Being way way over here in Germany often leaves me feeling remote from the goings-on in my home country. I compensate for this by spending (what my wife considers) an exceptional amount of time on the Internet pouring over US newspapers and blogs. Because this is a presidential year, I’ve been spending even more time online trying to figure out which contestant nauseates me the least. (PS – A belated thank you to Giuliani for dropping out. Now I no longer have to worry about your face popping up on my screen while eating.) And I thought splitting hairs was difficult. Attempting to root out the fine distinctions among the White-House wannabes requires a lot of effort and wastes a lot of precious moments with my kid. Howard Zinn, author of “A People’s History of the United States,” tells me it’s all for naught. Read this excellent article, and spend the next eight months getting some fresh air instead.

Do you religion but evolution? If so, you’re not alone; in fact, you’ll have plenty of company this weekend. That’s when religious and scientific folk from around the country come together in a big snuggle fest they call Evolution Weekend. These people have had enough of monkey trials, justa-theories, creation museums and other such national embarrassments. Their objectives are to create sincere dialogue about the relation between science and religion and to reassure religious types that evolution don’t mean no one no harm. The evidence supporting evolution is overwhelming, they say. Denying evolution – and therefore our God-given power of reason – does God and ourselves a grave injustice. Scientific theories appeal to the mind, and religion is designed “to transform hearts.” We feel a moment coming on.

The Typing Chimps think it’s a bad idea to cross-speciate Genesis with genetics, but maybe that’s just sour grapes – we wish we had a soul too. Guess we’ll be spending another lonely weekend at home.

Today my son became an Amurikin.

His passport/passeport/pasaporte arrived in the mail this morning, completing what has to have been the easiest bureaucratic transaction I’ve experienced since hanging my hat in this country. Of course, we had to drive to the American Consulate in Berlin to do it. There probably aren’t enough rocket scientists in the world to understand why the local German immigration office couldn’t provide me with a residence permit in under a month and without killing an acre of rain forest in the process while Lloyd and I can get our US passports in just a week and a half. And they sent our paperwork to the US first!

On the other hand, I don’t recall being interrogated and strip searched before entering the German immigration office, whereas gaining safe passage into the American fortress required negotiating a labyrinth that was part JFK Airport, part opening theme to Get Smart. Katrin and I wanted to photograph the moment, but the US government doesn’t want images of consulate waiting rooms to fall into the hands of evil-doin’ turrurists. To be fair, I was relieved of my cell phone and camera at the gate by a very friendly though mammoth guard. And no camera was necessary to permanently capture the image of this bulk-o-hulk goo-gooing at Lloyd, who wisely decided to giggle. Equally friendly personnel sped us through streamlined paperwork, and before you can say Bitte füllen Sie diese Formulare in dreifacher Ausfertigung aus, we were swearing with raised right hands that Lloyd was good people.

Once we were reunited with our phones and camera on our way out, I wanted to commemorate Lloyd’s Americanization with a picture in front of the consulate building, you know, in case he ever wonders why he just got a draft notice from Uncle Sam. Well, son, way back in 2008 your mother and I thought it would be a good idea to…. As I posed with our newly christened son at the top of the steps, a German cop loafed into action, telling Katrin that photographing the American Consulate was strengstens verboten. We both expected this, but I still protested on principle. It’s a public building, I argued. It’s outside; I could be a mere diversion for ten turrurists with cameras across the street, behind the bushes, peeking out of manholes. Delete zee fotos or zair vill be trahble his look told me. Very well.

Foto Cop pooped on my parade. But he’s not to blame. It’s not his decision to defend a large building in a large city from the prying eyes of the public. No, that order came from my country, the United States of Hysteria. Exaggerating? How else do you explain charging a few policemen with making an entire building invisible when we can’t even provide our citizens at home adequate safety? Have the Bad Guys never heard of Google Earth? Close your eyes…

I guess the cop wasn’t able to shoot the satellite out of the sky.

And our car was also too fast:

*Achtung!*

Even Mexico and Canada are now off-limits to non-passport-holding Americans who want to see what life is like outside the Kane compound. Apply for yours today!