A royal pain

The Royal Wedding, it appears is dividing young children directly along gender lines.

One of my friends is organising a 'Republican's Picnic' in the park to coincide with the nuptuals...(or an indoorsy one if the rain actually dares to fall on the royal parade... off with its head!) and she has invited Charlie and our local crew of mates to attend.  The idea was that the only wedding we'd have to watch would be the marriage of ants and sandwiches.

This seemed like a wonderful idea a few weeks ago, however we were absolutely not counting on the hypnotic pull that a princess and a prince getting actually, really married with a big dress and a proper coach and a parade and everything was going to have on the tiny females amongst us.

Seriously, half the Mums have pulled out of coming in the morning because their daughters are rolling on the floor and begging to be allowed to watch.  Some of them think they will be going to the wedding.  Other are forcing their reluctant Fathers to actually go into the hell of the centre of town to sit on shoulders and watch the procession go past.  One is going to a girls-and-champagne only party with her Mum leaving her Dad to come on his own.

This may not be a surprise to you out there who have daughters, but I have a son, a son who doesn't care a toot about the royal wedding; a son who only appreciates a princess dress if the girl wearing it will play trains with him.  And let him drive.

The Royal Wedding is a complete non-starter for us.  Neither the Frog or I give much of a damn and our son is oblivious.  I have Fridays off anyway so all this really means to me is that if it's sunny, the park will be that much more festive.  Now, it appears, the picnic may be delayed so that everyone can watch TV.

I'm quite tempted to walk into Brixton and see what the locals are doing - it's hard to imagine Brixton becoming MORE of a party than it already is on a bank holiday weekend but we'll see. 

I know it's curmudgeonly of me to avoid what is essentially a massive, nation-wide happy-day.  I know it may even be puzzling as to why I wouldn't want to go into the centre and experience the whole drama (including the 'Where's Charlie' drama as he dashes into the crowds...) but there you go.

Yes, it's lovely that two people are getting married but I don't actually know them even though we do live in the same town... Fancy that... and I just find it weird that people care this much about it.

Yes it's grand that English Royal Pageantry has exploded into action, but frankly the next coronation will be much more interesting - and Charlie will be older and with any luck, the next King will also be a Charlie and crucially, there will be no princess dresses involved.  That, I think, is something my little boy might just be interested in seeing. 

Or not.  Depends, I imagine, on what vehicle Charles uses to get to his new crown.