Unfortunately, Boggarts Don't Exist

"In this post, I promise that there shall be no mention of the royals, even though they were at Balmoral this week, where William and Kate attended a service and Prince Philip met Prince George for the first time and probably taught him how to swear (Philip taught George, not the other way around)!
But no. Not a word."

This was the beginning of what was meant to be this week's post. I typed that out on Monday or Tuesday. Trust the royals to make me go back on my word.

William and Kate have been granted a new conjugal coat of arms, which basically means that their individual coats of arms have been combined to signify marriage, two years and one child after their wedding. That is a picture, and if anyone is interested, the Daily Mail has broken it down and analysed it. Link.

I don't have anything to say. I don't understand why coats of arms are needed. I looks good though. Maybe Prince William can make it the lock-screen background of his iPhone. I wonder if he's upgraded it to iOS 7 yet.

Which brings me to the topic of today's post, but before that, Prince George's christening, October 23. Keep your day open. I'll be tweeting about it most of the time, so you can follow me @JustAsSaneAsMe.

Right. iOS 7. I don't like it. It's stupid, and childish, and everything is different, but for some reason, people love it. Everyone who I see who has an iPhone has iOS 7. But I can't stand it. And I know why that is.

Because it has changed.

Of all the things in the world that annoy me, and a lot of things do annoy me, change annoys me the most. I absolutely detest it. When something changes, whether for the better or for the worse, I either refuse to accept it or go off into a huge tirade. I don't know why that is. Here is a longer list of things that annoy me:
1. Change.
2. Crowds.
3. Falling sick.
4. Slow learners, like that girl in my French class who just cannot, cannot say 'Je m'appelle' but who probably won't take offence at this post because she doesn't know my name or that I exist, let alone that I have a blog in which I call her annoying.
5. My brother.

I've been reading Insurgent lately, where fear landscapes play an important role, and it made me think about how much importance fictional characters give to fear, and overcoming it (Another prominent example being Harry Potter and Boggarts). People in real life don't have many fears, and if they do, they aren't often faced with them. I don't know what my greatest fear is; death, probably. But a lot of people get annoyed by things, and they come into contact with these annoying things quite often. And sometimes it can be worse to find something annoying than to find it scary, especially if the thing in question is a person. It would be a lot less rude to tell a person that you find them frightening than to tell them that you think that they're annoying.

Boggarts need to evolve so that they take the form of the thing that annoys a person the most, rather than the thing that frightens them. And there shouldn't be a spell; the only way to get rid of this Boggart should be by sitting through a pre-determined amount of time of that girl trying and failing to say 'Je m'appelle' over and over again., until it doesn't annoy you anymore. Or until you shoot the Boggart out of frustration.

Unfortunately, Boggarts don't exist.

I'm just going to make that the post title and stop writing. The word Boggart has lost all meaning to me.

N

There Has Been A Royal Wedding!

Prince Felix and Claire Lademacher have literally just gotten married.

I haven't seen anything of William and Kate lately, so I actually had a post planned for this week that wasn't about royalty in any way. But then Luxembourg decided to have a royal wedding, so that plan was put off indefinitely.
I knew Prince Felix was going to get married. I knew it last year, when he got engaged. I mentioned the fact that he got engaged somewhere on my blog. I just didn't know that he was getting married today.

Civil Wedding

Kissing at the civil wedding

Religious Wedding

Kissing at the religious wedding

The dress

The bride, of course, wore Elie Saab, which is no surprise seeing as Elie Saab is to the Grand Ducal Family as Alexander McQueen is to the Duchess of Cambridge. Their favourite, if you don't get that royal analogy.

So, Claire Lademacher is now Princess Claire of Luxembourg (not to be confused with Princess Claire of Belgium as Google did when I was looking for wedding pictures), and Prince Felix is no longer an eligible Prince, so strike him off your list, girls, and keep a close eye on Harry.

I will too.

N

Dungbombs rule.

A quick round-up of royal news before I get to what this post is actually about.

This Thursday, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge attended the Tusk Conservation Awards, but before doing that Prince William quit his job!

