‘Spare’ by Prince Harry

KeepitLight68 that’s nice for you. I hope you enjoy reading it.

Here in the States some of us really like him and Megan. I would be curious to read what he has to say.

Someone gave me Finding Freedom -yawn , yawn , yawn ... it's self indulgent , badly written claptrap .
Let's hope that Spare is better - not that I'd buy it !

You try telling our toy poodle that Callistemon; he thinks he's both.

Well let's see. Larry versus Nova!

maddyone

Oooh, I’m very impressed by the knowledge you all have about the wife of Edward 1. But three burials? I don’t like the idea of being buried once, never three times over with all different bits of me all over the place.

Maybe you’re right Callistemon about the animals knowing. Our cats always knew when we went away because the neighbours fed them. They could be quite snooty when we returned. The cats that is, not the neighbours 😂

Cats are very much a law unto themselves and aloof, they deign to allow their presence on your lap! 🐈

Dogs think they're human
Cats know they're divine

Lathyrus

The three crosses left intact are very beautiful.

If you think they were a 13th Century publicity stunt (probably) maybe try to look on them as a triumph of the skill of the artisan.

I just love them

I agree they are beautiful, but the one in Waltham Cross, Essex (DD2 lives) is in the middle of a grottyshopping precinct!

I've just seen the funniest bit of PR using "famous" people's animals to impart some kind of message. A staged performance of Rishi, wife and dog putting money in the Remembrance poppies tin outside number 10. The trouble is their young dog wouldn't walk in a straight line, wasn't keen to sit properly and had to have treats put in its mouth every few seconds to behave. No way would it look at the cameras either!
At least The Queen's pony was impeccably behaved.

Oooh, I’m very impressed by the knowledge you all have about the wife of Edward 1. But three burials? I don’t like the idea of being buried once, never three times over with all different bits of me all over the place.

Maybe you’re right Callistemon about the animals knowing. Our cats always knew when we went away because the neighbours fed them. They could be quite snooty when we returned. The cats that is, not the neighbours 😂

The three crosses left intact are very beautiful.

If you think they were a 13th Century publicity stunt (probably) maybe try to look on them as a triumph of the skill of the artisan.

I just love them

Elegran Secondly, the logistics of flying the coffin from Edinburgh may have been better than from Aberdeen. It was a big plane to accommodate.

On TV it was a C-17.

Part to their mission is fields shorter than Aberdeen.

Lathyrus

“Didnt Edward 1st wife process through most of England after she died”.

That made me laugh 😀

Her body was brought by the most direct route to London, along such roads as there were in those days.

Perhaps you think she should have caught a Medieval train or even a 13th Century plane.

No, don’t tell me, they should have shipped her.
🙄🤣

The procession took 21 days with various stops until it reached Westminster.
Where the procession stopped Edward commissioned crosses called Eleanor Crosses.
There were also three tombs including two en route.
Most unusually, Eleanor had three burials, and so was commemorated with three tombs. To preserve her body for its slow transport to the chosen burial place in Westminster Abbey, her entrails were removed as part of the embalming process, and buried in Lincoln. Her heart – carefully carried separately from her body from Lincoln to London – was buried at the London Black Friars.

🤣

Yes I didn't phrase that very well!

Aren't the Charing Crosses all about her cortege's stopping places on the way?

I could be entirely imagining all this...

“Didnt Edward 1st wife process through most of England after she died”.

That made me laugh 😀

Her body was brought by the most direct route to London, along such roads as there were in those days.

Perhaps you think she should have caught a Medieval train or even a 13th Century plane.

No, don’t tell me, they should have shipped her.
🙄🤣

The residents of Aberdeen and all points south on the A90 don’t consider the Queen their "neighbour", that’s just not true.

Plus, the hearse would have had to drive from Balmoral to Aberdeen anyway, and once they were on their way, they might as well drive down to Edinburgh.
Balmoral to Dyce – hour and a half tops. Balmoral to Turnhouse – six-ish hours? With a stop off at Brechin Castle Services to stretch their legs.

It was a big plane to accommodate.
Dyce isn't a backwater. If it can accommodate the world's largest cargo plane, I'm sure it could accommodate whatever was needed for the flight of the Queen's casket to Edinburgh.

www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/north-sea/194683/worlds-largest-cargo-plane-delivers-helicopters-to-aberdeen/

The drive down the A90 done for ceremonial and spectacle, not for convenience.

Volver asks why the Queen's coffin was driven from Balmoral to Edinburgh, taking 6 hours by road instead of 45 minutes by air.

