Dear Prince Harry, Please do something foolish again

I have a confession to make. In the last few months I've started to grow bored of the British Royal Family. For someone whose all consuming purpose in life (aside from eating and tending to my family) is to write commentary about royalty this is bad news. It is a new year and I have yet to get riled up enough to blog. I've been relegated to writing about how I am uninspired to write about royalty. What will the rest of 2014 be like?



It's off to a bad start. Recently Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge celebrated her 1,000th day as a member of the royal family. First of all, I find this number reassuring. It gives me proof that there are other people just as bored as I am. So bored they sat down and calculated how many days Catherine has been royal. It is also proof at how inane royal news has become. And it allows me to date-stamp the moment when royal news all started to go downhill.

You will find people who disagree with that statement. After all, isn't Catherine the best thing that has ever happened to the royal family in all the years of its existence? Isn't it wonderful that she is perfection personified that she has never, ever put a foot wrong? Catherine walks on water and everything she does turns to gold...


*Yawn*


I love writing critical commentary about this but right now I'm so bored I can't rouse myself to do so. I've run out of steam. Not enough to flounce skirts, gather up all my toys and melodramatically bid farewell in a blog post (sorry). But every time I read my twitter newsfeed, it slowly gets there. There's nothing controversial to write commentary about. Nothing new. No scandals to put into perspective. No sanctimonious denouncements about invading Kate's privacy by the very people who contribute to the problem. No royals getting naked or going on multiple exotic vacations. Even Prince Andrew (AKA Air Miles Andy) seems to be economizing. I used to follow various Kate fashion bloggers until my timeline was monopolized by a minute discussion about the actual color of Kate's shoes during her tour of Canada. Until that point I was completely indifferent. And this is why I'm date-stamping the downward spiral of royal news at April 29, 2011.


Before that date the coverage of Kate was much more interesting. Call it the thrill of the chase, the suspense, will they/won't they get married. The dynamic was different. The ridiculous stories were much more entertaining. Sure there was interest in outfits Kate wore, but it wasn't as obsessive as it is now. Now Kate has been relegated to a beautiful clothes horse and she seems happy to oblige. Great news for Kate fashion bloggers, but not so much for people looking for signs of substance behind it.


2013 was definitely a good year for royal news. The 60th anniversary of the coronation kept my Twitter feed dotted with tweets from grumpy republicans and smug monarchists responding to it. Surely there has to be a middle ground? Then there was Kate's pregnancy. Coverage that bordered on the ridiculous a majority of the time. But now that Kate has given birth to Prince George/Savior of the monarchy and he has been duly christened. Now what? Prince Charles shaking things up by merging PR offices. William, Harry and Catherine 'branding' themselves. Beatrice and Eugenie getting jobs. Lady Louise's successful eye surgery. William and Harry giving up playing with helicopters. Heck the most interesting "news story" is not about the royals, but about the outfit a transvestite wore to receive an honor from Prince Charles. Is this what we have to tide us over until Kate gets pregnant again or one of the royals dies?



I swear, where is a undercover reporter posing as a fake sheikh when you need one?



© Marilyn Braun 2014



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