If the royal family were to be outed tomorrow, for whatever reason, what would their last names be?

As of 1917, it seems to be Mountbatten-Windsor, which is pretty much made up any way.  Technically, any of them can chose whatever last name they want.  King George V created the name in the first place.

http://www.royal.gov.uk/ThecurrentRoyalFamily/TheRoyalFamilyname/Overview.aspx

hearing the talk about Queen Elizabeth being in Canada and then speaking at the United Nations made me remember the time I saw the Queen.  In May of 2007, Keren was spending a semester in Italy, so the whole family decided to take a trip over to see her.  While I was over there, I was fortunate enough for work to foot the bill for me to stay in London for a few days and meet everyone I work with on a daily basis.  While I was there, my friend Penny took me to see Equus, staring Daniel Radcliffe, of Harry Potter fame (yes, I saw him naked).  Anyway, on our walk home at night, past the London Eye, we hear all these sirens behind us, and then a cop (bobby?) on a motorcycle pulls up and blocks the intersection we were walking past.  I was a little scared, but we kept walking, and then saw some more bike cops roll on by, finally followed by an old style brown car, in which i could easily make out the Queen.  They just zipped right on by.  Penny was shocked.  I think she had never even seen the Queen.  I fumbled for my camera, but it was too late to snap even a blurry pic.  I’ll see if I can get Penny to back me up on this claim.

This post is classified under "memories" for those facebook readers that don’t see categories.  I wanted to write down my memory of the day I found out my brother had passed.  Mom – be warned.

Caleb and I slept in what would be called "Uncle Jay’s" room together when we lived at my Grandma’s house.  He slept in the queen bed and I slept on the cot right next to it.  I remember that when I woke up, I used to wake Caleb up, talking to him, or checking to see if he was awake.  I got in trouble once or twice for it.  I don’t remember what day of the week it was, but I remember waking up, and going downstairs, thinking not to wake up Caleb.  As I sat and watched TV at the table and ate breakfast, my mom went upstairs to get Caleb.  Moments later, My mom was yelling, "Mom!"  I saw her carry Caleb down into the living room and put him down on the couch.  A large EMT lady showed up with ambulance a while later.  I’m 8.  I don’t remember any other siblings being home but me.  I remember my dad coming to the back door and telling me to get Pap-pap.  I think there was a little bit of tension with letting my dad into the house, but ultimately, he ended up to being able to come into the kitchen at least.  That’s where I remember holding a 2×3 photo of Caleb and crying in the arms of my dad, saying things like, "Caleb is gone", but I can also remember not really understanding what that meant.  I just felt like that is what I should be doing, as if I was just doing it because that’s what they do on TV or something.

It was Friday, January 26th, 1990.  Caleb was turning 10 on February 9th.  I assume we had the funeral shortly after.  I remember school at Bentleyville Wesleyan was canceled for the funeral.  I saw a lot of people at the funeral.  I remember Uncle Kenny playing a song he wrote and leaving a casette tape in Caleb’s casket.  I want to say I even put in one of his wood cars.  The weird memory is that I remember Jim Henson dying around the same time, and images of all the Sesame street characters showing up at his funeral, and thinking about those same characters showing up at Caleb’s.  Jim Henson didn’t die until May 16th, but I guess the memories were still fresh enough in my head to make that imprint, or it’s been so long that they just seem to overlap.  I remember Jesse and Uncle Tom coming up.  Honestly, I’ve had quite a few funerals, most at the same exact place, so a lot of the memories I have in my head right now, are bluring together, so I’ll stick to the ones I’m sure of…at least, as sure as my memory let’s me believe.

So, I’m pulling out of Giant Eagle Market District in Shady Side, making a left onto Centre Avenue.  A black prius is turning into the lot, and stops to let me get out onto the road first.  A guy is loading groceries into his car across the street and there is an asian woman standing next to him.  A mini van down far to the right, so my path is clear.  I accelerate, probably to 5 mph tops, and WHOA that asian chick is right in front of me.  she puts her hand on the front of my truck and moves to her left to the side of my truck.  She’s out of it.  I didn’t see her at all.  I roll down my window and ask her if she’s alright, and she just has a weird look on her face.  The dude loading his groceries starts to panic like a drama queen.  He’s saying things like, "Jesus Christ!, OH MY GOD, etc"  never really seeming to direct the comments to me, my driving, the asian woman, her jay walking, but rather just in awe of the situation in general.  I repeatedly asked the woman if she was alright through the passenger window, and she says, "yes, fine:" and nods and starts to walk towards the grocery store.  The drama queen puts his arm around her for a second.  There’s nothing more I can do.  She’s obviously startled, too foreign to communicate, or both.  I drive off accepting her "yes, fine." as closure.  should I have done more?

