New 10p coin collection celebrates 'quintessentially British' things
I love the ones dedicated to imperialism, bland food, poor dental care, and Irish oppression. The very best one commemorates my own personal favorite memory of London: men with pasty white legs wearing shorts with dress shoes and black socks.
I was kidding about those, of course, but there actually is one celebrating the English tradition of standing politely in line. You see, there's one for every letter of the alphabet, and they decided to go with queuing instead of Queen Elizabeth or Victoria. Kind of an odd decision, as I see it. I would immediately associate queuing with Russia, but Queen Victoria is about as English as English can be.
Also
* They went with B for Bond and J for Jubilee. I would have gone with B for Beatles and J for James Bond. Screw the jubilee. Which jubilee? All of them. Plus jubilees are generic, not uniquely English.
* And I think I would have gone with W for Wimbledon instead of WWW. I know Tim Berners-Lee is English, but I doubt if many people would associate the WWW with England.
* M for Mackintosh? I guess that's a good choice, but I would have gone with either Field Marshall Montgomery or, even more obviously, Monty Python.
Before I clicked, I was pretty sure F was going to be Fish n Chips. I knew it wouldn't be Fucking - they're British after all.
ReplyDeleteEspecially given the definition of "quintessentially", W should have either been WImbledon or Winston Churchill.
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