As a kid in Canada, I got it into my head that the children’s classic The Velveteen Rabbit was The Velveeta Rabbit. I blame my parents, naturally.

The guy who does the porch pirate videos was a NASA engineer. His names Mark Rober and he makes those porch pirates regret being thieves. His father also works at NASA; he worked on the James Webb telescope. Pretty interesting dude.

I was travelling cross country, through Iowa, a while back. It was the dead of night and we stopped at a Highway Rest Area. I was thirsty, so I walked up to the COla Machine, tucked behind prison bars, and, as I was fishing for change, noticed a rather large, oddly shaped dark area covering part of the machine's illuminated display. ...it was a moth. ...LIT~erally the size of my face. I ran back to the car, screaming.

The first picture you use for a Gila monster isn't actually a Gila monster. It's a Mexican Beaded Lizard, the only other member of the Gila Monster's genus (Heloderma). The way you can tell is there's only black scales on the head. I'm only pedantic about this because I've spent decades becoming an expert on Gila monsters and beaded lizards because they're my favorite animals and I used to take care of one at a natural history museum. I love them very much.

I wish you’d do it the other way round. Things we have in the UK, but not stateside

Around Bastrop, TX, there is a detached area where the Loblolly pine grows, perhaps the most western area of it's range. This area is also known as the "lost pine" area. Unfortunately, 10 or so years ago, a quite large wildfire destroyed much of the trees here. Luckily there is a protected area where new pines are growing again in the ashes.

When I was in Japan, I found an interesting thing in the frozen food section. A package emblazoned with an American flag and the words (In English with Japanese Katakana under) AMERICAN DOGS on it. I took it home and opened it up to my joy, Corndogs! It was a nice bit of comfort food for when I was feeling homesick for America. (Alright, I lied, there were "American Dogs"/corndogs clearly on the packaging and a window so you could see them resting in their frozen American glory.)

As an American I'd be fascinated by a reverse version of this series. also, I've never heard the phrase "porch pirate" before so thank you for that.

Laurence, a fellow aging Brit here. We had American processed cheese in those big blocks back in the before times, not BC(19) [before covid] but BC [before computers] in the 80s. It was a staple in our shopping from the sadly missed Safeway supermarket.

I’ve always called loblolly pines telephone pole trees. Reason being I live in an area that has a lot of paper and timber mills so the pines are planted in certain designated areas in my county for harvest. It takes about a decade for them to grow tall enough to be used for telephone poles.

That was nine things. Laurence gave us a bonus. Years ago, Herb Caen (columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle) wrote that Chico, California was the sort of place where they have Velveeta in the gourmet section of the supermarket. It did not endear him to the residents of Chico.

In the west we have sphinx moths, I’ve laughed so hard when one late evening one got into a grocery store and sent people literally screaming and running around like crazy people. I was able to capture it and take it outside and let it go, and people looked at me like I was a crazy one! It’s a moth, they don’t bite or sting!

I love how much you are learning about the wide and diverse American Culture and her very unique vocabulary, demographics, horticulture, geography and anything else that I missed. Your humor makes me laugh and thank you so much for being a source of education to many. Even us in the U.S. are learning many new things that we have never heard before that is actually a "thing." It's better to be a Wise Owl than an Ignoramus.

Don't worry Lawrence. I've lived in the US for 70 years now (east coast) and I have yet to experience a corn dog. Have to say, I'm actually learning a lot from your LITP series - especially place names that I've been mispronouncing all my life. You are a real treasure. 💜

"...which I thought was an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical." I love all your jokes, but I love your theater jokes a whole lot.

Hush Puppies, Bleachers and Nor' Easters at the same time sounds like a Packers home game.

The first time I remember hearing the term "deplane", in the late 1980s, I couldn't help but imitate the character Tattoo from the late 70s/early 80s TV show Fantasy Island, who in the opening sequence would always yell "Da plane! Da plane!" in preparation for welcoming the guests for this guest star-driven show. kzfaq.info/get/bejne/ftqnhdmh2rTclY0.html

I have NEVER heard of a "loblolly pine" before, and I've lived my entire life in the U.S.

Unfortunately, you either didn't know, or forgot about the old series "Fantasy Island", with Ricardo Montalban and Hervé Villechaize. Villechaize's character, 'Tattoo', was the assistant to the island's host, and spoke with a heavy accent, and nearly every episode, could be heard announcing the impending arrival of new guests to the island by calling out "The plane, the plane!", which sounded very much like 'De plane! de plane!'

