Monday, May 6, 2019

Royal Line of Duty

Unusually no signature to this royal announcement
The announcement of the birth of a new 'Earl of Dunbarton' for May 6th 2019, came at 2.00pm UK time, with a Palace Statement, followed by a Twitter post approx. one hour later. It stated that the half blue-blood baby was born at 5.26am - This caused some confusion within the media outlets, many not understanding that the birth had taken place hours prior to the announcement from the Palace about the Duchess of Sussex going 'into labour'... the majority of royal correspondents on Sky News and BBC sent into a frenzy asking why it wasn't announced earlier?!

Up to 2.00pm today the story hitting headlines here in the UK was... Who is 'H'? This is the question that loyal fans of the record-breaking BBC1 police drama 'Line of Duty' have been asking for weeks. Is the character of Ted Hasting going to turn out to be the corrupt cop come boss-of-bosses with a Godfather-like presence? Is he hiding his identity and about to be exposed in the finale? I won't dwell on the answers revealed yesterday. What I will mention is the fabulous Irish actor who plays the character with such believability; Adrian Dunbar.

Adrian Dunbar in 'The Hollow Crown'... I think you know where I'm going with this don't you?
Adrian has starred in some of the most iconic, revered and rewarded British movies of all time, including 'My Left Foot' and 'The Crying Game', and lesser remembered TV stints, for example, with headline grabbing Eco-warrior Brit actress and lovey Emma Thompson in 'The Blue Boy'. Apparently his turn in Star Wars Episode 1 ended up on the cutting room floor.

However, Adrian is now the hottest property on TV in the UK. He recently joked to a less than modest Piers Morgan while being interviewed by him for breakfast television that, 'I'm the biggest TV star... this week!' 

So the name 'Dunbar' has literally been on everyone's lips for a while now.

A portrait of the 1st Earl of Dunbarton
With the latest Royal Baby news, we have a synchronistic connection to the collective psyche of the British Public at a time of disillusionment in the form of a name. The news is distracting the masses from their troubling thoughts of Brexit for example - or so say the 'experts'. What better way then than to announce the arrival of the next Earl of Dunbar... Dunbarton... 

Prince Harry 2nd Earl of Dunbar ton, beaming outside some Windsor Castle stable and barn, no manger in sight however!
Dunbar's number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships—relationships in which an individual knows who each person is and how each person relates to every other person


Dunbar family name in ancient Scotland, they lived in the barony of Dunbar on the North Sea coast near Edinburgh. The place name comes from the Gaelic words dùn, meaning "a fort," and barr, meaning "top," or "summit."

Dumbarton comes from the Scottish Gaelic Dùn Breatainn meaning "fort of the Britons". ... By the 18th century the names "County of Dunbarton" and "County of Dumbarton" were used interchangeably.