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

Inflation here in Spain, per the VdG: One bit goes up, the total comes down: Inflation continues to drop. It’s the 4th consecutive month in which prices have fallen. The opposite of what happened last year around this time. The CPI didn’t reach 2% for the first time in a long while. However, sugar, milk, potatoes and oil and continue to rise. Only fruit seems to be doing the opposite in our shopping baskets.

As for olive oil prices generally . . . The FT reports that: Prices are surging into record-breaking territory after an extended period of unusually dry weather in southern Europe damaged crops. European prices first moved above €4/ko in September but have now shot up to more than €7/ko owing to soaring temperatures and a lack of rainfall in Spain, Italy and Portugal. Spanish officials say the devastating effects of heatwaves and water shortages* demonstrate the urgency of tackling climate change, but an election next week could install a new government that is less convinced. The matter has become a hot topic in Spain, where olive oil is a staple product with an outsized influence on economic sentiment. More here.

*Spain has one of the highest per capita water stats in the world but I wonder what it would be if all the golf courses were excluded. They’re mostly in the (very) hot and dry South, of course.

Today saw the 7th and final encierro in Pamplona. As with all the others, it was rapid and poco peligroso, leaving the commentators struggling a bit with what to say. Though I guess this view isn’t shared by the lucky chap who got a horn through his trousers, just a centimetre away from his orchestra stalls. The run was preceded by a hologram/AI video of Hemingway telling us a few things about the tradition. As for these times, the number of runners is said to be around 1,700, with women being an increasing percentage. Today, the pre-run commentary honed in on a couple of men in their 60s, if not their 70s. Perhaps wanting to go out with a bang.

The UK

Gremlins caused me to place Japan at no. 2 – as well as at no. 4 – in yesterday’s list of countries popular with Brits/DT readers. It should’ve been New Zealand. As I’ve been there a couple of times, my ‘hits’ total stays the same. I don’t think I have any readers in NZ, so I apologise to readers in Oz, just in case any of them is a Kiwi. Correction: Just seen there’s been ar least one NZ reader this morning.

Quote of The Day/The Way of the World

We are discovering that the decline of organised religion does not imply the eradication of human irrationality, human tribalism or the human longing for moral certainty. Astrology is – astonishingly – a booming industry. Antivaxers prosper on GB News. Among educated people there is a burgeoning faith in the existence of a quasi-spiritual “personal truth” that trumps objective reality. A fascination with apocalypse afflicts the “doomer” fringes of the climate movement and AI pessimists warn that the end of days is near (“everyone will die, including children”). Conspiracies such as QAnon have morphed into quasi-religions promoting visions of a child-sacrificing, blood-drinking elite that would not look out of place in a medieval Doom painting. Not exactly a new sentiment. Committed Christian G K Chesterton said many years ago that: When a man stops believing in God he doesn’t then believe in nothing, he believes in anything. Stupidity and gullibility are like water; they have to go somewhere.

Finally . . .

Another of those headlines . . . Off-duty policeman arrests a man who was strangling his partner in a park in Madrid. As it happens, this was in my daughter’s barrio of Carabanchel, and close to her flat.

I spent quite some time yesterday, assembling – IKEA-style – the lawnmower I bought to replace the one that burned out trying to cut the grass that awaited me on my return from 2 months in Madrid. It was less expensive than I’d expected, possibly because you have to put many of its pieces together yourself. The boast on the box is of ‘80% improved collection’. This is presumably in the plastic box that took me at least half an hour to put together. Essentially because the top and bottom halves wouldn’t cooperate and I had to press various sections of plastic without breaking anything, especially the critical lugs. But, rather to my surprise, the mower worked when I plugged in the extension cord. At least it did until one of my grandsons pulled it out and left me with a mystery.

A bloody magpie has just landed on the sill of my salón window, when I don’t have a machine gun to hand. . .

For new readers:- 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 – updated a bit in early July 2023.