CIJ’s assumption is fair. Our colonial cousins use the crude ‘awesome’ to describe what the civilised english-speaking world would call brilliant. The reasoning for this escapes me, for whilst ‘brilliant’ refers to something of exceptional quality, namely Yekke2’s Abie reference in this instance, ‘awesome’ would imply that I was awestruck, which would be a massive overstatement. This propensity to overstate and exaggerate, so much so that words become divorced from their original meaning, is one of the many ways the Americans have cheapened a language they have no right to defile.
And the colonial commoners also appear to be unable to comprehend the intricacies of spelling, as used by the civilised world for centuries, and therefore spell everything phonetically in an attempt to simplify it, basically dragging it down to their level. This leaves us with abominations such as ‘favor’ or ‘color’. The reasoning for this does not escape me, as it quite blatantly stems from the brashness and lack of depth that typifies American culture.
I hope I nobody takes offence (not offense) at this treatise, as it is primarily intended to entertain. And by the way, have I given any clues away as far as your original question is concerned?