We have corndogs here in Australia but we call them Dagwood Dogs. Don't know why. They are a must at the local agricultural show (fair) dipped in sauce.

Here's an idea I don't' know if you've talked about if you've run short- From what I understand Britain doesn't really distinguish between solid fruits crushed and boiled with sugar (Jam) vs when it's then strained to leave just the juice (Jelly in the US, No name but "Jam" in the UK from what I've heard, but it may not be true) Some people in the US even distinguish between preserves and jam, wherein preserves has larger pieces of fruit still in it.

I'm a simple guy... Lawrence posts, I hit 'Like.' First 'Like,' this time. 😛 Edit: "Velveeta" would be an epic musical. All about grilled cheese sandwiches and cheese sauces. Gila Monster venom is the original source of an important anti-diabetes medicine. It's synthesized now, but yeah... Lizard spit.

Funny enough, I grew up in Alabama and I’ve never heard of a Loblolly pine, we just call them pine trees 😂

Lawrence could make reading from the want ads or obituaries section of the paper as amusing as hell. Thanks buddy! I love your videos, Lawrence!!!!

So happy for you Laurence. Your years of hard work and dedication are paying off, and there probably isn't a youtuber more deserving than yourself. Health and happiness to you and your wife ✌🏼♥

Here in Japan the Corn Dog is called an "American Dog".

Watch the old show “Fantasy Island”, starring Ricardo Montalban & Herve Villechaize. Villechaize’s character would often shout, “De plane! De plain!” When guests would arrive. Just a bit of useless trivia 😂

As a word lover, I just binge watched in ascending order this entire series. Thank you. I had a good many laughs and chuckles doing so.

Velveeta and American "Cheese" isn't actually cheese. It's a cheese product. You can make it out of basically any cheese (I'm not aware of one you can't). It requires using sodium citrate to allow the cheese to emulsify in water. It's basically how fondue cheese and cheese wiz is made. Corndogs vary on the batter. A lot of times people use the ultra-sweet stuff which I don't care for. Fun fact, a Loblolly Pine seed went to the moon (sorta, it didn't go to the surface, just circled around it) and it grew up in Arkansas at a school of forestry. They were called Moon Trees. A PR stunt from NASA.

I'm sitting by my window looking at a Loblolly Pine Tree forest that surrounds us here in Georgia. The reason there are so many of them is because they are planted by large companies. We have massive acreage covered by them. As you pointed out, they are very tall (at maturity) and have very few branches which means the dimensional lumber created from the harvested trees have far fewer knots to interfere with building houses, decks, etc. Keep up the good work, mate (Can I say that even though you aren't? Hubby wants to know).

My dad pointed out that “deplaning” isn’t really proper. The plane is depassengering.

As a Midwesterner i mentioned Velveeta as a refrigerator staple to an Italian American friend from NY. He was horrified.

My husband is from Mexico and he had never heard of corndogs either. I don’t think they have that in Spanish. He saw them the first time at the grocery store and called them condors, which is a bird. lol! 😂

When I first moved to England age 10 I found out the hard way about no free refills (and also why no ice?!) I usually would drink a whole cup of something before the meal even came. My dad wouldn't buy another, and there wasn't water either, so my first meal out I had to eat with nothing to drink. All the subsequent ones I'd be forced to ration my one pint cup of warm coke for the whole experience (I'm a heavy beverage imbiber, I usually knock back 5-6 glasses of unsweet iced tea in a meal, but as a kid it was the same with coke, and I also drink the free water). Yeah, the refills and tiny bottles of things was my hardest adjustment. Being said, I really miss England. Thanks for all you do and giving me something to rant about. Love the channel, wish you the best.

As an Australian we tend to use the same words as they do in the UK for a lot of things. I’ve never heard of deplaning before, we’d be instructed to alight, disembark the flight or exit the aircraft. I’ve learnt so many new things about America from this series. Great work!

In elementary school, we had a Gila monster that stayed in the science classroom. Didn't realize it was strange, I wonder if Australians have interesting animals in their schools.

Luna moths are GORGEOUS!!! I don't know about everyone else, when we see one we call everyone in the house to see!

This has to be a real job because we all jump on it this fast 😂😂

Lawrence you need a quote from Tatoo for the plane joke, ""DE-PLANE DE-PLANE!"

