Game of Thrones and the Art of Infodrinking

So Game of Thrones is pretty awesome.

I'll admit that, despite my fondness for mead and Renaissance Festivals, I'm not usually much of a fan of high fantasy. I'm a bit of an impatient reader, and nowhere do writers lose me quicker than during heavy-handed, action-stopping world building scenes, which abound in most sword-and-sorcery novels. Often these infodumps occur as our brawny hero marches over the pastoral wilderness (which has already been explained to us through end paper maps)...