For one thing, the people past whom she was driven considered themselves her neighbours. Her ceremonial duties were kept to a minimum in Scotland and when she was at Balmoral she was "off duty" Many of the neighbours (and tourists too) had memories of meeting her in the hills complete with headscarf and dogs, like any other Scottish countrydweller. Once she was on the plane at Turnhouse, she had left Scotland for good. As she arrived at Northolt, someone said "She's come home" as though she had died in Timbuctoo. The funeral ceremonies and "drive-past" were to be in London and Windsor, the interral at Windsor, (nothing of note was planned for Sandringham) Had she been whipped off to Northolt at the earliest opportunity, there would have been no chance for her Scotttish neighbours to pay their respects.

Why the slow drive? Because that is the respectful speed that is customary for an occupied hearse to travel. Why the tractor guard of honour? Why not? An imaginative move by local farmers, and good for them. I don't suppose it was PR, pre-organised by the Palace specifically as a marketing ploy, it had all the trademarks of a "great wheeze" thought up by some farmer who planned to stand his kids on his tractor to get a better view and expanded that idea to include his friends.

Secondly, the logistics of flying the coffin from Edinburgh may have been better than from Aberdeen. It was a big plane to accommodate. Plus, the hearse would have had to drive from Balmoral to Aberdeen anyway, and once they were on their way, they might as well drive down to Edinburgh.

Perhaps, also, it gave the family time to get home to London themselves in time to meet the coffin on its arrival? That would take a while, even for them.

Smileless2012

They know more than we give them credit for Callistemon.

He knew although my mother wasn't living with us when she died.
It was very strange.

Smileless2012

In your opinion The whole funeral event was PR volver, not in mine.

Everything Meghan and Harry do is PR.

The funeral was a State occasion for our Head of State.

Millions of people witnessed Lincoln's funeral procession from Washington, D.C. on April 19, 1865, as his casket was transported 1,700 miles (2,700 km) through New York City to Springfield, Illinois. Lincoln was the first president to lie in state in the United States Capitol Rotunda

Remember a tiny John F Kennedy Jr saluting his father's coffin? Millions lined the routes. The funeral was modelled on that of Lincoln.

They were State funerals for Heads of State.

They know more than we give them credit for Callistemon.

she my mother, not the friend to avoid misunderstanding

maddyone

Oh that is hard Iam to see your dog upset. As I said upthread I don’t think the animals will have had any understanding about what had happened to the Queen, but they, especially the dogs, will certainly miss her.

When my mother died and we arrived home after travelling back from the funeral, we picked up our dog from a friend and he jumped into the favourite chair she used at our house. He wasn't allowed on the furniture normally. He refused to jump down but just lay there, head on paws, looking sad, for the rest of the day.
How did he know?

At great risk of needing a tinfoil hat, I think that for all the advantages Harry has had it is a very poor show to turn on your closest family in print. Every family has its issues, but IMO dirty washing should not be sold to the highest bidder.

I held no brief for Diana, I thought she came across as needy, manipulative and unhinged. I think Harry is exhibiting the same traits.

From the outset, I thought Meghan was in it for the kudos and notoriety, the fact that she is from such a dysfunctional background made alarm bells ring for me, and she has not disappointed in that regard.

I have no doubt that Prince Charles could not fill the loving, motherly, gap Diana left, but he clearly cares for his sons and his extended family, but perhaps lacked the emotional intelligence to convey that in a way Harry, in particular, needed.

William seems the most level-headed of them all and I suspect that is down to Kate being 'ordinary' and having a different perspective to that which William would have been exposed to had he married from royal breeding stock.

I do think that had Diana lived she would not be as deified as she now is, death created a person and a character which did not match reality IMO. However, I have no doubt that the rift between William and Harry would not have persisted as I think it would have broken her heart to see what is going on between them now and she would have been the peacemaker. I also think she would have advised Harry against the book.

In your opinion The whole funeral event was PR volver, not in mine.

First paragraph - Understood, thank you. It was just a general question though, everyone saying that the Netflix cameras had been tipped off to be there, but I just wondered if anyone knew whether they actually were there or not.

Secondly, (and I will get shot down in flames for this, I know 🥺) The whole funeral event was PR. The whole thing was too good an opportunity to miss. Everything the RF does in public is an opportunity too good to miss.

Choreographed "vigils" lasting 10 minutes; sad, cute ponies; 10-mile-long queues that could have been avoided with a ticketing system; six hour drives instead of 45 minute flights.

I know it's not new, didn't Edward I's wife process through most of England after she died? But it is PR. It just is 🤷🏼‍♀️.

No need to ignore it volver. If you don't understand I'm happy to explain. In response to a post of mine you quoted you asked how I knew the cameras (US tv) were there; I never said they were.

That question would have to be asked of those who made the arrangements but no doubt had the entire journey to London been made by road, passing through as many villages, towns and cities as possible, you would still have regarded the entire thing as "too good an opportunity to miss".