I started to write that I had meant to be a better blogger when I returned to the UK, but I have only gotten worse.

Then I got all happy and thought I would explain that that sentence must mean I was a Yank at heart because Brits never, ever say “gotten”. Though it is, in fact, the older form (you’ll find it in the Bible, and in every day use in America), Brits only ever say “got”. They find “gotten” oddly quaint, old fashioned, and definitely American.

But in the middle of writing I started worrying about saying I was a Yank at heart, because it turns out that a hell of a lot of bloggers are Texans (why?) and, it seems, they don’t like the implication that Americans are Yanks.

Then I was going to apologise and say that I had been called a Yank so long that I had got used to thinking of all Americans as Yanks and didn’t meaning anything particularly northern by it. (I grew up mainly in New England, but my family is southern and I could join the Daughters of the Confederacy as well as the Daughters of the American Revolution.) A Brit friend of mine says that outside of Oxford people don’t say Yank so much. Apparently they know it might be offensive.

Only just when I was trying to explain about that, I realised I had written “got used” instead of “gotten used” and I became completely paralysed because suddenly that must mean I am a Brit at heart.

Also apparently my spelling has gone wonky since I’ve been back. I’ve lost track. Do you say wonky?

And my grammar, it seems, is dodgy. If you don’t say dodgy, I would give it a try if I were you. You’ll find it a useful word.

More later, when I work out which language I speak.