Royal-watchers know all–even before it happens

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A pair of internet spoofsters, Josh Pieters and Archie Manners, conned four sober-sided royal-watchers into commenting on Megan and Harry’s Oprah interview two days before it was aired–which is to say, two days before any of them had seen more than the few snippets that were used as trailers.  Ingrid Seward, the editor-in-chief of Majesty magazine (no I didn’t know such a thing existed either but I think I’ll see if they’re hiring),said of Markle, “To my mind this was an actress giving one of her great performances–from start to finish, Meghan was acting.”

Richard Fitzeilliams (he’s a royal commentator, whatever that may be) said it was “not a balanced interview” and that Oprah had given them “an easy ride” and was “totally sympathetic.” Markle, he said, “used extremely strong language to describe her relations with members of the royal household.”

Don’t you wish you knew what was about to happen? 

Irrelevant photo: Lesser celandine, growing between rocks.

The spoofsters also drew the experts into discussing a couple of invented topics: Markle’s refusal to get vaccinated and her support for the Balham donkey sanctuary.

As far as Lord Google will tell me, the donkey sanctuary doesn’t exist. I like to support causes that don’t exist myself. It’s so much less disappointing when things go wrong.

Or maybe it does exist but Lord Google got stars in his eyes and let the headlines about Markle’s nonexistent comments eclipse anything real. 

Fitzwilliams (whatever he does with his time when he’s not commentating) said his comments were used out of context. 

Yes, dear. They always are. That’s why you have to be careful what you say. Because they might just cut the part where you say, “Well, I could be wrong about this since it’s irresponsible speculation, but . . . ”

Anyway, keep the tale all in mind next time you read someone’s comments about what’s really going on in the royal family. 

 

And elsewhere in the world

A fishing ship caught fire off the coast of Thailand, the crew was rescued, and the navy was sent to check for oil spills. They spotted cats huddled together on a sinking ship. One of the sailors swam over and swam back with four frantic cats clinging to his shoulders. And head. 

The sailors seem to have adopted them, or at least it looked that way in the photo taken after the rescue, when the sailors were gathered around a table and the four cats were shoving their faces into food bowls. I haven’t seen an update. 

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A delivery man in Vietnam heard a child crying and someone screaming for help as he was about to deliver a package, and when he looked up saw a toddler dangling from a high-rise apartment building’s balcony. He’s not sure how, but he “found ways to climb into the nearby building. I mounted on a 2-meter-high tile roof to seek a proper position to get the girl.”

He tried to catch her in his arms, but the baby fell into his lap.

The girl was bleeding from the mouth and he rushed her to a hospital, where they found she had a broken arm and leg. She was in stable condition. He ended up with a sprain and thousands of social media followers. 

*

A burglary in France went wrong when a hotel fire alarm went off. The owner woke up and followed the thieves–who’d smashed into the wine cellar, grabbing 350,000 euros worth of burgundy–down the motorway and called the police, not necessarily in that order.

When the cops closed in, the thieves started throwing bottles of wine at their windshields. What the hell, they had hundreds of them. They missed, but they did get away after hitting a toll booth and taking off on foot–presumably without the wine. 

Many flat tires went unreported on that stretch of highway–they were too tipsy to care.

*

If you were hoping for actual news today, my apologies. I needed a break and decided you probably did as well.

48 thoughts on “Royal-watchers know all–even before it happens”

  1. Our Royal Family is the gift that keeps on giving isn’t it? Not like there’s anything serious to report in the news. At least ‘The Crown’ will have some fabulous fodder for series 10, or whenever they get to that bit.

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  2. I definitely needed a break! I am so cross with the British media and royal commentators and a lot of the public that I no longer know what to say! Other than they need to get their heads out of their bottoms and maybe listen when people are saying there is something wrong inside an institution that practically invented subjugating other nations…

    So yes, I like stories about rescuing cats and small people and using wine a s a weapon :-D
    I hope the cats go on to be fishermans cats…they’d get more fish than they could ever need :-D

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  3. Yes, Harry and Megan. Thankfully, only one of my friends has mentioned the Oprah interview to me. I had no comment.
    I had a wonderful chuckle over your preference to support causes that don’t exist since you were less disappointed when things went wrong. Like, for example, with the Lincoln Project which I supported during the 2020 campaign but which has now disintegrated into a blithering mess. I should have tried a donkey sanctuary.
    Bravo to the cat rescuers and survivers!

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    • I’ll confess to being pretty ignorant about donkeys–I haven’t even gone as far as feeding them carrots. I know that donkey sanctuaries in the UK raise a lot of money–more (this was some years ago, but it may well still hold true) than women’s shelters. They seem–at least to us humans–uncomplicated. Easier on the emotions than the issues around battered women. We can feed ’em a carrot and go home smiling instead of wondering, What on earth is going to become of her and her kids?

