Royal mating rituals

Up, and to the Star to talk of cabbages and kings (and, perennially, women) with Tonic.

Apparently a man is going to marry a woman later this week and the landlord has been perhaps a little exuberant in his anticipation of a right royal knees-up.

We spent some time wondering whether the mural depicted Tudor courtly courtship rites from a time when the concept of romantic love was in its infancy.

Then our conversation changed to other subjects. It was only towards the end of the evening that the royal sword drooped and the earthy prince's sword arm fell off at the elbow.

We spent a moment contemplating the relevance of this metaphor to the scenario that sprang unbidden to our lips.

The pause was brief and we continued to wet our lips with further gulps of an excellent Bass served from the jug. "I'm tasting old leather and marigold (gloves)...".


From the above, you might detect Republican sympathies in me, or at least the antipathy of the divorced to saccharine wedding Schmalz; I admit I cannot raise much enthusiasm for either an elected President or the State's need to ensure an 'heir and a spare' engendered by a system of hereditary succession, which in the former case might well be considered a back-handed compliment to our present Sovereign.



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On viewing but failing to blip the International Space Station in its eastwards passage across the sky, which I observed as I walked to the pub:


En-route to the Star
Brightest star glides overhead
Soon extinguished