That's right. He resigned from the Armed Forces to become a full-time royal, which means that he will be undertaking more duties on behalf of Her Majesty The Queen, making more appearances at public events and becoming the patron of more charities. He'll also be able to spend more time looking after Prince George, so that Kate can go out to undertake duties on behalf of Her Majesty The Queen, and so on and so forth.
This will be interesting to watch, because Prince William has often been accused of being a 'lazy' royal, because he doesn't carry out as many engagements as, say, the Countess of Wessex, even though he's closer to the Crown and not all that much younger than Sophie.

After ceasing to be a part of the RAF, Prince William went to the Tusk Conservation Awards with his wife, Princess William (more commonly called Duchess Catherine or just Kate), their first evening away from Baby George. She wore this sparkly thing.

Now there is nothing wrong with this dress. It's pretty, and it probably cost more than my car, so that's fine. But I've always preferred day time Kate to red carpet Kate, and even of her red carpet appearances, this isn't my favourite. Show off how much baby weight you've lost, Kate!
Oh, and she wore those Jimmy Choo's. How I detest those Jimmy Choo's.

This week Prince William mentioned that fact that he owns an iPhone twice. Once to say that he listens to the sound of crickets on his iPhone to relax, and again when he asked to be excused for constantly checking his iPhone for updates on how Prince George was doing (He didn't say iPhone at the second instance, but we all know). I always assumed that the royals, at least the more modern ones, owned phones, but to the best of my knowledge they've never admitted to it. William mentioning it twice makes me wonder if it has been newly acquired and he can't help but show it off. ("Oh, yes, I just had a son, and someday he's going to be the ruler of sixteen nations, but did you hear? I bought an iPhone.")(That's not what Prince William sounds like)(I wouldn't know, I've never met Prince William)

Also, finally, Prince Harry turns 29 tomorrow, so tweet at him wishing him a happy birthday!
I wish Prince Harry had a Twitter.

In really big news this week, Warner Brothers has announced a movie adaptation of the Harry Potter spin-off 'Fantastic Beasts &Where To Find Them'. J. K. Rowling is going to make her screen-writing debut with this movie, and Harry Potter fans are going to line up for tickets weeks in advance because it's been SO long since anything new has come out and they're beginning to suffer from withdrawal symptoms.

I've read the book. I bought it at the height of my Harry Potter obsession, and read it from cover to cover. And I can list at least three flaws in this endeavour to make it a movie.

1. Fantastic Beasts has no story. I saw the One Direction movie this week with my friends, and that had no story either. It was just a glorified advertisement for the band and their concerts. And even though I do like One Direction themselves (No judging!), I wouldn't advise people to watch the movie. The opposite, in fact. And that's what is going to happen with Fantastic Beasts. It's going to make money by playing on people's fancies, and then just not be very good.

2. The best part about Fantastic Beasts is Harry and Ron's little notes in the corner of every page (including 'Glumbumble' and a picture of a troll captioned 'My name is Gregory Goyle and I smell'). And Dan and Rupert aren't coming back for this, so I don't know how they're going to do that. Even if they did come back, I don't know how they would have done that.

3. Harry Potter fans will be disappointed if it doesn't live up to their expectations. I know I will. The books got progressively better, and so did the movies, but there is no way that this will trump Deathly Hallows : Part 2. And I've already been disappointed enough (I'm looking at you, Casual Vacancy).

I think I'll just watch it when it comes on TV.

UPDATE : As I'm typing this, my Twitter feed is filling up with news about Princes William and Harry and thirty year old Pippa Middleton at some society wedding, but I can't find any pictures yet, so I'll cover it next week.

N

Baby Tiaras

On Tuesday morning, I woke up with a splitting toothache. I made a mental note to visit the dentist the next day because I was sort of busy on Tuesday, with college and exams, but mostly because I really hate dentists. My tooth hurt like the devil, but I ignored it all day, wanting to stay as far away from the dentist for as long as possible. The next morning I woke up and had my breakfast, and it wasn't until I was eating my third slice of toast that I realised that I no longer had a toothache. Just to make sure, I banged at it with the end of my brush to check for any pain, and when there wasn't, I just went about my day as usual. That tooth hasn't bothered me since.

Let that be a lesson to everyone. Don't go to a dentist unless it's absolutely necessary, and even then put it off for as long as you can. No good can ever come out of visiting a dentist.

