Book Quotes of the Day

From Peter Biddlecombe's spelling error filled (but still hilarious) The United Burger States of America:

On Philadelphia:
"Now I know all about this Philadelphia and city of brotherly love business--it means that if the police beat you up in front of a video camera they will immediately take you to a hospital afterwards--but I can't for the life of me understand why they didn't call the place Franklin, or even Franklinville or, I suppose, given the American genius for yukky (sic) names, HappyBenjyFrankyVille. Rather than the cradle of American Liberty, it's more like the Cradle of Benjamin Franklin, the short-sighted harmonica-playing son of a man who changed shades and colours every day of his life (he was a dyer)."

On Milwaukee:
"For all the hype about Wisconsin being the beer state of America, the capital (sic), Milwaukee, is pretty dull, flat and insipid.* A bit like most of their beers.** In fact, given the size of their dairy industry, it should be called Milkwaukee instead.
* It is.
**Except for Miller.
"Before I went there I thought it was going to be all bierkellers the size of baseball pitches, beer flowing in the streets and hearty, thigh-slapping, strapping, 20-stone Americans in their designer lederhosen getting schlossed out their tiny minds...Instead it's like a small town; a very small-town Chicago."***
***It is a small-town, but you never ever say Milwaukee is like Chicago. If we could, we'd declare ourselves in a different time zone.

On New Jersey:
"New Jersey is like Michael Jackson's nose. It's for ever changing, updating, and reinventing itself."

On Boston:
"As for the whole 'no taxation without representation' business, Massachusetts and all the others broke away from the UK because they believed so fervently in no taxation without representation. Right? OK, try asking a Boston barman or cab-driver to deduct the Massachusetts sales tax from your bill because you're not entitled to vote in the US, and you'll soon see how much they believe in no taxation without representation. If, that is, you get out alive."

On New York:
"Now that wandering the streets is no longer fraught with danger, the excitement has gone. There are people around at all hours of the day and night, taking cabs, riding the subways--where you can watch the weirdos, spot passengers on the fiddle as well as on the violin and shrink with fear as way-out rappers leap into the carriage at the last-minute, boom box in hand, to serenade the world--or risking their lives on the Staten Island ferry."

On Detroit:
"Not just one derelict office building; not just one street of derelict office buildings, banks, and stores, but whole blocks of derelict office buildings, banks, stores, hotels, and theatres. Welcome to Detroit, originally named by its founder, Antoine de la Mothé Cadilliac, as far back as 1701 as Ville d'Etroit, or City in a Right Mess. Which at least proves one thing: the French are not always wrong."