By a spooky coincidence the Queen died at Balmoral on the 174th anniversary of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert first visiting the castle.

The Royal couple had stayed at a number of residences as guests in Scotland, but did not have a property of their own. After a very wet stay on the west coast in 1847 it was suggested they look further east for a better climate. Owned by the Earl of Fife, but leased to Sir Robert Gordon, brother of the Earl of Aberdeen, since 1830 Balmoral fell vacant at the end of the year upon Sir Robert's sudden death. The new leaseholder Lord Aberdeen leased it to the Queen and Prince Albert sight unseen. They made their first visit on 8 September 1848. They bought it outright four years later.

The royal family owns Balmoral & the state owns Buckingham Palace?

Yes, most of the Royal residences are the property of the Crown and cannot be sold, Balmoral is a private residence, as is Sandringham in Norfolk where the Royal Family traditionally spend Christmas. 

Queen Elizabeth's dogs have found a home with Prince Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/queen-elizabeth-ii-corgis-cared-prince-andrew-sarah-ferguson-report .

Yes, most of the Royal residences are the property of the Crown and cannot be sold, Balmoral is a private residence, as is Sandringham in Norfolk where the Royal Family traditionally spend Christmas. 

I’ve been there and it’s a wonderful place to visit. You’d like it Tom, as it has a great arms and car collection. There are guns and rifles that cover the centuries, along with a huge array of sporting guns. However, the main attraction is the fantastic car collection, which spans the whole history of the car. The oldest car there is a 1900 Daimler which was bought by Edward Vll. It’s unusual in the fact that it is one of the very few cars ever sold by the royals and it was tracked down 50 years ago and restored for this collection. Except for Rolls cars Daimler is the most prevalent and there are some real beauties with most of them being custom built. Probably the most unusual is a London cab,which Prince Philip bought so he could get around London in anonymity, although why he didn’t just buy an ordinary car with tinted windows I don’t know as when you need a black cab you just wave them down as they pass. London had hundreds of them and all they did was roam the streets waiting to be flagged. It’s amazing just how easy it was to get a cab, you never had to wait more than a minute or two. Philip must have had hundreds of people trying to flag him down.

I've been to Sandringham, but only seen Balmoral from a distance as it was occupied at the time, my own fault for going in August. 

You're not alone, Mark.  I had just finished watching the Paddington video on youtube before coming here -- with tears.  Elizabeth has been Queen nearly the entirety of my life and certainly the entirety of yours.  When you visit your mausoleums and local cemeteries, you can hear the echo of someone grieving just like you 800 years ago.  Witnessing history has its price.  The British have long held the Land and the King/Queen in heart and hand.  I think this feeling prevailed even before Elizabeth I wed herself to the Land.

We're getting used to the idea now, but the funeral next Monday will set us all back again. It's easy to drift away and think everything is normal, then it hits you - the Queen is dead. 

Queen Elizabeth's dogs have found a home with Prince Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/queen-elizabeth-ii-corgis-cared-prince-andrew-sarah-ferguson-report .

For a divorced couple they get on remarkably well, living in the same house! There are rumours every so often that they might remarry, but I suspect not, they'll carry on as they are. 

Simply to keep the numbers down. It'll be a huge turnout with hundreds of official guests, ordinary Brits can't be pushed aside for foreigners. We can't have the Bidens and their entourage taking up half of the Abbey. 

Queen Elizabeth's dogs have found a home with Prince Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/queen-elizabeth-ii-corgis-cared-prince-andrew-sarah-ferguson-report .

For a divorced couple they get on remarkably well, living in the same house! There are rumours every so often that they might remarry, but I suspect not, they'll carry on as they are. 

Oh good, I was fearful the Corgis would wind up at the dog pound.

Simply to keep the numbers down. It'll be a huge turnout with hundreds of official guests, ordinary Brits can't be pushed aside for foreigners. We can't have the Bidens and their entourage taking up half of the Abbey. 

I didn't know that any Brit was "ordinary."

I learned that from you Art. Maybe Mark is really Irish?

Speaking of ordinary Irishmen, what are "cor blimey trousers" as in:

My old man's a dustman

He wears a dustman's hat

He wears cor blimey trousers

And lives in a Council flat.

Art will know, I suspect he still wears them.

Speaking of ordinary Irishmen, what are "cor blimey trousers" as in:

My old man's a dustman

He wears a dustman's hat

He wears cor blimey trousers

And lives in a Council flat.

Tricky one this, have you got a spare hour? Firstly it’s got nothing to do with the Irish and everything to do with Londoners, especially Cockneys. Most people have traditionally called all Londoners cockneys but the fact is, to be a real Cockney you have to be born within the sound of Bow Bells, which belong to the venerable and ancient church of St Mary Le Bow. Outside of that sound and you were not a Cockney. Traditional Cockneys, ie white Londoners, are now as rare as rocking horse shit. One of the most famous of these Cockneys was a none Cockney called Lonny ( real name Anthony) Donegan, a very influential musician of the 50,s and 60’s who actually invented his own brand of unique music called skiffle. For some reason everybody thought he was a cockney but he was born in Scotland to a family that wisely abandoned it when he was two year old and fled to London. His dad was a professional violinist who actively discouraged his son from ever becoming a musician. Anyway, to cut a long story down to a long story Lonnie was hugely successful on both sides of the Atlantic and many popular groups and solo artists owed him an awful lot. When I was a very young, handsome, talented, delinquent Lonny was a household name and I remember him on the tele all of the time. Back in those days there was only two tele stations and I think they closed shop at about 10.30 at night so as to get the peasants in bed early so they weren’t late for work in the morning. The highlight of the week was a prog called ‘Sunday night at the London Palladium.’ A variety show which was the most watched prog on tele, as anybody who was anybody appeared there. Now, we get down to the nitty gritty, as we god’s chosen people say, meaning the crux of the matter. I remember it well, Lonny and his skiffle group topping the bill and they sang a novelty song called ‘My old man’s a dustman.’ Know what a dustman is? It’s what we in the north of England call a binman, or you call a garbage collector. Your ‘old man’ is the term we give our fathers over here. So, his old man, ie his dad was a garbage collector. If you’re still awake I’m nearly at the end. The third line of the song sings, he wears core blimey trousers. These aren’t some style of pants as the term core blimey is actually a cockney statement of surprise, much like…. Bloody hell, feck me, Jeses Christ! Goddam bigeezus etc. Gerrit? 

Art, does your chewing gum lose its flavor on the bedpost over night?

Major, thank you.  My first contact with this song, God save me, was the Bee Gees in a 1963 performance.

Tom, I agree that you can tell a lot about a person by the way they treat their employees.  I would give Charles a pass, though I haven't read about this incident, this time because he is in a rather stressful place.  Prince Charles was not treated well by the media, in my opinion, and I doubt he will be treated well as King Charles III.  Then again, maybe he is just a jerk.

I will give him a pass for now as well, Shula. BTW, there were many instances of terrible, rude, obnoxious behavior by Churchill. Especially to his secretaries. The stress of leadership eh?

Remember the story I posted a few weeks ago about the missing Scottish Crown Jewels discovered in a walled-up room in 1818 111 years after being locked away? Well the Crown is the one you can see on the Queen's coffin in Edinburgh today. 

It's a relief that we've got through to Charles III, so many European Monarchies have ended with a someone entitled "the Second", at least we haven't ended with another "Second".

Monarchies that have been abolished with a King (insert name here) the Second are Germany, Russia, Italy, Greece,Portugal, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria.