Awake, for morning in the bowl of night has flung the stone that puts the stars to flight.

And, lo, has caught the sultan’s turret In a noose of light!

Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable

 Christopher Howse: ‘A Pilgrim in Spain’

Cosas de España/Galicia

Andalucia: Yesterday, Mojácar, Today, Ronda.

A fascinating discovery, not far from Pv city.

And, down to earth . . . Useless(?) tools lovingly laid out today’s in flea/gypsy market in Pv city:-

The UK

The Liverpool Echo claims that – thanks to the efforts of local ‘influencers’ – these Spanish cleaning products have become very popular locally – Limpia Cristales, a window cleaner; Limpiazul, an all-purpose cleaner; and Asevi Colonia, a fabric conditioner. Bizarre but stranger things have surely happened. And, on the plus side, there’s at least 2 tapas restaurants in the city. Though one of these charges €31 for an Albaríño wine which costs €7 here in Spain.

In the UK, Liverpool is synonymous with humour. Talking of which . . . This article on John Cleese contains this nugget of truth: In Italy they admire their creative geniuses. In France ditto. In this country — perhaps because of our history of stability and suspicion of revolution — we seem to afford greater recognition to solid establishment types with their knighthoods and peerages. I think this is a cultural blind spot, when you consider that it is creatives who change the world and, in the case of comedy, evoke that priceless and mysterious phenomenon called laughter.

The UK & The EU

There are some, including me, who think that Brexit was a sensible goal, though not of course in the way and in the form it was abominably achieved by Boris Johnson et al. The basis of this view is set out below, from an article about British politics which will be of lesser interest/contentiousness.

France

This might be true, I guess: Less than a year into his 2nd term President Macron cuts an increasingly isolated figure: his ratings are poor, the team that helped him to power in 2017 has broken up and his landmark pension reforms face resistance in parliament and on the street, with mass protests across the country again this weekend. Yet help is at hand from a more popular resident of the Elysée Palace: Brigitte Macron, his wife and former school teacher, who is said to be giving the president discreet lessons on how to understand the mood of their ever fractious compatriots. The national mood possibly hasn’t been improved by France losing a great rugby match to Ireland yesterday. Highlights here. Rugby at its very best. And here’s something about the game for (North)Americans. Other than Canadians.

The Way of the World

In the early middle ages money was not much used from day to day. So, as we head for the cashless society, are we progressing or regressing?

Details here of just one of the many scams doing the rounds.

English

Dribble drama: A condition invented by marketeers who want middle-aged men to insert something in their underpants, As seen on British TV. But possibly from the USA. Talking of which . . .

Did you know?

Delivery of product from the USA can take an inordinately long time to reach Europe and cost a packet. I checked on a small electrical product – weighing only 22gm – and got these quotations:-

Product $18, plus:-

First Class International Mail (allow 3 to 4 weeks for delivery): $20.77, or

Priority International Mail (allow 2 to 3 weeks for delivery): $60.18

I suspect there’d be charges and taxes on top of this, the EU being rather protectionist at heart.

Finally . . .

Does this seem like an appropriate headline to you: One-legged British crime boss arrested after 5 years on the run.

My elder daughter’s writing is so bad she’d never even be allowed to write a doctor’s prescription. She wrote something which Apple then put into typed form, thus. Possibly only the last word is accurate. But only possibly:-

For new readers:-

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1. If you’ve landed here looking for info on Galicia or Pontevedra, try here. If you’re passing through Pontevedra on the Camino, you’ll find a guide to the city there.

2. Should you want to, the easiest way to to get my post routinely is to sign up for email subscription. As opposed to using a Bookmark or entering the URL in your browser.

THE ARTICLE

Janet Daley, The DT

There was one principle that made me an unequivocal supporter of Brexit. It was not a desire to stop migration from other EU states, which did not bother me at all because I believe that people who seek an opportunity to improve their lives make a valuable addition to society. It wasn’t all those niggling regulations, many of which were absurd and need not have been as rigorously observed as they were in the UK.

No – what made up my mind was the unacceptable basis for membership in this union of what had once been independent nation states. Since the birth of democracy, the idea of freedom has been rooted in a sacred guarantee: you have a right to elect the people who make your laws. What follows from that of course is that you also have a right to replace them. What the European Union had done – quite deliberately – was to remove that power.

The lesson that had been learned by the founding members of what had begun as a post-war alliance between France and Germany was that democracy was dangerous – the will of the people could not be trusted. Populations in the grip of hysteria can make terrible choices (Hitler, Mussolini, the Vichy government) so we must never again allow mass anxiety, which easily turns malignant, such unchecked control. Western Europe, in a fit of self-recrimination and idealistic fervour, opted to replace popular democracy with benign oligarchy. The sovereignty of member states would be dismantled to prevent any future war in Europe, creating economic interdependence to avoid the sort of competitiveness that led to regional inequality and resentment. In future, policy decisions would be made by EU officials – bureaucrats and managers whose electoral legitimacy was, at best, second-hand and who could not be displaced by any popular vote.

The final stage of this process is intended to be fiscal union, in which the uniform taxation and industrial subsidy policies of all member states will be dictated by Brussels in order to ensure that there can be no “unfair” competition. At that point (assuming that it is ever reached), holding elections for national governments will be pretty much pointless. On what basis, reader, do you decide which party to vote for in a general election if not its tax and spending proposals?