"Loblolly" is an old Southern term for "mud puddle". In fact, I've driven down a dirt road with an old Southern gentleman who called out, "Watch out for that loblolly", meaning to avoid going through a muddy pothole. There are three pine species that are common in the Southeast: loblolly, slash, and longleaf. Longleaf grows in dry, sandy soils, slash in more intermediately dry soils, and loblolly in wetter soils. But, loblolly has been widely planted outside its native range, which is why it is also so common. Fun fact about loblolly pine: if you crush the needles, it smells EXACTLY like oranges. (Because the needles are very high in Vitamin C.)

Porch piracy: as a recent immigrant to the UK, this at first had me stumped. On arrival here, we were astonished that packages could (seriously?) be delivered to you and left on the porch (outside, in the rain, for anyone to carry off!). So your mention of "porch piracy" brought a smile. Being from South Africa the concept was foreign yes, but also incomprehensible in the extreme. A parcel delivered like that might make it for an hour, on a very quiet day! Generally it would be gone within minutes. Over here in the UK it's quite normal. The neighbor across the way had a package delivered to his front door about 11 days ago, while they are soaking up the sun in Spain for the Easter break! It's still there (albeit a bit soggy by this stage!). Yeah, had a good chuckle about this one (at my expense of course!). Cheers mate.

I can remember when free refills first got introduced in the early 1980's by the Pepsi company to try and lure people into Taco Bell. McDonald's was the last holdout, not wanting to give free refills until the early 1990's.

Yeah, the first time I heard a flight attendant use the word "deplane," he'd been a bit of a wit throughout the flight and I thought he was using a jokey phrase to refer to "get the hell off so we can go on break." Turns out it was a word.

'Deplaning' prompted the vision of one of those old woodshop how-to videos being run backwards: 'Your newly smoothed table top can once again be rough and thick.'

Another very humorous look at the common language that separates us! Well done Lawrence!

When I told my friend from the UK about some of our foods like Frito pies, chicken fried steak with country gravy, cow pie cookies, and the crazy deep fried foods at the Texas state fair, he thought America had lost its ever lovin' mind. He told me about the deep fried Mars bars, but was confused as to why we had deep fried butter, cheesecake, twinkies, and yes, beer. Then I told him about the highway clustertruck known as a "mix master".

Luna Moths are sick. I remember years ago one night a few friends & I were at our (now gone) local 24hr 711 sometime late in the evening/early morning when there was a Luna Moth outside the store. I was finishing up my purchase of probably snacks & cigarettes and one of my other friends that was outside opened the front door. The clerk saw the moth and was like "no, no, no don't let it in" while my friend was like "it's comin in!" as he ushered it into the store. Absolutely hilarious encounter at the time. Guess it doesn't quite translate well via text but trust me it was great.

I love that there’s a little animal that we call a “monster”.

Congratulations Laurence! You truly deserve it. You’ve worked really hard.🐝❤️🤗

Aww... I hope all of you get to try a corn dog and some Velveeta. Corndogs, best dipped in mustard. Velveeta, best thing for grilled cheese sandwiches.

I live in Arizona and I can vouch for the Gila monster. There is even a river named the Gila.

Those pre-packaged singles are not American cheese. You need to find an actual deli and get some Land o Lakes or New Yorker American cheese. It is very different than that rubbery, yellow crap. White American cheese is what you typically find on a cheesesteak other than provolone. It's kind of a mild cheddar flavor, and very creamy and melts really well. It's probably one of the best cheeses for a grilled cheese sandwich.

Harvester, Subway and Nando's do soft drink refills, and Wetherspoon's do hot drink refills

I think deplane is relatively new. It's pretty new to me anyway. I remember people saying disembark. I am american and deplane just sounds really funny and kinda dumb to me. It makes me think of that show from the 70s where the little guy is famous for shouting "De plane! De plane!" When I plane is landing. I don't remember the name of the show, it was before I was born, but I remember my mom telling me about it.

I can't wait for Part 50. : ))) Once again, Laurence, this was a good one. Keep'em comin'.

Can't go wrong with Velveeta & Ro-Tel. Or a good corndog.

Herb Caen was a very popular columnist in the San Francisco Chronicle. His columns were about a dozen short items, light humor, society gossip, local shenanigans. In the early 80's he happened to be traveling in the north state, and while in a Safeway supermarket in Chico he discovered that they had put the Velveeta in the Gourmet Cheese section. Of course he wrote about it in his column and thus Chico became the butt of many jokes about their sophistication, or lack thereof.

Actually Laurence, there are TWO venomous lizards native to the USA, Besides the Gila Monster, there is the Mexican Beaded lizard. Yes I know it says "Mexican". Still they are, in fact, native here. Most are not un-documented.

