By George

A list of 20 things that I associate with the word 'England':

1. People making lists

2. People with red faces

3. Restrained silences in ultra-crowded environments (inside buses, trains, waiting rooms and lifts)

4. Unrestrained noise in ultra-quiet environments (a suburban road after dark, a library, anywhere you're trying to get some peace)

5. Queues for no reason

6. Complaints when it's too wet, complaints when it's too dry

7. Inbuilt obsolescence

8. A surplus of coffee shops, a deficit of tea shops

9. Healthy scepticism, unhealthy cynicism

10. The most beautiful and greenest of all possible green fields

11. A love of everything foreign except the people

12. A self-preserving fear of extremes (especially political points of view)

13. The BBC, the greatest organisation in the world

14. Half-day closing

15. The postal order

16. Audiences clapping along to music on the down beat (grim, military) rather than the up beat (loose, relaxed)

17. The freshness of the air after a thunderstorm

18. Unblinking support of unwinnable causes

19. Muddling through

20. Not talking about what things you'd associate with the word 'England'