The Queen Mum’s Turd


Emily’s job is shit. Not bad shit, but genuine, for real shit. She works for a company that designs and builds sewage plants. Depending upon what she does next her whole career could be shit.

You’d think, in an industry that deals, indirectly, with effluent all day, that the conversation in the office could get a little scatalogical. Apparently this is not so, apart from one day, when the tale I’m going to recount was told.

Working in the office is a guy in his late forties, I’ll call him Bob, who was passing on a tale he was told when he was an apprentice. At the time he was working with an old lag, who I’ll call Alf, who had worked in a shipyard during the war. Alf is the main protagonist in the tale.

One day, early in the war, the Royal Family was visiting to do a morale boosting tour and inspect one of their new ships. They were all there, King George VI was there with the Queen Mother (still just Queen at that point) and princesses Liz and Marge. No doubt they toured the ship, shook hands with some dignitaries and let the oiks stare at them. By all accounts the princesses behaved like spoilt brats, but what do you expect.

Now royalty, no matter what one might wish to think, are only human. It is always a possibility on a royal visit that one or more of their majesties will have to answer a call of nature. However, they can’t be seen to use the same facilities as mere mortals and subjects. So, in case they could not hold it in until they got back to the royal train, a special monarchic portaloo was set up.

Alf, being a devout Royalist, kept an eye on the port-a-throne all day. After the visit had ended, but before the clear up began, he sneaked in and snagged himself a very special souvenir. He was adamant that the floater he rescued belonged to the Queen Mother, all that gin probably helped it’s bouyancy.

When the royal turd had dried out sufficiently, Alf lacquered it and mounted it on the mantelpiece. At the time that he told Bob this tale it was still there, in pride of place. Maybe one day it will turn up on Antiques Roadshow-

“Now this is an interesting piece. Can you tell me anything about its history.”

“My great grandfather gave it to me. He said it was the Queen Mother’s.”

“Reeeaaally? How fascinating. It does have a most lustrous mahogany finish. I can’t keep myself from running my fingers over it and feeling the contours. The Queen Mother you say? Do you have any idea what she might have used it for?”

“It’s a turd.”

“A third?”

“No, a turd.”

“A tu……… Oh.”