Czech Republic here. It is abolutely unheard of to leave an article of mail, let alone a package, unattended. Packages are delivered hand-to-hand or picked up by the addressee at a post office or the delivery point (which can be a code operated box). There is is no way in hell a package would be left anywhere. People simply PAY for the aforementioned delivery and there would be no record of it otherwise.

Velveeta was an ingredient in my dinner this very night! It was good ol' burger mac, but I made it fancy with onions, mushrooms, spinach, bell peppers, garlic and other seasonings.

"A relatively small area of the United States" Well, Maybe a relatively small *proportion* of the US, but a large land area. :) (Was that you who had a video about how hard it was to wrap your head around the sheer size of the US as someone from a much smaller country?) Love your channel. Thanks.

No free refills? Barbarians!!!

I still love the description of corn dogs in Ratatouille. "Cheap sausages dipped in batter and deep-fried. American."

Pro tip: Mustard goes on Corn Dogs. Mate! Take the 3 hr drive & get on down to Springfield, IL and hit up Cozy Dog. The Original (well, um, maybe). While you're there, the Lincoln Library is pretty neat too.

Each one of these gets better than the one before

I wonder how long corny dogs have been available in the UK. I know of KZfaqrs who do food hauls that have included them. You're just adorably funny, Laurence.

Loblolly was dried compressed soup. On HMS Victory etc, a surgeon's assistant was know as a Loblolly boy because it was his job to serve meals in the sickbay. Soup considered as being the best diet for sick sailors.

My personal feelings about Velveeta is that it's not cheese, it's processed cheese food (just like those rubbery singles), and it's good for mixing with Ro-Tel and not much else. If you have trouble melting cheese in a sandwich, turn down the heat.

Yeah! Another Lost in the Pond! Thank you Lawrence.

KZfaq is a real job, if you did the same work on late night TV you would be making a fortune. We love having you here on demand. 😁👍❤

Velveeta Cheese and Shells New York Company Italian Style Sausage Diced onions, jalapenos, and bell pepper/poblanos Start cooking the noodles in one pot Crumble and brown the sausage in a saucepan Add in diced veggies, cook with sausage until soft Once all is cooked, combine I don't have a name for this yet, but this is one of my favorite meals I've come up with.

Ah, free refills, the drink version of the all-you-can-eat buffet. A long time ago, my husband and I were in London after bicycling around western Europe for 6 months (which resulted in our being perpetually hungry). I was in a cafe that had an all-you-can-eat salad bar, and thought, all right, FINALLY i can eat my fill...and then noticed, in smaller type, "One visit only". I carefully constructed a mountain of salad on my rather small (to me) plate, and braved the cashier's disgusted look as I paid for my one visit.

It's BLOODY TIME Britain got words for these things!! LOL!

American cheese is not the silly little cheese slices with the plastic wrapped around.. Real American cheese is bought in the deli department

I went to a restaurant in New Britain that didn't have free refills and was stunned. We ended up spending nearly $24 on soda because we just assumed it was free for refills AND the soda was overpriced in the German first place. They never mentioned that they were charging for them. Fool me once... I would have gone back to that restaurant if it weren't for the soda scam.

Parcel pirates/thieves are such a big problem in the UK because parcels aren't usually left in the front of houses where they can be seen. They will either be left in a pre-arranged place or very often left with a neighbour. I've got to know quite a few of my neighbours because we've looked after parcels for each other. Btw we DO often have 'front porches' in the UK but they are different. We sometimes have a front door behind which is a small area with a mat and maybe a cupboard and then another front door leading to the house. This small area between the doors is the front porch and it's where parcels can be left. All our Amazon packages are left in our front porch. It's out of the weather and out of sight. Ideal.

Love from Georgia 🇺🇸❤️🇬🇧

Corndogs are also called prontopups in the northeast...cornbread battered and fried hotdogs...awesome food

We have a yard game called Corn Hole (look it up) not to be confused with the old farm boy prank "corn hole".

I first heard of gila monsters over 30 years ago, not through a wildlife documentary, but because they were a low level mob to be defeated in the Bard's Tale Pt 3. I didn't give any thought at the time, and even more recently when I started playing the remaster version, that there would or could be such a thing in real life, so thank to for making very old memories seem even weirder. :D

The first and only time I had Velveeta happened to be in Australia. And I always got free refills at Nando's in Britain.

