Andrew J. Lederer

in restaurants and other public places, for being too loud. (i call it enthusiasm).

i generally don't wish i had heeded his advice, but in london, where loudness is equated with americans, i find i suddenly represent not just myself but also my countrymen.

the other day, in a restaurant near leicester square, a classic, cranky, english dowager-type loudly (and without irony) chastised me for my volume as i passionately analyzed the anti-michael moore film, "manufacturing dissent".

and today, a classic, cranky, older gent wouldn't shut up (again without irony, though brits believe they are suffused with it) about what he saw as my loud and lengthy phone conversation in a local cafe.

well, this is the kind of offense that actually mortifies me, since loudly talking into a cell phone is one of the most obnoxious things people do and i've mocked others -- in their presence -- for this rude obliviousness.

unfortunately, when you get lost in the world of a phone call, you can suffer a diminished awareness of the physical world around you.

still, though sometimes they're unavoidable, these technology-inspired affronts are the ultimate responsibility of the affronter and i was deeply embarrassed when confronted with my sins.

but . . .

the offended dowager, protecting the gentility of her beloved britain against boorish americans, was doing so in a "cheap eats"-listed chinatown hideaway where she was about the only brit present and one of the few people even speaking in english. (where, exactly, did this "classy" dame imagine she was eating?)

and the cranky guy this morning wouldn't shut up even after i immediately took control of my volume and was clearly responding to his criticism.

frankly, it made me not want to apologize to him.

but i did anyway, because it isn't just me in the indiscriminate, "you're different than we are", redhead-mocking eyes of the british (though my father could tell them otherwise).

i represent americans.

have a nice day.