~

Now the big news this week, obviously, is that Princess Madeleine of Sweden, who you may remember from my post about her wedding not three months ago, is pregnant with her first child with her title-less husband, Chris O'Neill.

That was quick.

This possibly untitled baby is going to be born in the March of 2014, and I am going to have a quick roundup of all the royal babies born or conceived in this year so far.

Sacha Casiraghi (21st March, 2013)

Pictured here with his mother, Tatiana Santo Domingo. Sacha's father, Andrea Casiraghi, will be the ruler of Monaco if Prince Albert dies without a legitimate heir, but because Sacha was born illegitimately as well, I'm not sure whether he will ever be able to rule. Nevertheless, he is a royal baby, which is more than can be said about the thousands of babies born every.... hour? Minute? Second?

Baby Tindall (Due January 2014)

This is one baby that will definitely be untitled, and definitely not be King, but will have Queen Elizabeth as his/her great-grandmother anyway. Good luck, kid. 

I also, for some strange reason, hope that this child is a boy and is named Augustus. I don't know why I wish that way, but if you read about Gus Tindall in the papers a few months from now, remember; you heard it here first.

Prince George (22nd July, 2013)

I've written enough about this baby as is. I'll leave him alone for now.

Baby Elmaleh (Due Late 2013)

Like Queen Elizabeth with great-grandchildren, this baby will be Princess Caroline's second grandchild born this year. Unlike her brother, Charlotte Casiraghi intends to get married to her fiance, French actor Gad Elmaleh, before thier child is born, in the autumn, so there's a royal wedding to look forward to. Sort of. 

Maud Elizabeth Daphne Marina (15th August, 2013)

I'm not sure what this child's surname is, because her grandparents are the Prince and Princess of Kent, so they don't have a surname, but their rank in the royal family isn't high enough to warrant their granddaughter a title. Her parents are Lord and Lady Frederick Windsor, but there isn't a Windsor in sight in her name, so I'm not sure at all. That's the thing with babies. It's hard to be sure with them.

Baby O'Neill/Prince(ss) of Sweden (Due March 2014)

I'm just amazed at how quickly these two decided to have children. It took Kate and William two years after getting married, and their child would be directly in line to the throne. This baby very possibly won't even have a title. But if he/she is anything like his/her cousin Estelle, this is going to be fun.

A girl would be best, in my opinion. I mean, someone needs to continue to wear Madeleine's tiaras (Imagine that. A baby sized Modern Fringe) after she can't any longer.

~

Last week, I asked you to give my vote for the GGBI and Poltimore Tiaras a thumb-up. Unfortunately, Order of Splendor went on vacation before it announced the two tiaras that had been added to the Readers' Ultimate Choice, so I don't know whether my choices won. Thank you anyway, if you voted for me. 

Yesterday was Pippa Middleton's birthday, and she turned 30. By the time her sister was that age, she had gotten married in the wedding of the decade and was carrying the future King of England. Congratulations Pippa!

Also, next week the Duchess of Cambridge is going to be making another appearance without Prince George, at the Tusk Conservation Awards, so I will be commenting on that. If I don't forget, that is.

N

Your Shoelace Is Untied

In my last post, I wrote about my desire to see the Duchess of Cambridge appear in public sans Prince George. Two weeks have passed since then (I really should not forget to put something onto my blog when Saturday rolls around), but the Duchess has complied. And not just once. Twice!

Here she is out shopping, looking prettier than someone should when they're buying groceries.

And here she is at the start of the Anglesey ultra-marathon with William, who is just having the best time with that bell. She's been wearing jeans all week, which is quite unlike her, but good in a way. Makes her seem more common. Like someday we could all be like good ol' Kate Cambridge.

Hmm. Maybe not.

Sometimes I wonder whether it's wrong of the press, and of the people who go on to read their articles, and of the multiple website that talk about her (mine included) to encroach upon Kate's privacy like so, but then I remember that she spent over £7000 on this dress that she wore only once, probably without batting an eyelid, and I just go back to looking at every picture of her that I can find.

