The Registrar General for Scotland finally released a death certificate that raised more questions than it answered:
Queen Elizabeth II’s cause of death is described as “old age” in the register of deaths released on Thursday.
The registrar general for Scotland, Paul Lowe, confirmed that the Queen’s death was registered in Aberdeenshire on 16 September.
Suspicious, innit? She survived in power for 70 years and this is the best you've got? Apparently Scottish law allows this sort of obfuscation:
Old age is acceptable if the doctor certifying death has cared for the patient for a long time, was not aware of any disease or injury that contributed to death and had observed a gradual decline in the person’s general health and functioning.
The Queen had been experiencing sporadic mobility problems during the final period of her life and used a walking stick regularly in public. Her use of a walking stick came after she was admitted to a private London hospital for “preliminary investigations” in October last year – her first overnight admission for eight years.
Oh? The People deserve a full investigation! A similar fate could befall the current heads of state of not just the UK, but Cameroon, Lebanon, Norway—or even the United States.
We demand the truth!
Wow, yesterday went on a bit. From getting on the bus to Peoria to getting off the bus back in Chicago, I spent 18 hours and 20 minutes doing something connected with the Peoria Symphony's performance of Beethoven's 9th yesterday. I think it went quite well, and I expect they'll ask us back the next time they do a huge symphonic choral work.
Right now, Cassie has plotzed completely after two nights in boarding, and I need to figure out what I'm eating this week. So I'll post something more interesting later today.
In the meantime, enjoy this Saturday Night Live bit that will challenge even the most attentive English speakers throughout the former colonies:
It's mid-July today, at least until around 8pm, when late April should return. The Tribune reported this morning that our spring has had nearly three times the rain as last spring, but actually hasn't gotten much wetter than normal.
Meanwhile:
Finally, via The Onion, Google Maps now shows you shortcuts through people's houses when they're not home.
It turns out, tenors don't actually spread Covid more readily than the other three sections, despite what you may have heard from the Welsh Government:
The advice appears to have been motivated by a spoof social media news post, created by meme page Quire Memes to appear as if written by us here at Classic FM. A doctored headline claimed that ‘Tenors should sit three metres away from other choir members, COVID study says’.
The post, which is categorically fake news, is captioned: “Tenors found to disperse aerosols the furthest, in this in-depth coronavirus study.”
A government spokesperson denied that the advice was based on a spoof post, but said they “apologise unreservedly for this error and for any confusion it may have caused”.
Professional tenor and choral director Charles MacDougall told The Telegraph it was “preposterous” that the Welsh government appeared to have based their official guidance on a meme.
Believe me, tenors have enough problems without being blamed for spreading this particular disease. Gonorrhea, however...
I swear, the local poké place used three shots of chili oil instead of one today. Whew. (Not that I'm complaining, of course.)
While my mouth slowly incinerates, I'm reading these:
On that last point, comedians Jimmy Carr and Emil Wakim lay down epic burns against anti-vaxxers:
Happy Wednesday! Here's what I'm reading before my 8pm meeting, now that my 6:30pm meeting just ended:
And finally, the New Yorker's Tom Papa introduces you to "asshole cat behaviors."
With apologies to Radio Netherlands, Goldberg hits Jeffrey Toobin's latest HR incident with frequency until it hertz:
There’s been a lot of handwringing—so to speak—about Toobin, the New Yorker’s legal correspondent. One writer, after running through a string of jokes about Toobin’s prosecution of his “southern district,” insists that we should act like a jury ordered by the judge to ignore evidence. In one of the greatest understatements ever written, he says, “Granted, there are few things more unprofessional than masturbating during a company meeting,” and then goes on to say that Toobin’s just too good at providing perspective to be shunned for toobin’.
Over at the Daily News, Jonathan Zimmerman, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, wants to make this seminal moment into a seminal moment. You see, the people who should really be embarrassed are the ones making a big deal about this. Zimmerman makes the perfectly fine point that people should be more upset about Toobin’s past behavior, specifically his adultery, and not hoist him on a petard for hoisting his own petard on a Zoom call. We’re all prudes, you see, because everybody does it, but doing it has been “a big no-no since the advent of the Enlightenment.”
In a country with over 1.3 million lawyers, I love the idea that the one guy caught badgering his own friendly witness is just too indispensable.
I won't spoil the rest of it, except to say Goldberg really pulls it out. He's not dicking around here, he grabs it with both hands. And he's not just writing for the house organ; he let it hang out for all to see.
Bonus: Here's Sir Paul McCartney explaining Jeffrey Toobin's new reality:
I stumbled upon this commercial from the 1980s that ran in the UK:
Definitely John Cleese. (And what the hell has 4.1 megabytes?)
McSweeny's gives you the person "in charge of the deck chairs on the Titanic, and they absolutely did need rearranging:"
I am aware that the phrase “like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic” has become shorthand for “a task rendered useless in the face of overwhelming circumstances.” Well, here’s another phrase for you: “how you do anything is how you do everything.” And if I was willing to die leaving a bunch of chairs sloppily bunched together with no thought to view or most pleasant sea breeze, I can assure you that I would have made a lowly member of the Eternal Choir indeed. As it is, I am a frequent soloist, thank you very much.
As an everlasting spirit, I can see that some of you are slumped over your workspaces, or your children, wondering what the point of any of this is. Does it really matter, I hear you ask yourself, if I finish my screenplay? Who’s even going to make movies anymore? Who cares, in the long run, if I file these reports or simply burn my entire house to the ground? What the disharmonious FUCK is the point of Zoom calls for kindergarteners? These are the thoughts of an inattentive chair-master, my friends. I am sure that when you think of the kind of chaos that’s unfolding across the planet as bodies are wrecked by virus and economies by quarantine, your daily data-entry tasks seem like small, absurd potatoes. I invite you to look up from your own navel and consider whether you wish to die with dignity, or like a fractious, spoilt child who can’t even manage the most basic of secretarial tasks.
It's...surprisingly on the nose. (It's still not the Baroness Elsa's letter, though.)
Starting in March, this year has seemed like a weird anthology TV show, with each month written and directed by a different team. We haven't had Aaron Sorkin and Thomas Schlamme yet; I'm hoping that'll be the season finale in February. This month we seem to have Armando Iannucci running the show, as the President's antics over the weekend suggest.
So here's how I'm spending lunch:
Tomorrow night will be the vice-presidential debate, which I will again live-blog. I can't wait.