So that seven to ten days elongated into a full seventeen, which was rather inconvenient as I was meant to fly after fourteen, and thus lost my flight. The expectation of an imminent courier also left me confined to my house, and lead me to realise the limits of never venturing outside. There's something truly intangible about existing in one place for too long. It's easy to see how people can go mad in isolation; even with all of the resources and diversions of the internet at hand.

Getting the email that the courier had the VISA was a relief not just because it meant I could travel and wouldn't miss my own wedding, but also because it meant I could throw away the bloodstained volleyball that had served as my constant companion and return to civilisation, and people, and sunlight that wasn't filtered through a window.

The courier having received the VISA on Friday morning, I managed to convince a sympathetic member of their customer relations team that I could pick it up from their central processing hub rather than wait for it to be delivered to me on Monday. Confirmed to be there on Saturday, and with assurances that picking it up would be simple, we drove over.

At the courier, we met the person left in charge; a bubble-faced man apparently only just out of childhood who wore an air of confusion, as though he had only just woken from an especially interesting dream, and who happily admitted that he was just a driver and didn't know what he was doing. We gave him the details and he gumped away, only to return empty handed. This didn't bode well, and so it proved as he had spectacularly succeeded in not locating my VISA.

"Do you want to go away and I'll find it later?" he asked, hopefully. "I'll deliver it your house personally."

"Not really", I replied. He looked unsure of what to do next. "I really don't want to leave without it in my hands, to be honest."

By this point, emboldened by the courier's (seemingly misplaced) confidence I had rebooked my flights for 9am the next day. Not having a VISA or passport was probably going to be a bit of a problem.

The gump shuffled back off to search for the package, and we waited. As time passed and he returned again and again to update us on his continued lack of success we began to despair.

We began to try and help out. Had he checked to see if it had been put to one side? He had. Was it likely to be a different size to most other VISAs as it contained all my documentation? It wouldn't. Did he have a parent nearby who may be able to help? Apparently not.

The lack of boats and aircraft suggested we weren't in the Bermuda Triangle, but the couriers office seemed to have a similarly disorientating effect; "Would you like a cup of tea?" the gump asked, at one point, two hours in. We assented and he left. Our cups of tea never appeared. Like the package, the kitchen was seemingly lost.

Fortunately a rescue party had obviously been sent out after the gump, who presumably shouldn't have been allowed out of the company creche in the first place, and they proved more capable. Suggesting checking the safe, and the delivery stacks, they returned with a package ten minutes later. It looked exactly like the one the gump hadn't been looking for, being the wrong size and shape and in a different place entirely.

The smiles, the laughs, the 'not your faults' that greeted this discovery can be brushed over.

IT system be damned. Courier be damned. I have my Passport in hand, and my VISA in bag. I am as ready as I can be, and I am going to America.