~

There were two basic skills that I did not learn as a child and that I haven't completely grasped yet. One of them is telling the time on a clock that isn't digital. The other is tying shoelaces. And as a result of that, oftentimes my shoelaces are terribly tied, and come undone as I walk. Now, every morning for the last two months I have been walking the kilometer from the train station to my college campus, and on that walk my shoelaces invariably get untied. I don't ever stop to tie them, partially because I know they won't stay tied, but mostly because if I stopped, and bent down, I'd hold up the people behind me, and they'd all get irritated. And trust me, you do not want to further irritate people who have spent an hour on a crowded train on a Monday morning. No. So I end up just walking without tying my shoelaces, and to compromise for my lack of shoelace tying skills, I have learned to walk without tripping, so it doesn't bother me one bit. What does bother me is every person who I pass stopping me to tell me "Your shoelace is untied".

It's a good sentiment, I know, and I should probably be grateful that they tried to avert the possible event of my tripping and falling on my face, but for some reason, it really annoys me. I know that my shoelace is untied, random stranger, because I am not daft, and because the person who passed me not two seconds ago told me the same thing. But I can't say that to a person. That's incredibly rude. Also, time-consuming, which is my bigger concern. It's a lot quicker to just nod and walk on, shoelace still undone.

If this was a good story, it would have a moral like 'Strangers can be helpful too', or 'If you can't tie your shoelaces, you should probably go with Velcro.' But this isn't a good story, so there isn't a moral. Deal with it.

~

You know how at the end of a YouTube video, the person who made the video asks you to give it a thumb-up if you liked it? Well, I'm not going to do that about my blog, because I don't know if you can like a blog post, but I am going to ask you to go over to Order of Splendor, where I have voted for the Girls of Great Britain and Ireland and Poltimore Tiaras as the two ultimate diamond tiaras in the comments of the last post (here's a link), and if you agree with me or just like me, somehow, give that a thumb up. I write under the username 'N', but I also leave a link to my blog, so if you load all the comments and ctrl+f for 'blood' or 'sweat' you should find it (Searching for 'tiaras' would be absolutely redundant. Don't do that). And if you thumb it up, I promise I will leave you alone for an entire week.

Found A Penny, Lost A Pound

This is a link to a video. If you watch it at about the thirty second mark, and listen to the way he says 'Dungeons and Dragons!', you'll have a pretty good idea how I said the next sentence when I first found out.

The Duchess of Cambridge is making a public appearance!

Now, I can't say I haven't seen Kate for months, because that isn't true, but what I can say is that it's been a very. very long time since I've seen her without baby George stuck to her like glue.

And, while I'm speaking about this, that is Prince George's first official picture. It was taken by his grandfather, the one who isn't royalty, and the only thing anyone can talk about is that the picture isn't very good quality. Well, critics, I just have one thing to say : No one cares. The people who are going to be looking at these pictures aren't professional photographers. They don't care that the lighting is bad, or that Michael Middleton doesn't know how to use photoshop. All they're going to be extremely chuffed to see a picture of their future king. Or England's future king, anyway.

This picture comes right after Prince William gave his first interview post-George, in which he says a lot of... things about his son. Watch the interview on YouTube (And if you're feeling particularly nuts, you can read what Suri has to say about him. She now writes about George under the tag 'hrh prince george of cambridge'). All through the interview, he calls Kate Catherine, which I find a bit weird. Is he doing it because she's really Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and he feels that people should call her by her given name and is trying to set an example? Because that's rubbish. Everyone calls her Kate, and they aren't going to change because Prince William subtly hints at it. He could just as well have called her 'Poppet', like he did outside the hospital.

But I'm going to veer away from the royal family for a paragraph or so. You'll notice that although this post is dated August 17th, which was a Saturday, it wasn't actually written then. That's fairly obvious because the official pictures of Prince George weren't released until Monday, August 19th, two days after the post was allegedly written. And that's because, ever since I discovered things like YouTube, and tumblr, I've been spending almost all my time there, and very little time reading and writing. And I'm worried that I've started to dislike it, to think of it as a chore. And while the Internet is all very fun and occasionally educational, it's nothing on books and paper. It's like finding a penny and losing a pound.

And now that I've got my title reference in there, I'll stop writing on Tuesday.

Oh. I could have pretended to have traveled forward in time, got the pictures from Monday and posted them on Saturday. I didn't think of that before just now, and I'm not even sure that's accurate as far as time-travel goes. Picture:

N

One Line

Post royal baby, I'm beginning to realise just what a boring life I lead.