Lady of the manners
Dear Hettie
I can tell you one thing about this barge to celebrate the Queen's diamond jubilee: thrones or no thrones, golden canopy or not, it's going to be bloody awful. One might as well celebrate the occasion aboard a cross-Channel ferry. I'm a Navy man; this tub is an embarrassment. Plus, it's going to be frightfully dull chugging about in it for hours. How to get through it without throwing oneself overboard?
Yours, HRH Prince Philip*
After all the horrors you've been forced to endure over the years - your ears bleeding while tone-deaf school children sing songs about sunshine and raindrops; that ache as your brain starts to melt during yet another interminable amateur dance performance - I'd have thought that floating about on a Pimp My Ride-style barge with nothing to do but admire the view would seem like a jolly holiday. If it's boredom you're worried about then do what the rest of us do on long journeys - play games. There's nothing like a round of Eye-Spy or Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? to pass the time. Plus, they'd be easy to play while you're waving at the crowds so I'm sure the Queen wouldn't mind joining in. And to really give yourself a boost, insist that you be decked out in the full crown and robe regalia. Beneath those generous folds of velvet and ermine you can secrete all sorts of treats: gin and tonics, travel sweets, mini-Connect Four - really, the sky's the limit.
*Prince Philip's quandary as imagined by ES