      Oops. Sorry. We were doing feel-good, and the psychology of donkeys, not of humans. I slip into campaigning mode so easily.

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  7. I noticed that you had not posted since The Interview (which I didn;t watch either – Dr. K’s Exotic Animal ER” was on opposite) so I figured you were either saving up for a biggy or – unimpressed, I heard a (British) commentator this morning on NPR and decided that, for all their faults, your Royals are still an improvement on The Trump Firm.

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    • If that’s the comparison, yes, they’re an improvement, although I’m pretty sure the royals are more even expensive. They’re also absurd. I don’t really have much interest in the royals, don’t particularly believe that we know what goes on among them–they’re by design a black box–and am unlikely to write about them. Now insiders pontificating on what hasn’t yet happened among them? That’s my kind of story.

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  8. I loved the story about the sailors rescuing the cats (I bet his back was in pain with those kitty sticking their claws in). I misread that at first and thought it said a hundred cats and spent a whole moment wondering aboyut the 96 that hadn’t been rescued. I haven’t quite woken up yet! As for Meghan – I don’t really care about the “he-said-she-said” aspect of it, what got me was how utterly miserable she was trapped she was in that situation…good for her getting out. The British tabloid press are evil and the have destroyed many, many women over the years (some of them aren’t even famous either).

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    • A hundred cats? Swimming with four would’ve been hard enough. (You notice I’m avoiding the thought of 96 of them drowning.) You remind me of a kids’ book, something like Hundreds of Thousands of Cats. The illustrations involve swarms of cats. I don’t really remember the text, but I loved the illustrations. It’s not from my childhood–kids’ books were boring back then.

      I have no idea why any country would want a royal family, but I do have (some) sympathy for anyone trapped in it. It sounds horrible–especially when you’ve got the tabloid press baying at your heels and a few gallons of racism poured in. To mix a metaphor.

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      • Now you mention it the Hundreds of Thousands of Cats book rings a very distant bell. I amall in favour of an elected head of state every few years like they have in the Repubic of Ireland where they have a poet as a president. It also means that they aren’t saddled with the job for ever and they can go on and do other things.

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        • The US introduced term limits for the presidency, mostly because they didn’t want another Roosevelt staying in office. It brought us the unexpected blessing of keeping Reagan from running again. But all told, I have mixed feelings about it–for any office. On the one hand, it easy for corruption and dictatorial habits to creep in when anyone’s in office too long. On the other hand, it’s nice to keep competent people in office when they’re doing good things, and there’s no guarantee that someone new will be even remotely competent. It takes a while to figure out how things work, how to get anything done. I don’t know. I’m passionately on both side of this one.

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  9. Richard Fitzeilliams (he’s a royal commentator, whatever that may be) said it was “not a balanced interview” and that Oprah had given them “an easy ride” and was “totally sympathetic.”

    Wow! A reporter (wait, she’s not a reporter) with an agenda! Whoda thunk it?

    With regards to the Vietnamese story, over here some attorney would get hold of the girl and her parents and sue the delivery man for inflicting undue harm onto the child.

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  12. http://www.wandagaghouse.org/about/millions-of-cats-by-wanda-gag/

    If this is the book you and Emma Cowrie are remembering, I bet you were around for it – – or rather, it definitely came first – it was written in 1928.

    It’s possible they misspelled the name of where the donkey sanctuary is. Maybe it’s in Balaam.. Though given British pronunciation (never mind Gaelic or Welsh) Balham is probably pronounced “Balrashamun”.

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    • That’s the book, and you’re right, it was published well before I was born–19 years–but I didn’t see it until I was grown. Too bad. I’d have loved it. Thanks. I do remember thinking that, at least in English, that’s an unfortunate last name.

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      • When I took Children”s Lit in college our prof made sure we knew it was pronounced “Gadge”(second g had a j sound.) Oddly enough in my teaching career I encountered a family named “Gaj” who pronounced it “Gay.”

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        • After living with English place names (Woolfardisworthy, pronounced Woolsery), nothing should surprise me, but of course everything will continue to. I know at least that Gag isn’t English in its origin, but since it’s here, I’ll blame our language and our insane spelling system for it anyway.

          Was children’s lit fun to study, or did studying it take the fun out of it?

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          • It was ok – you learned the background of some of the books and about the authors. But reading the lit itself is the most fun ! – as you probably know, a good book is a good book whatever level it is written for. Some of today’s Young Adult books would put your teeth to sleep.

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            • I haven’t read a lot of young adult books–a few, but not the ones that put my teeth to sleep. They’re sleepy enough as it is. Why, last night before supper–

              No, you don’t want to hear that tale.

              I have a lot of admiration for the people who write for kids. It’s one of those things that looks simple and isn’t. I’m fascinated by the idea of studying it–I think because it never crossed my mind that someone could.

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