The Unofficial British Royal Family Pages

Monday 8 November 2004

Royal News in Review: Beyond Snubs and Old Aunts

Barely eight days into November and we’ve already seen a month’s worth of royal news in Britain. Queen Elizabeth’s historic State visit to Germany, Charles and Camilla’s withdrawal of their acceptances to attend the Grosvener/van Cutsem wedding, the funeral of Princess Alice, the oldest royal ever… there’s little doubt that one or all of these stories kept your desire for royal news sufficiently sated throughout the week. And just in case you were ever on the verge of faltering, the news media made sure that dozens of satellite stories that kept you from losing interest as the week waned. Among the most sensational of these stories were the Telegraph’s “Camilla Boycotts Wedding over Snub,” or the even more hyperbolic Daily Mail article, “The Other Marriage Charles is too Gutless to Attend.” Now how can we be expected not to read about these stories with headlines like this? 

But as one person who was too consumed this week by life’s little challenges to fully indulge in my favored pastime of following the royal news, I was able to conduct a late review of the week’s events from a slightly more dispassionate perspective. Knowing the gist of most of the stories, but not the specifics, I read the articles in search of details. And details were exactly what I found. So, in case you missed it, here are the best, most overlooked aspects of the past week’s royal news. 

Queen Victoria Rocks

The last place you’d expect to find a likeness of Queen Victoria is in the U.S. state of Washington, but – against all odds – there she is, carved in stone in the middle of the Columbia River. Even more bizarrely, the profile of the Queen – which was surveyed in 1881 – is not a manmade creation, but a natural phenomenon, which was appropriately named “Victoria Rock.” Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Majestic rock presents likeness to British Queen.

No, Really, It’s Fascinating

The Duke of Kent proved on Friday that the job of a minor royal is not always a glamorous one as he toured the manufacturing site of one of Britain’s “leading” designers and manufacturers of electronic fly killers. Wakefield Today: Duke of Kent coins it in during visit 

Tea in a Fish Bowl?

While on her State visit to Germany last week, the Queen refrained from partaking in the “dainty cakes” offered to her while on a scenic tour aboard the S-Bahn train. Of course, it’s perfectly reasonable to believe that the Queen was either: a. Not hungry; b. Unwilling to spoil her appetite for lunch; or c. Too interested in the scenery to eat; but the Telegraph seemed to lean toward the theory that the large windows on the train put the Queen – who is reportedly shy of eating in public – off of the tasty morsels.  Telegraph: Cake before luncheon takes the biscuit

Queen Lilibet

As if her reluctance to stuff her face in public wasn’t already evidence enough that the Queen is – underneath it all – a lot like the rest of us, she proved her humanity yet again when she signed the message placed on Princess Alice’s funeral wreath with her childhood nickname, “Lilibet.” BBC: Royals due for princess's funeral

Back when We were German, too…

On her visit to Germany last week, the Queen enjoyed a fine German wine from the K�nigin Victoriaberg winery, which was named for Queen Victoria in 1850 following a brilliant idea by the winery to capitalize on the Queen’s name (and, undoubtedly, her German roots) after she visited the winery in 1845. Clearly, the marketing gimmick has stood the test of time, as the winery is now not only profiting from a connection to historical British royalty, but to modern royalty as well. The Scotsman: Victorian Wine on Menu; Wine International: Queen serves Riesling honoured by Victoria 

Ich Dien

William and Harry took their father’s motto as Prince of Wales – Ich Dien, or “I serve” – to a whole new level last week when they acted as ushers at the wedding of their friend Edward van Cutsem. And we thought that outdated protocol prevented the royals from living normal lives and being there to support their friends… Yahoo: Sky News: Wills and Harry Usher in Wedding Guests 

Hiding Her Assets for a Change

Was it just 12 years ago that Sarah, Duchess of York, appeared topless in British tabloids having her toes sucked by John Bryan? My, how time passes. In any case, we’re all a little older and wiser now and, fortunately for us, the older and wiser Sarah has announced that she is not – I repeat, not – naked in photos that will appear in Elton John’s AIDS Foundation book. Rather, she is mercifully covered with a long black sheet. And speaking of black, that was also the color of the wig she donned to obscure her identity on the London Underground. Apparently, it was such a great “disguise” that not even Sharon Osbourne (!) noticed who it was. BigNews: Duchess of York wears wig, rides subway 

“I wasn’t sleeping, just resting my eyes.”

It’s difficult to ignore the fact that the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh are getting on in years, so you can’t deny them their right to a little rest every now and then. That said, the Queen appears to have dozed off last Thursday during a lecture on the medical use of magnets (can you blame her?), while the Duke appears in a photo printed in the Sydney Morning Herald to have nodded off during a presentation on energy production. I guess he was conserving energy in his own way. The Scotsman: Queen Finds Magnets Lecture Strangely Unattractive; Sydney Morning Herald: Queen of the greens

Until next week, 

- Tori Van Orden Mart�nez