Trooping the Colour

Thank you for the reminder. I've been gardening and would have missed it.

I don't usually watch this and expected to see Saturday Kitchen but it does all look rather splendid in the sunshine. Anyone know what the blue fluffy things are on the horses' headbands?

I’ve never seen it live but always try and watch if I can. Back when DS was in junior school and DH working at the MOD in a “shop window” appointment, he was given four tickets by his boss for seats in one of the stands. DD was very small then and I knew she wouldn’t last through it, so we stayed at home and DH took DS and a friend from school. They had a wonderful time and talked about it for ages afterwards.

The drill has changed a lot over the years, but is never less than impressive, especially the wheel movement that the massed bands do, for which there are no instructions -it’s just sort of “handed down” and, apparently, if you are a young bandsman in the middle of it, it can be very scary indeed!

Every single uniform there is a bit of a pantomime, but it all looks great in the sunshine.
I bet they are all looking forward to a Saturday afternoon in the garden after a nice lunch.
Would love to be a fly on the wall.

I caught a glimpse of Keir Starmer and his wife looking tense and exposed. I feel sorry for him. He must really be feeling the burden of responsibility with all the defence debate going on.

All the horses are given a carrot 🥕 at the end, I hear.

I remember many years ago (about 50 !) my mother and I were shopping in London. Suddenly there was a great surge of people and we decided to follow them out of curiosity. We ended up at a rehearsal of this event. Lovely and totally free!
Today I am having a lazy day. Having watched this event this morning I intend to watch tennis from Queens this afternoon. I will go grocery shopping this evening though.

That was an unexpected treat Greenfinch.
I was once standing on the pavement outside Chester town hall and realised that the couple on my right were the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester. They were young, the Duchess had recently had their first child. They had attended a function in the town hall and were waiting for their car to pick them up. No obvious security then.