Diamond Jubilee

My favourite Jubilistic word is Jubilymipics.  I learned it from my wife.  She watches a show called Twenty Twelve which is a satire on the organizing of the 2012 Olympics in London. Although, based on watching the news, the real Olympic organizers might be parodies of themselves.  So in the midst of the previously blogged Shakespeare event, the Diamond Jubilee happened.  We would have had a spectacular view of the Thames flotilla had the landlord not sold the flat we were lettting.  We were booted out 5 days before it. 

Fortunately, the residents association had booked a boat trip along the Jubilee route 10 days beforehand.  It was cool.  We left from the pier built while we at the compound and headed off to the starting point near Putney Bridge.  Then we rode to Tower Bridge and came back.  

The actual flotilla happened on the same day that we saw Hamlet.  After the performance, we waded through the riverside crowds on the south bank until we got to the Blackfriars Bridge, or more accurately, down the road a bit from it.  We couldn't see the river but we could see a giant TV that was on the bridge.  Well, mostly… sometimes a tall person or someone with a child on his shoulders blocked our view.  We waited there for the Queen to pass.  I had this expectation that we would hear cheering or something that would indicate she was passing.  Nope.  Best I can figure, she may have been going under the bridge at around the time when I saw a bunch people on the bridge running the width of it from west to east.  At some point 10 minutes later, someone standing just behind me shouted that he could see the royal barge.  Barring hallucinogens, basic optics says he most definitely did not.  He seemed pretty convinced as he described what he saw again and again.  His mates seemed pretty happy for him.  I have decided that I am happy for him too.