Velveeta dip with rotel tomatos is 🤤

How does this video only have 6 likes? It’s typical Laurence; educational & full of his trademark dry British wit. 👍

I live in Pennsylvania, and just a few years ago, I was about to enter my house when I spied a Jurassic-era luna moth on my screen door. I was completely paralyzed and couldn't enter. I stood there for awhile, looking at it, and then just left and went to a bar for a glass of wine. I called my husband and told him I'd come back when he'd rid the place of the scourge. He came home from work and shooed it off, but I've never been the same, frankly.

When I traveled to Britain I was amazed at the lack of ice. We only stayed at one hotel with an ice machine and most mixed drinks would be served with only 1 or 2 cubes and water was chilled but no ice.

The glitter bomb videos are absolutely hysterical.

If you ever do #8, include "Livermush". We think it is delicious. It is one of the items made after a "Hog-killing". Loblollys are numerous, because many trees planted by paper and lumber companies are Lobs, "Improved Loblolly", to be precise.

Luna Moths are quite beautiful. We saw them occasionally at night when we were in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

don"t mess with the Indiana State Fair! I try to get back every summer with my Indiana family. Long history of entering contests, etc. I do end up with a corndog every time!

I am sure, when most Brits reference getting off an aircraft, it is the same word we use for getting off a ship... Disembark or Disembarkation. I also use it for getting off a bus. The word Deboarding somehow feels unintelligent.

Love ya Laurence. You’re doing great. I’ll never miss one of your videos and am now working very hard to visit your home island.

I live in Northwest Missouri and I have two loblolly pines. My father-in-law brought them to us, in 1994, from north east Arkansas. They are very flexible trees. Arkansas does not get the kind of snows that we can get in Northwest Missouri. More than once, after particularly heavy snows, the tops of the trees, which stands from 60 feet high, will be pinned to the ground from the weight of the snow. And the funniest porch pirates videos on KZfaq involve booby trapped boxes.

But Lawrence,... I *must* correct you about the beer! Yes! We did have free refills on beer,... But the laws were changed and we were forced to stop. Some bars in California had something called the Beer Bust, and ours was every Sunday from 2pm to 8pm. It was used to get more people to come in at a time the bar was not normally busy. After 8pm everything went back to normal. But, how can you make money? Not everyone wanted beer, they would also buy shots, and the lines for refills were so long, there was no chance they were "over served". But,... the law was changed so that we could not sell any alcohol beverage below it's cost. (So we calculated carefully so we could find a glass that we could serve for a dollar,... But it just isn't the same.)

We eat hobo sandwiches. A mixture of velveeta cheese, ground beef, and pan sausage. On a wheat sub bun. Pinnacle of dining.

How about: 1) Breakfast Burritos. They're a staple here in the Southwest. I don't know about the rest of the country. They're at all food trucks/lunch wagons/roach coaches (I assume you've already covered those), diners, coffee shops, fast food places and even supermarkets, grocery stores and liquor stores. Basically eggs, some kind or kinds of meat (bacon; breakfast sausage, ham, chorizo, etc.), potatoes (fried or hash browns) and or refried beans/frijoles, sometimes rice, usually some chile salsa and pico de gallo (look it up), and of course cheese which is usually something like Mexican Ranchera or Panela, wrapped inside a large flour tortilla (corn tortillas taste better but aren't flexible enough to contain large amounts of burrito filling). Served hot. Your entire breakfast minus coffee and a pastry and orange juice in a handy wrapper. Usually quite large. Very American. They don't eat anything like this in Mexico unless they were brought there by former American residents. 2) As an extension of the above Frijoles aka Refried Beans. Cooked pinto beans put in a frying pan with some lard, for taste and to cook. The beans are smashed into a puree with something like a potato masher. Chicken stock may be added in small amounts to make it relatively smooth. Typically no additional seasoning is needed but usually served with something like a salsa or chile sauce. Pretty a staple side dish and recipe ingredient. It's in every burrito. I doubt whether either one of these is known in England. They're mostly Mexican though frijoles are eaten throughout the former Nahuatl and Mayan areas of North and Central America.

I just LOVE that you live in Chicago which is on edge of lake Michigan because with as it "The pond" as well. But lake Superior (which is bigger), that's lake Kitchi gami!

As I always say, You are hilarious!

I had a food box delivered... they left the box!

This is a real job, Uncle Toby.

I’ve heard of people who package up their cat boxes to set out to prank porch pirates. Just imagine stealing a package off a porch, opening it up , hopefully in their car, to find kitty litter soaked in cat piss and poop. Oh the smell. lol