Queen apparently still bitter over that whole Boston Tea Party mess
MSNBC reports on the meeting yesterday between Barack and Michelle Obama and Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip.
During their private meeting, President Obama and the first lady gave the queen a personalized iPod with video footage of her 2007 visit to Washington and Virginia. She was also given a rare songbook signed by composer Richard Rodgers.
In return the queen and her husband, Prince Philip, gave the Obamas a signed portrait of themselves.
Now, I have been giving people signed pictures of myself as gifts for about 25 years now, so I totally understand where the Queen is coming from, but if someone were to give me an iPod, I think I would have sweetened the pot a bit by maybe throwing in a couple ShamWow‘s or at least a Snuggie Blanket. Of course, maybe she got wind that the Obamas planned to give an 84-year-old woman an iPod and just assumed (and rightly so) that they were insane, and therefore the gift SHE gave didn’t really matter.
Thanks to faithful Macenstein reader Andreas for the tip!
Well, she is actually 82 and the photo above shows her mother, but maybe you just want to stress your American point of view. 😉
thanks geWAPpnet ,
Well, I have found my American POV has traditionally been more accurate than my British POV, present article excepted.
And you are quite right, an 82 year old woman will likely appreciate the iPod far more than an 84 year old. Maybe I was just trying to keep the article timely for the next couple years.
🙂
– The Doc
It seems Obama has “funny” gifts all the time – I read on one European newspaper, he gave a “crappy” DVD box (best 25 classic US-movies) to Englands Prime minister, but he could not play it at all, because it had different country-code… 🙂
On reverse the Prime minister gave Obama a fountain pen, made of wood from a famous war-ship which was on a war against slavery and an old first-print of Winston-Churchill biography.
So at least Obama does not spent to much hard tax-payers money for presents… 🙂
in German:
http://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/panorama/vermischtes/Die-seltsamen-Geschenke-des-Barack-Obama/story/23397170
Does anyone know what kind of iPod it is?
If it’s an iPod Touch I could send her some Promo Codes of my Apps.
Dreamin of a review signed with Lizzy, HRH *gg*
But damn, the promo codes don’t work in the UK App Store…
This is not the Queen’s first iPod, she has used one since 2005. Also, a silver-framed portrait of the queen and her husband is a long-standing customary gift of the royal family. But I agree, a ShamWow would have really livened things up.
I genuine signed HRH Photo, in a silver frame is worth about £5000 on the open market. An ipod with some CNN footage is worth about $200. Nice that the Obamas have some sense of worth with their gifts. Hope that he brings more to the table at the G20 summit.
Gordon Brown – I propose that the UK offsets 3d world debt by two billion pounds stirling
Barack Obama – I propose the US sends some Taco Bell and an XBox to help the starving in Africa….
Hey! I was reading a post on The Apple Blog about the new Yahoo! iPhone app & look what i saw in the second paragraph:
“There’s also a list of popular search topics, which depressingly included “ShamWow” when I was writing this up.”
Lol! 😀
http://bit.ly/Ham57
If Obama visits the queen enough, and gets a signed picture each time, and sells them on the open market, he could pay off our debt AND LOWER TAXES.