Trooping the Colour aka why I'm not suited to royal life

[MrsLeonFarrell]

I wee. A lot. Particularly if I think i can't get to a toilet because, say, I'm stuck on a parade ground.

I get hot. Very hot. Even in a thin linen dress can't imagine how I'd cope with a coat dress and hat in full sun.

I get travel sick. Those carriages look like they sway a lot.

I have an inappropriate sense of humour. Lip readers would have a field day.

What about you? Would you sail through a major royal event or would you be like me, an unfortunate tabloid headline in the making?

Couldn't do it. Couldn't wear 1980s catalogue style clothes. Couldn't do the clutch at the crotch thing. And would find the show up and smile events tedious and pointless. Not sure tye privilege would make up for the mind numbing boredom.

Oh and trooping of the colours? I would probably keel over

I actually thought he looked a bit slower and frailer yesterday. Of course it was pretty warm yesterday, so that might have made him feel a bit tired.

I don’t think most people in the UK outside avid royalists and the families of people involved, do consider it to be a major event though? It’s just something you see at the end of the news.

I’ve certainly never seen it on TV and the only one I remember was when QE2 had blanks fired at her.

Catherine has more class.

I thought this kind of thing was primarily important for the people being ‘trooped’.

I think the level of interest would be the same whether done by a King or a President, but I imagine that these formal military occasions will always happen.

trooping of the colours

Though if you were attending the event you would presumably call it by the correct name ...

I am similar to you ,
My inappropriate sense of humour would let me down too alongside my extremely low boredom threshold.

Oh dear. I added an s. You have just nailed why I could never make it as a royal. Apart from from everything I said earlier everything I say, do, write being picked apart by mumsnet, dailymail and others.
And the need to switch off my brain and only parrot and do what courtiers and dailymail want me to. No. Def wouldn't make it ( not that I would ever qualify or be considered given my background)

I wouldn't expect these annual events to draw the same crowd as a funeral or Coronation. It seemed much the same as usual.

Not quite.

It's 'Trooping the Colour' (not of, or colours). The colour is trooped through the ranks of soldiers, historically so that they can recognise it in battle.

(I would never qualify either but appreciate the history.)

Yes colour not colours. That why I added the "oh dear I added an s)

”Trooping the Colour”. You said “Trooping of the colours”. So an added “s” and an added “of” as per pp. Pedantic moment over 😆

edited for clarity

This, absolutely.

Do you know for certain that there were fewer people watching in Horse Guards' Parade and along the sides of the Mall than there were in the last ten years, for instance?
The parade ground and the main road of the Mall have to be empty until the whole ceremony is over and the horses and troops and royals have gone from each part, gradually.

What are 'like Radio 4 listeners'? Is the 'like', you know, like, I mean, erm, like, one of those utterly unnecessary words which people throw into sentences?

Is there a sacred rod of Ebenzeer, or even Ebenezer, in the bible? I wouldn't be surprised to find one.

I don't know whether or not I know any Children of TikTok. Are they all growing up to be sneering, jeering, little nihilists or are there good parts of it?

Well, Trump's bigliest parade in US military history or whatever he called that little vanity project was a bit of a damp squib apparently so I think the Coldstream Guards and the RF held their own.

Trooping happens every year and has for centuries, it is ticketed on the parade ground for obvious reasons. It isn't like a Coronation or a wedding or a Jubilee and the flypast can be seen from multiple points. I guarantee that if there were provably unprecedented crowds in the Mall (which looked pretty full to me) the rhetoric about forelock tugging serfs would ramp up even more.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/15/trump-army-parade

Those brothers look like trouble. If I had to ride in a carriage with my cousin he would make me laugh so hard I'd die. We'd be in terrible trouble.

See. Not Royal family at all.

Maybe Kate could twerk if she wants to be more relevant !

How nice for her that she doesn't have to.
How nice that her husband doesn't need to record himself shimmying past a camera, flapping his hands around his todger (there's a "Children of the Tiktok generation" word - not) for attention.
How much more relevant to most people's lives it is not to put up videos of themselves bumping 'n' grinding during private moments of their lives.

Well they are fortunate to sup on the King's shilling (aka our money) whereas our American friends have to sing or "twerk" for their own suppers. Besides which if they did indeed shut up as most of you seem to wish for what else would your write about ? I thought Kate had called time on all the outfit nonsense or am I behind the times ?

Well they are fortunate to sup on the King's shilling (aka our money) whereas our American friends have to sing or "twerk" for their own suppers.

Do they? Options decreasing perhaps.

Besides which if they did indeed shut up as most of you seem to wish for what else would your write about ? I thought Kate had called time on all the outfit nonsense or am I behind the times ?

I've said nothing about them shutting up or about the "outfit nonsense", whatever you mean by that. So no point questioning me about those matters.
I'm not part of a collective "you".
I presume you would say you're not either.

The American response to the vanity project. Oddly enough a couple of world changers based outside of LA apparently didn't march but Martin Luther King III and his wife did in Philadelphia.

https://www.npr.org/sections/the-picture-show/2025/06/14/nx-s1-5433731/photos-no-kings-protest

I’ve got a really expressive face and am always making a joke about things so there would be loads of awful, unflattering photos of me in the Daily Mail pulling goony faces. Like Fergie.

Me too!

@upinaballoon We like to anticipate/join in LOUD commands in this house :)
'bags of swank' yes ! (I think it comes from a book by David Walder re a officer cadets life at the fictitious Yres OCS in the 1950'?- now out of print it seems)
Ds & another Cadet were especially singled out for harshness by their Corporal, (the son of the Company SM). They, therefore, especially enjoyed parading with BoS (which, oddly, didn't seem officially popular in that detachment, at least) Happy Days! I must say it was really wonderful to see it live, even though our visit was cut short by the stands collapse (2022) though you can see quite a bit from the Mall for free it's not quite the same as seeing them on a parade ground.

I'd rather be you!

I've got the most awful Resting Bitch Face. I have learned the hard way that if I want to appear 'neutral', I need to slightly simper all the time. It's a strain!

If I were a royal my gloomy mug would always be on the front cover of the tabloids with a 'Cheer up, M'am - it might never happen!' or 'Why the long face?' headline.