- Crosses the Line Twice: When talking about how Dutch sometimes sounds remarkably like a garbled version of English (especially as its speakers so often effortlessly switch between the two) Bryson conjures this jaw dropping exchange between a hotel proprietor and his unseen wife:"I presented myself at a small hotel on Prinsengracht and asked the kind-faced proprietor if he had a single room. "Oh I don’t believe so", he said (in English). "But let me check with my wife". He thrust his head through a doorway of beaded curtains and called "Marta, what stirs in your leggings? Are you most moist?". From the back a voice bellowed, "No, but I tingle when I squirt!"
- Fridge Logic: One of his Notes From a Big Country was partly devoted to examining all the gaping plot holes in The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
- Newer Than They Think: Australia's Trans-Continental Railway
- As well as the reach of Australian utilities, geographical knowledge of the place, pretty much the whole country (only independent since 1901).
- Nightmare Fuel: Many descriptions of Australian wildlife and the travails of outback explorers (though it's all Truth in Television...). Also the descriptions of potential megadisasters in Short History.
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