Journalist Fionola Meredith takes a look at what is making the headlines in Tuesday's morning newspapers.
It is a toss-up for front-page dominance between the Queen's diamond wedding anniversary and the ongoing saga of Northern Rock.
The Daily Telegraph goes big on the anniversary, describing the Queen as "radiant in white", and charting "a lifetime of commitment to her nation and her husband".
Libby Purves, in the Times, admires the Duke of Edinburgh's pragmatic "square the shoulders, get on with it" attitude.
"For all his irascibility and lack of tact, the Duke remains married, smiling, interested, and faithful to the strange job we foisted on him", she says.
At the bank, the government is considering backing a management buyout of Northern Rock to safeguard jobs and placate angry shareholders, the Guardian reports.
But it is taxpayers who could face a multi-million pound bill for the rescue of the bank, says the Times, after Chancellor Alistair Darling refused to give a guarantee that the £24bn Bank of England loan will ever be fully repaid.
'Blemish'
"Northern Rock? More like Northern Crock," sneers the paper's editorial, adding that the affair is "a nasty blemish" on the reputation of Britain's financial system.
Meanwhile, Guardian sketchwriter Simon Hoggart has a go at Mr Darling, saying that when it comes to this bank, he is "not saving, but drowning", while the Sun dubs him "Chancer of the Exchequer".
Several papers are fascinated by Amazon's new electronic book, known as the Kindle, which goes on sale in the US for $399 this Christmas.
The Independent says that the battle to persuade us all to finally abandon the familiar spine-creased paperback was ratcheted up by the arrival of the Kindle, which the paper describes as "undeniably natty".
The protest by dissident republicans in the Markets area of Belfast, which caused a policing meeting to be called off, is top story in the News Letter.
It is condemned in the paper as "bully boy tactics" by Christopher Stalford of the DUP, but Sinn Fein's Alex Maskey said everyone had the right to peaceful protest.
Football
Two very different football-related stories in the Belfast Telegraph.
There is a report on IFA Chief Executive Howard Wells' apology, after those 64 Northern Ireland fans were thrown off a flight to Gran Canaria.
And David Healy has sent a message of support to an 82-year-old Northern Ireland fan, who was roughed up and robbed by a gang of youths as he watched Northern Ireland beat Denmark on TV.
There's a strange and rather dispiriting picture in the Irish News - Santa and his colourfully-dressed elves standing out in the cold on Monday, as CastleCourt shopping centre was evacuated following a bomb warning, which turned out to be a hoax.
And finally, back with the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh's diamond wedding anniversary, the Times takes a clear-eyed look back at their nuptials all those years ago.
Tiara trouble
With its hitches, glitches and naff gifts, it was "just like any wedding", the paper says.
Apparently, the bride's tiara snapped on the morning of the wedding, and her pearls were left behind by mistake at St James's Palace.
And then there were the presents - 2500 of them, from all over the world - everything from diamond necklaces to automatic potato-peelers. Mahatma Ghandi sent a piece of lace, intended as a tray cover, woven by his own hand.
But Queen Mary, it's claimed, was "disgusted" because "she thought it was a loincloth".
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