Interesting Facts

According to news reports, the new royal baby, Prince George has been given some unusual gifts, they include the following:- A hand-embroidered blanket made by nuns in Spain. An apple tree (supposedly this is traditional, but I can't remember getting one, probably because I'm not the first born son). A baby crocodile (called George). (I guess it beats silver spoons and rattles, but really, all he needs is loving parents and a relatively normal upbringing. We always tell our children that they can be whatever they want to be, so why not tell them they don't have to be whoever people say they ought to be.  If I were his parents I'd give him a free pass from becoming king.)

Pet crocodiles in the UK have to be micro chipped. (Yes, people do keep crocodiles as pets. In fact in 2010 there were 72 licensed crocodiles and alligators kept as domestic pets, but no one knows how many are being kept unlicensed. I wonder what they do when it's time to go walkies.)

The Duke of Edinburgh was given a baby elephant when visiting Sri Lanka. (In fact, the Royal family usually receive presents when they go on holidays (sorry - state visits), and some of them are quite ridiculous. Princess Anne was given a brown Syrian bear by the then Soviet Union. Prince Andrew was given a newborn Gambian crocodile. The Queen was given a pair of sloths in Brazil in 1968. It's not always animals either. Prince Andrew was given two bags of basmati rice by the Pakistan High Commission 2008 the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall were given two wristbands, two baseball caps, four T-shirts and 18 CDs by the Bob Marley Museum in Jamaica. When the Prince of Wales married Lady Diana Spencer, she received a pair of 100-year-old silk mittens, a silver-plated mousetrap and, most esoteric of all, a piece of crocheted lace made from yarn spun by Mahatma Gandhi. Other gifts have included a box of volcanic ash from Montserrat, a yellow metal hatpin from J...