Most ridiculous British laws:

10. In the city of York it is legal to murder a Scotsman within the ancient city walls, but only if he is carrying a bow and arrow

9. It is illegal to enter the Houses of Parliament in a suit of armour

 8. It is illegal to avoid telling the tax man anything you do not want him to know, but legal not to tell him information you do not mind him knowing

 7. The head of any dead whale found on the British coast automatically becomes the property of the king, and the tail of the queen

6. A pregnant woman can legally relieve herself anywhere she wants, including in a policeman’s helmet

5. In Scotland, if someone knocks on your door and requires the use of your toilet, you must let them enter

4. Mince pies cannot be eaten on Christmas Day

3. In Liverpool, it is illegal for a woman to be topless except as a clerk in a tropical fish store

2. It is an act of treason to place a postage stamp bearing the British monarch upside-down

1. It is illegal to die in the Houses of Parliament

Courtesy of Yahoo/AP

well, its been a while.  i was supposed to go to PSU this past weekend and help serah move her crap back home, but I ended up not going, and my mom and J’aime went out friday night and came back early saturday morning.  fun fun.  I regret not going though.  Since i was home, i was working on the dragon game, and ended up causing a terrible thing to happen.  Long story short, we had to roll the game back to 2 weeks prior.  we had nearly 1000 accounts friday.  After the restore, we stood at 577.  So i promoted quite a few players to help out, and we set out to restore all accounts that sent in what their stats were before the crash.  So that is what i spent MY ENTIRE WEEKEND doing.  i didnt go to sleep until saturday morning for like 4 hours.  then a little bit later on.  I was so dead without the help of those that dedicated their time to bringing everything back up to date.  the game sits aboce 800 accounts now.

I start at mellon Monday, day shift.  I will be working twice as much as i am used to, but also making twice as much.  Should be interesting.  Thanks to Barb who made it possible.  She also got me the position at cobweb, which i would be no where without.  I have never found a job on my own, or got a job from a head hunter besides pitt helpdesk.  dairy queen, iomega, cobweb, touchtown, and now mellon, i got all from networking.  Chris says he is just the opposite:)  But that’s chris.  who, by the way, has some MP3s in the download section now.

starting at mellon monday means i am not going to Yankanuck with the family though.  The only thing to do up there is fish, and i am not a big fan of fishing.  I was kind of wanting to go and take my laptop, and just writing out the deck or something.  Yankanuck is a marvelous place, i’ll be sure to try and round up some photos.

anyway, its late, i just got back from walmart buying a salt and pepper shaker and some silverware.  fare thee well.  I leave you with 2 of my favorite things joined together in harmony.  a guitar and legos.

my mind is blank. all i did the past few days was work. I saw twisted thursday, that wasnt too bad. I have been puting A LOT of work into legend of the green dragon. got about 60 people playing now. I am working with a few other developers on a castle, that should be really cool when it is done. LotGD has become one of my favorite hobbies now. The code writing is very easy, and you are just limited by your imagination.

not too much going on this weekend. havent decided what i am going to do yet. for some reason the power went out last night. I hate when my computer has to go through the disk check when you restart after a crash.

maybe i should clean my room. maybe go out with bob. maybe come home and hang out. i dunno. it’s too much trouble going home. i have to wake up at 6 am to come back with Chris if i go home. that sucks. especially because i have to go right to class from the T when i do that, i dont get to stop at the apartment at all, so i have to take all my bags and crap to class. oh well. andy kicked my arse in snake, maybe i will try to get my score back. I have pretty much given up on tetris Adrienne is the tetris Queen. and i bow down before her.

speaking of the queen, she always ends her updates with a quote or something worth while, so i am going to try and do that too:) so for today, i leave you with….[drum roll]…the etch-a-sketch guy.