Ellen Wallace
The news always take sharp left at the holidays and where we had crimes, crashes and political dodgings we suddenly get stories about the quaint and curious. The reason, of course, is that even editors tire of the news. Since none of the Big Fat News that is supposed to have an impact on our lives is happening because everyone stops working editors have an excuse to put up the fun stuff.
I would normally expect this to happen tomorrow but lo and behold! the BBC has posted a delightful story about all the Firsts racked up by the British monarch. The excuse is that she is about to break Queen Victoria’s record for the oldest monarch on the throne.
That astonished me. I assumed, clearly without ever checking, that Victoria lived to be about 93. My great-grandparents, who were of her generation, but far poorer Irish immigrants to the US, lived to be older than she did. Now there is a matter for modern researchers into old age to take up: was Victoria the precursor to modern comfortable unhealthy lifestyles, making it only to a paltry 81 and something?
I was also startled to read that today’s queen is the first monarch to hold a concert in her back garden. Why didn’t that occur to George or Victoria or any of the others? E-mail is a little more understandable.
But what surprised me most is that She Who Rules is never named. No wonder British citizens subjects who read the previous sentence will be tut-tutting me for not making that a capital Q. When in Britain, some things can be taken for granted.
I do think the BBC might have added her first (some would say only) name.
GenevaLunch, 20 December 2007.
Filed under: Society
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