Wow, things have been ferociously busy, but here's a condensed recap of the last couple of days.

We left Humberside airport well enough, passed through Schipol,  then arrived in JFK on Monday. Unfortunately, the airport gave us some erroneous information about our departure gate, which led to us missing our connection!

A complimentary stay at a hotel in Queens was followed by a cab to LaGuardia, and a flight to Nashville on Monday morning.

The Tennessee Rotary welcome committee met us on landing, and managed to get us to Pulaski TN for our first formal appointment on time, no easy feat! Pulaski is a small town with a rich history.  The Pulaski Rotary club, and the Mayor welcomed us in and listened graciously to our ad hoc presentation, which went well considering our jet-lag. We toured the courthouse, learned about the similarities and differences between English and US law, and saw the immaculately preserved courtrooms.

We had a tour of Martin Methodist College, which specializes in music and the arts. Whilst there, we were treated to a short piano concerto, played beautifully on a Steinway.  Apparently the college were recently gifted twelve of them. The not-for-profit theater in Pulaski town square recently discovered an abandoned opera House on the first floor. They are in the middle of restoring it (an estimated two million dollars to raise), but apparently the it's one of the oldest opera houses in the USA.

Tuesday saw visiting the Stones River battlefield, the site of one of the largest civil war conflicts. Our guide (also a Rotarian) talked us through the context surrounding the battle, and the effect it had on the small town of Murfreesboro.

At dinner, we attended Murfreesboro country club and gave our presentation to the Rotarians there. In the afternoon,  the vice president of Mid Tennessee State University arranged a informal chat with the head of English there. That was a very fruitful discussion - they have one hundred and twenty five staff and eight thousand students in that faculty alone. Tom and Warren gave me some insightful advice for teaching American lit, and we hope to keep in touch. The evening had us at Bubba's backyard for a fish Fry - pure Tennessee barbecue. Bubba is a local mortician with a wicked sense of humor and a great collection of Ford Model T's. His food was fantastic.

Today we visited the Space Center in Huntsville, Alabama, where they have a Shuttle, and a Saturn V rocket, amongst a wealth of NASA exhibits.

This evening saw us transferred to Green Hills, a gorgeous outlying district of Nashville, where we were received by the local Rotarians.

American authors discussed this week:
Audra Welty
The 'Fugitive Poets'
Ellison's 'Invisible Man'
Ambrose Bierce
Nella Larsen
Washington Irving
Jack London
 Flannery O'Connor