The day that England thrashed France

In France, it's a fact, rightly or wrongly, that few folk celebrate the Battle of Waterloo, which took place exactly two centuries ago, on 18 June 1815.

My wife and I used to drive to Waterloo often when we were living in Brussels, but it’s an uninteresting place. Funnily enough, I’ve always been intrigued by the fact that the illustrious Napoléon Bonaparte was defeated by a dull Englishman, Wellington, neither in France nor in England… but on the outskirts of the Belgian capital. That has always appeared to me as what the French call une histoire belge (a Belgian tale, which might be translated as a shaggy dog story).

Maybe we should have made an effort for the second centenary of this terrible defeat… but it’s not easy to rouse enthusiasm for this affair. Besides, France has always had an excellent reason for celebrating a quite different event: the BBC radio speech of Charles de Gaulle on June 18, 1940.

Be that as it may, the French newspaper Le Monde has just reacted to this anniversary by the publication of a moving English-language editorial addressed to our British neighbors:

http://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2015/06/18/britain-beware-brexit-could-be-your-waterloo_4657095_3232.html

Registration of a birth in England

Having examined countless BMD records [births, marriages and deaths] in the context of my personal genealogical research, I was delighted to come upon this copy of a quite ordinary birth record, bearing today’s date.

Click to enlarge

The informant was the child’s father, who signed the registration simply by means of his given name: William. He and the baby’s mother, Catherine Middleton, have unusual occupations. The father apparently earns his living as a prince of the United Kingdom. And the mother works in the same kind of job, as a princess of the United Kingdom. As the saying goes, it takes all sorts to make a world. As for the offspring, a girl, she was born 3 days ago in a Westminster hospital. I always feel a little sorry for babies born in the middle of big cities. But I realize they're capable of growing up just as happily as us country kids.

They sound like a nice little family. The only thing that upsets me a little is the terribly complicated name they’ve given to the baby, composed of no less than 9 terms: Her Royal Highness Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana of Cambridge. What I mean to say is that I know a couple who simply named their little female baby Zoé. I reckon they would have been happy with the single letter Z... except that the registry office wouldn't have agreed. But everybody, of course, has different attitudes towards inventing names for babies.

There’s another minor detail, of a puzzling nature. I’m incapable of fathoming out the family’s simple surname. Concerning the mother, there’s no problem: she was a Middleton. On the other hand, the father’s surname is hard to define. But that’s neither here nor there. I may have already said that it takes all kinds to make a world.

Britain being Islamized outrageously?

Poor Stacey Dooley! Poor Luton! I feel sorry for the people and the nation I once knew.

If Brits were to think of themselves as tolerant promoters of liberty, equality and fraternity (which they may or may not, I don't know), then I would say that they're getting screwed. Maybe it's too late to do anything about it. It would appear at times that they're already well and truly screwed. Meanwhile, praise the Royals, and celebrate the birth of George...

Remember the 10

Thinking of Bobby Sands. And of his comrades Francis Hughes, Ray McCreesh, Patsy O'Hara, Joe McDonnell, Martin Hurson, Kevin Lynch, Kieran Doherty, Thomas McElwee and Mickey Devine. All invited to die, in 1981, by a woman with iron in her soul: Margaret Thatcher.

Thinking of the former Yorkshire miners, too. And of the sacrificed British working class of the 1970s in general.

The Wizard of Oz was probably the first movie I ever saw, and it impressed me immensely.

These days, we've been seeing a lot of the late prime minister on French TV, and I'm somewhat surprised to realize that her bizarre vocal accent and robotic personality nauseate me.

Birdwatcher-in-chief

Over time, I've got around to considering that a passionate birdwatcher cannot possibly be an entirely bad person. So, the appointment of Andrew Parker as the new head of M15 (the United Kingdom's domestic security service) is no doubt good news for law-abiding Brits.

                                          — photo AFP/Getty Images

Am I alone in finding that Parker's facial features remind me of Dilbert? I know it's a mistake to judge a spook by his external appearance (which might have been manipulated deliberately, to mislead evil observers), but I can't help wondering whether his thick glasses, no doubt indicating a case of myopia, are an ideal device for spotting sleazy individuals and other varieties of exotic birds. In any case, if only I knew his personal address, I would happily share with the birdwatcher-in-chief my recent experience involving an encounter with a splendid big-beaked Hawfinch specimen [display]. But I hasten to add, to remove all possible insinuations, that I have no reasons to suspect that the bird in question, during its brief stay at Gamone, was entailed in anti-British activities of any kind whatsoever. One never knows, however. And I prefer to leave this question up to a specialist such as Parker.

PS Apparently the name of the fellow in question is indeed Andrew Parker, even though a certain British newspaper pointed out that it had been asked not to supply readers with the name of the new head of M15.

British trick

There are rumors that Her Majesty's Guards are recruiting certain exceptional sportsmen with the aim of putting together a top-level basketball team, in the hope of challenging the USA.

Meanwhile, the Coldstream Guards hit upon the diabolical scheme of using one of their top basketball-players (whose identity cannot be determined, since his eyes are hidden behind the rim of his busby) in order to humiliate an unpopular foreign visitor—the perfectly normal president François Hollande—by making him look like a dwarf.

Back in the good old days when Nicolas Sarkozy was president, his buddy David Cameron didn't need to use this kind of nasty trick.