all british money (paper and coinage) contains a photo of the queen. as the queen ages, her photograph on the money ages, as well! below are three 20 pence pieces that were in my wallet when i came back to the us. the first (the one on the left) is dated 1982, the second is 1991, and the third is 2008. (i don't know if there was an earlier likeness of the queen on money printed before 1982 because i didn't have any money from before 1982 to examine.) you can see here that the queen ages as time goes on - she's a young woman on the earliest coin and an old woman on the most recent coin. also, when the queen dies or steps down the government will begin the process of taking those coins and bills out of circulation and replacing them with coins and bills with the new monarch's face on them. sally told me about this on one of our last days in oxford, and couldn't BELIEVE that i didn't know this. "what happens on your money?" she asked. "all the people on our money are dead - so we don't have that problem."
in closing: to those of you who are still reading, let me say thank you from truly deep in my heart. i like writing and it has given me great joy (and a purpose - aren't we always looking for that?) to be able to write for an audience this summer. the giving out of my stories has been quite a valuable experience for me - recording the moments i don't want to forget and the places i want to remember. but your comments have been even more valuable to me. when i was in another country, without people around whom i know and love, this blog has been such an important way for me to be able to connect with people back home. i would keep blogging, but i think it's a little presumptuous of me to think that you guys (or anyone, for that matter) cares about my daily life. it's the exciting stuff you're here for! the pandemic flu - that's why you stuck around! so here ends this edition of "from claire to here."
before i left for europe i was listening to a lot of new-to-me music (neko case! brandi carlile! nickel creek!), and this song stuck out. thank you for listening to my stories.
if you've got no one to tell them to
--brandi carlile, "the story"
now if you'll excuse me, i have a lot of trashy tv to catch up on.
4 comments:
We will miss the blog, but now we have you back -- a trade I will make every day. Thanks for sharing you stories.
I'll miss your blog. But I love Nickel Creek, so we can totally listen to that sometime.
Hooray-I loved reading the blogs, and Welcome home-we missed you
I'm not just in it for the travel/pandemic/trivia! I'm sure you could make a blog about your everyday life very exciting (and funny!) I vote you keep it going - I'd read it :)
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