Harry Sterns got the meeting underway at 7:14 pm—ignoring his wife who was telling Ethel Brown her recipe to make peach cobbler. (I’ve tried her peach cobbler and it’s darn good. The recipe is appended to the minutes.)
Harry, once more, reminded the secretary that she was not to put her own opinions in the minutes. Nobody made any objections to the minutes of the last meeting, so we have no idea if anyone, other than Harry, has a problem with the secretary’s opinions. Motion by Ralph Goode, second by Myrna Sterns to accept the minutes, motion carried.
The treasurer reported that he gave all the money ($82.15) to Harry to go to Buffalo (and not stop at the casino in Niagara Falls) when former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is speaking there and see if she will be our guest speaker to boost attendance at our next annual meeting. (This led to the usual arguments about whether we are supposed to be Irish republicans or American republicans—still unresolved.)
Harry told us the big news: it seems the English guy with the big ears is bringing that skag of a wife of his for an official visit to Babel. No wonder we have such a good crowd tonight. (Except for Mildred Lapierre who has gone into labour with her seventh but her husband Maurice is here and he insists that he have two votes.) And you should have heard the protests when Harry said this was our chance to protest and get our league better known.
Tom Flanagan objected to Harry’s idea of a protest. He said last time we protested was when that pretty lady from Haiti told people in Paris she was Canada’s head of state. Harry insisted that the secretary send a strong letter to Ottawa pointing out that the Governor General had not been elected to anything and only served because the Prime Minister had appointed her as the Queen’s representative in Canada.
That Rideau Hall sure has nice stationary and we are thinking of framing the letter from some servant of hers saying our letter would be brought to the Governor General’s attention, if she ever gets back from her world tour. We could put up the letter next to the one we got when we asked her what raw seal liver tastes like. (We are still waiting for her to read that one. Betcha she spend a lot of time with her head in the bowl from that!)
But the meeting is getting a bit heated. Sam Brooke wants to barricade the railroad tracks south of Babel to keep big ears and his funny looking wife out of town. Harry said you cannot do that as it would just annoy all the commuters who want to get home in time for supper. He says the commuters are very good for his business as they are all likely victims of early heart attacks. (And Harry’s is the best funeral parlour in Babel.)
Maurice then gave what for to Harry about dumb ideas such as wandering around town with signs saying something about the (French expletives deleted) monarchy when if you just forget to tell people, nobody will know Chuck and Camilla are in town.
That struck a note with the women members and there were a number of increasingly shrill demands for a vote to ignore the Prince of Wales and his dowdy wife when they come to Babel.
Harry gave us all a very strong lecture about that. His premise seemed to be that if we ignored them, we would be no better than the 83.4 per cent of Canadians who already ignore the monarchy. (About half of those pro-monarchy people are women with confused hormones who want to mother Prince Harry or William or both.) Our Harry believes that we have a vital role in countering the doddering idiots in the Monarchist League without meeting them in pitched battle. That is good as there are few members of the Monarchist League younger than 80. We are supposed to make nice with them while pointing out the error of their ways.
The meeting ended with extra helpings of Myrna’s peach cobbler, thanks to Harry for the use of his best viewing room and a rousing rendition of God Save the Queen.
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