A hopelessly optimistic press release doing the rounds of editorial inboxes today with all the likely success of a door-to-door punch in the face salesman, carries the cheery subject line:
Dangers for Elderly Revealed As Queen Spends Time on "Throne" With Tummy Bug
That's right. They have pounced upon the breaking news that the Queen had a tummy bug nearly a week ago.
Clearly the delay owed something to checking the Queen was alright before trying to score some cheap coverage on the back of her runny tummy. But either way, surely the window of opportunity has been wafted a few times and firmly closed some days ago.
The release even admits that it is behind the times:
"It emerged earlier this week that Her Majesty the Queen was admitted to London's King Edward VII's hospital on Sunday, as a precautionary measure, and was assessed for symptoms of gastroenteritis.
"Commonly, this condition of the stomach causes the unfortunate sufferer to spend a lot of time on the "throne"."
Throne. Because she's the Queen. See what they did there.
We can only assume the people behind this release - who I can't quite bring myself to name - having laughed about it to themselves for the best part of a week thought their clever word play and belated opportunism would result in a barrage of publicity for their business.
And what line of business are they in?
Bathrooms.
Because if you're going to be spending a lot of time on the toilet you want to make sure your bathroom is a safe and pleasant place to hang out.
The release quotes a man calling himself a "bathroom expert":
"Tummy bugs afflict us all but the older you are the more debilitating this illness is. Apparently women of the Queens [sic] age are more susceptible to falling down in the bathroom and in fact 1 in 5 women actually require hospital treatment for fractures, most commonly the hip."
It goes on...
"It's worth checking out the bathroom of any elderly person..."
Whatever floats your boat.
"We all want to live independently in our own homes for as long as possible but we have to be more aware of the dangers of falling in small spaces."
Having tried to scare old people into paying for a new bathroom with a veiled threat about being put into a home, the release goes on to promote a new online bathroom design tool.
"The Queen herself could use the online system and I'm sure she'd be delighted with the makeover she'd receive" he said.
Presumably once she'd got over the initial shock of a company exploiting her loose bowels for marketing purposes.
What next, Andrex asking whether The Queen scrunches or folds?
The apostrophe is correct in King Edward VII's -- it's the hospital's official style
Posted by: Danny | Mar 08, 2013 at 23:46