thing—”
I stopped him right there. “Let’s say I wanted to find out if someone was royalty or not—how exactly would I do that?”
He glowered at me like a bulldog learning that his Beggin’ Strips weren’t real bacon. “This isn’t me giving you a lesson. This is you bamboozling me into working on the Sabbath!”
“Everybody ought to work at least one day a week,” I said. I put on my drugstore reading glasses and slid them down my nose until my computer screen came into focus. I readied my fingers on the keyboard. “Now tell me how.”
He was smart enough to submit without a tussle. “You know what country?”
“Romania.”
He pointed to the Google box on my toolbar. “Type in the person’s name and then Romania. And then something like royalty or royal family.”
I typed in Violeta Bell, Romania, royal family. “Now what?”
He sighed at my ignorance. “Click on the Google Search box.”
I clicked. My computer screen blinked just once and told me it had found 14,600 websites for me to check out. I was amazed. And a little annoyed. Eric always made the research projects I gave him seem like a major chore requiring almost metaphysical skill. “That’s it? I could have James do this for me!” Then I started scrolling down. Clicking on the websites. Reading. Finding absolutely nothing useful. “This could take all day,” I grouched.
Eric forced a handful of M&Ms into his mouth. “Let’s refine it a bit.”
“How do I do that?”
“You need something more specific.”
I stole a few M&Ms from his bag. Popped them in my mouth one by one while I thought out loud. “I doubt that Romania has had a king or queen for a long time. So if there are any living royals, they’re hanging out there like forgotten socks on a clothesline. How about we try pretenders to the throne? ”
He nodded his approval. I typed it in and clicked the Google Search box again. My computer screen presented me with a whole new collection of websites—430,000 of them in fact. But my dismay was short-lived. The very first site gave me exactly what I was looking for. It listed the modern-day pretenders to the throne for every country in the world. Including Romania.
The would-be king of Romania was, in fact, the former king of Romania, eighty-five-year-old Michael I.
The website also contained a ton of historical background on the Romanian monarchy. I was in seventh heaven. Eric was bored silly. He slid down in his chair and fished a bundle of comic books out of the enormous cargo pocket in his shorts. “Who are you—Captain Kangaroo?” I asked.
“Captain who?”
I keep forgetting how old I’m getting, that even someone in their early thirties like Eric would have no childhood memory of the avuncular Saturday morning television star pulling carrots out of his big pockets for Bunny Rabbit. “Never mind, Comic Book Boy,” I hissed. “You just go ahead and fritter your life away with that crap while I make America safe for little old ladies.”
“Sounds like a plan,” he said. He buried his nose in an X-men adventure. I started mining the website for answers.
It was hard for me to believe, but Romania had only been an independent nation since the 1860s. That’s when it pried itself loose from the old Ottoman Empire. In 1881, the Romanian parliament imported a German prince named Charles and crowned him as the nation’s first constitutional king—Carol I.
Carol I had no living heirs. So when he died in 1914, his nephew, Ferdinand, became king.
King Ferdinand died in 1927. But his son, named Carol after his great uncle, was more interested in running around Europe with his mistress than running the country. So Carol’s five-year old son, Michael, became king. That’s right, he was five. Talk about dumping more on your children than they can handle. Anyway, little Michael’s reign lasted just three years. In 1930, his playboy father had a change of heart. He booted the boy off
I stopped him right there. “Let’s say I wanted to find out if someone was royalty or not—how exactly would I do that?”
He glowered at me like a bulldog learning that his Beggin’ Strips weren’t real bacon. “This isn’t me giving you a lesson. This is you bamboozling me into working on the Sabbath!”
“Everybody ought to work at least one day a week,” I said. I put on my drugstore reading glasses and slid them down my nose until my computer screen came into focus. I readied my fingers on the keyboard. “Now tell me how.”
He was smart enough to submit without a tussle. “You know what country?”
“Romania.”
He pointed to the Google box on my toolbar. “Type in the person’s name and then Romania. And then something like royalty or royal family.”
I typed in Violeta Bell, Romania, royal family. “Now what?”
He sighed at my ignorance. “Click on the Google Search box.”
I clicked. My computer screen blinked just once and told me it had found 14,600 websites for me to check out. I was amazed. And a little annoyed. Eric always made the research projects I gave him seem like a major chore requiring almost metaphysical skill. “That’s it? I could have James do this for me!” Then I started scrolling down. Clicking on the websites. Reading. Finding absolutely nothing useful. “This could take all day,” I grouched.
Eric forced a handful of M&Ms into his mouth. “Let’s refine it a bit.”
“How do I do that?”
“You need something more specific.”
I stole a few M&Ms from his bag. Popped them in my mouth one by one while I thought out loud. “I doubt that Romania has had a king or queen for a long time. So if there are any living royals, they’re hanging out there like forgotten socks on a clothesline. How about we try pretenders to the throne? ”
He nodded his approval. I typed it in and clicked the Google Search box again. My computer screen presented me with a whole new collection of websites—430,000 of them in fact. But my dismay was short-lived. The very first site gave me exactly what I was looking for. It listed the modern-day pretenders to the throne for every country in the world. Including Romania.
The would-be king of Romania was, in fact, the former king of Romania, eighty-five-year-old Michael I.
The website also contained a ton of historical background on the Romanian monarchy. I was in seventh heaven. Eric was bored silly. He slid down in his chair and fished a bundle of comic books out of the enormous cargo pocket in his shorts. “Who are you—Captain Kangaroo?” I asked.
“Captain who?”
I keep forgetting how old I’m getting, that even someone in their early thirties like Eric would have no childhood memory of the avuncular Saturday morning television star pulling carrots out of his big pockets for Bunny Rabbit. “Never mind, Comic Book Boy,” I hissed. “You just go ahead and fritter your life away with that crap while I make America safe for little old ladies.”
“Sounds like a plan,” he said. He buried his nose in an X-men adventure. I started mining the website for answers.
It was hard for me to believe, but Romania had only been an independent nation since the 1860s. That’s when it pried itself loose from the old Ottoman Empire. In 1881, the Romanian parliament imported a German prince named Charles and crowned him as the nation’s first constitutional king—Carol I.
Carol I had no living heirs. So when he died in 1914, his nephew, Ferdinand, became king.
King Ferdinand died in 1927. But his son, named Carol after his great uncle, was more interested in running around Europe with his mistress than running the country. So Carol’s five-year old son, Michael, became king. That’s right, he was five. Talk about dumping more on your children than they can handle. Anyway, little Michael’s reign lasted just three years. In 1930, his playboy father had a change of heart. He booted the boy off
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