If, like me, you're helplessly fascinated, what's your prediction on the royal baby's birth?

Male child with autism, somewhere near the end of August.

Not what I was asking, of course, but okay…

Ooooh, I didn’t even know all this about Kate spending time with her family. I think it is a good guess that she might deliver there. Is she near her due date? I know nothing. Is her OB in London though? So, the doctor would have to travel up there as well. Are the cities far apart? Thing is, I think if Kate goes to the hospital it will be found out no matter what city.

I’m going to bet and say she does deliver in her home town, because I think she will want her sister and mom there.

(addendum) The boy will be birth in the Scottish Highlands.

Betfair.com there’s your bookie

The baby is waiting for Nelson Mandela to die so his spirit can enter it’s being.
For the record, she’s not permitted to have a home birth, so much crap follows the royals that protocol simply doesn’t allow for such independent thinking.
The baby will be born within a week from now & will have Diana as a secondary name if it’s a girl.

I’m betting on Wednesday, July 17. It will be a girl, and they will name her Charlotte.

I think she’ll follow tradition and have the baby in a hospital – probably St Mary’s Hospital, which is where William and Henry were born.

I think it will be a girl called Amelia or Charlotte. On 17 July.

I feel like I should be writing – I say it was the Reverend, in the study, with the gun.

Already gave birth to a hermaphrodite, whilst riding the Tube disguised as Elizabet Bathory? ;-o

I think it’s a fairly high probability that the child will be human.

I didn’t realize she was due until I read this question. I think it would have to be a hospital birth, even without the rule @ucme cites. If something were to go wrong in a home birth, even with the best possible care, there would be awful scrutiny. And I think it would be at St. Mary’s. There’s simply no point in trying to make their plan a secret.

Can anyone explain the popularity of Charlotte as a baby name? It’s not one of my favourites, and if it’s Pippa’s middle name, it seems an odd choice to me. Has there been any speculation that they would call a baby girl Diana? Whatever the choice, they’ll have a lot of tots to answer to.

I think Charlotte is a favourite because it’s a female variant of Charles, the child’s grandfather.

Here are the odds with one of the UK’s top bookies. Alexandra is the runaway favourite for a girl and George for a boy.

@downtide That hadn’t even occurred to me… I hope that doesn’t happen.

There has to be a story behind the inclusion of Wayne (250/1) and Waynetta (500/1). Do you suppose the bookie is named Wayne?

Wayne and Waynetta are characters from a British TV show

Ignore the betting odds, they have no more clue than the man in the fucking street.
There’s a strong possibilty William will want his beloved mother’s name in there somewhere, almost certain the baba will be given up to 4 or 5 names & while it’s very unlikely the first will be Diana, it may still get a nod.
Probably George for a boy though, says the man in the street.

@downtide Oh my.

If it’s a girl, she will grow up and have to attend many pompous, stuffy ceremonies wearing very dopey, ridiculous-looking hats…

Update: 7/22/2013 5:40 a.m. The news has reported that Dutchess Kate has been taken to the hospital in the early stages of labor.

Thanks! Maybe I will actually watch the news this morning.

Duchess.

If we are making corrections, probably we should add the time zone to the date and time. Was it EDT @chyna? Just to document it here.

Also, which hospital? The one she is supposed to go to? Or, a surprise one near her parents?

Well it’s all over now, so most everyone knows that Duchess Kate (thank you @ucme) had a boy, but to answer the above, it was EDT and it was the hospital that Princess Di had her children.

I just found out that it took a week for Charles & Diana to name William, surely they won’t take that long.

@ucme, what I read was that it took a week to announce William’s name. Maybe it felt nice to keep it private for a little while.

@Jeruba Yeah, that’s what I meant an announcement shouldn’t really take that long.
Privacy is fine, but it’s just a name, well several actually.

@Jeruba As I said earlier, you were way off the mark with your prediction of smokescreens & a home birth. It just doesn’t work like that, never has, never will.

I can see that my guess was wrong, thanks. I can’t really imagine the constraints they live under.

However—” just doesn’t work like that, never has, never will”: according to the information I’ve seen, a hospital birth is a very new custom for the royal family. Home birth has been the thing—for centuries. Princess Diana broke that tradition by giving birth in a hospital. Here’s one story. Isn’t it true?

Hey, i’m man enough to admit when i’m wrong & it seems this is just such an occasion.
I bow to your powers of research, my assumption was based on royal births during my lifetime & that was a mistake, which is fair enough.
I’d only add as a feeble attempt at defence that categorising a home birth as one taking place in a palace is a privilege afforded exclusively to the royal few.

After the last season of Downton Abbey, this would probably be the wrong year to return to home birth.

Well, I’d have to agree with you, there, @ucme: it’s not what we usually think of as a “home birth” (which has been, after all, the lot of humanity for most of its history—if not between rows of grain in a cultivated field). But if we don’t call those home births, then don’t we have to say that the royals are homeless?

That same story also notes:

The Queen was the first British monarch since the Middle Ages to be born in a private house rather than a palace or castle.

She was delivered by Caesarean section at 17 Bruton Street, the Mayfair home of her maternal grandparents, the Earl and Countess of Strathmore.

A needle in a very large haystack, well found…hope you didn’t prick yourself.

If we are talking about change, let’s not forget that if the baby had been a girl she would have been first in line of Kate and William’s children for the the thrown. Seems British royalty does definitely change in more ways than one.

Regardless of the sex, this baby was going to be third in succession to the throne, guaranteed to be monarch.
Although it’s not likely to happen any time in the next half a century or so, bet Harry’s pleased.

@ucme Yes I know third at this point, but first of the children William and Kate will have. Maybe I worded it poorly. As in William is first before Harry.

Charles is next in line followed by William, then “Baby Cambridge” & Harry moves down to fourth.
Given that Wiils & Kate will almost certainly have more children, Harry, along with various minor royals, will move ever further down the line of succession.

@Ucme That’s what I meant. The baby is first after William. If William is King, then the next to be in charge is the new baby. Or, would Kate stay Queen first? If she outlived William?

I believe she’d be considered a Queen Consort, not a true monarch & that their first born son would become King in his own right.
It’s like the Duke of Edinburgh, he’s never had the title King Phillip…quite right too.

Got it. That’s how I thought it worked, but I didn’t feel confident about it. I learned that stuff back in Jr. High and probably didn’t get an A either.

I love the way you say “in charge”…it makes me giggle.

Normal service resumed, I guessed correctly…baby officially named George Alexander Louis.

Initials are GAL. Did they even think about the initials? Not that I care that it means female, but just sayin’.

Edit: Wait, what is the last name? I can’t even think of William’s surname. It’s never used.

Coulda been worse, Simon Henry Ian Thomas.

LMFAO! My mom knew a guy in school David Oscar Gsomething. I don’t remember his last name, I just know it started with a G.

What is the Prince’s last name? William and the new baby? They can choose a last name out of several if I remember correctly, is that right?

Hold on a minute, you just added that part let me think, they don’t use surnames as such, just titles, but his official surname is Mountbatten-Windsor…what a bloody mouthful that lot is.

I like Alexander. My daughter would have been called that, if she’d been a boy.

I don’t think the Royal Family uses their surname at all. William goes by “William Wales” in the navy. That’s a surname he can use on account of his father being Prince of Wales.