Awake, for morning in the bowl of nig+ht 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

Lenox Napier returns here to one of his favourite topics – ‘Residential Tourism’. I do wonder if our lives would be better if we did have what he, rightly says we don’t have. Our own Ministry?

A (subsidised?) Times columnist discovers the world’s best jamón, down in Sevilla. Spanish prices here.

There must be an election imminent . . . The trains that will allow expansion of high-speed rail travel to all of Galicia will arrive in November, said the Minister of Transport yesterday. The Avril trains can circulate on tracks of variable gauge*. And low-cost AVEs will be operative in 2024, at greater frequency and with more seats. According to Renfe, the Avlo will allow travel at 300km per hour, at prices from €7, with a fixed price of €5 for children under 14 and with discounts for large families.

* On the old tracks between Ourense and other Galician cities, I think. At the moment it takes 2 hours to do the 560km from Marid to Ourense and another 2 hours to do the 150km from Ourense to Pv city, via Santiago de Compostela. Assuming you don’t have to change at either Ourense or SdC. Which can add another hour.

Reader Maria’s Galician blog can be found here. And here on FB.

We’re all Celts in Galiza, of course, and this is our big annual Celtic Music Festival in Ortigueira, mentioned by Marìa.

I clearly missed this 2015 article about a place I’ve visited many, many times over the years. So frequently that, when I first came in 2000, they ceased asking me what I wanted and always just gave me a ración of zamburiñas al ajillo and a half-ración of calamares, plus a copa of albariño. By the way, it took 10 years for the owner to smile at me, and another 5 before he began treating me as a faithfu/honoured client. Things can take their time here. But his kids were a lot better.

The UK

The bizarre BBC again . . . Richard North yesterday: While all hot-blooded males of a certain age drooled over the singing of Jane Birkin, can anyone seriously defend the BBC’s decision to put her death announcement at the top of the evening news bulletin, elevating its status to the most important event in the world, for that day?

Talking of (alleged) Left-leaning organisations . . . Only in The Guardian . . .

Europe/The EU

European leaders have visited Tunisia for the second time in weeks in an increasingly urgent effort to halt the flow of thousands of migrants sailing from the north African country towards Europe. More here. Not only a UK problem. Nor unique British solutions.

The USA

Everyone who visits the US realises that (massive) pickup trucks – rare in Europe – are a huge business there. This article says the ‘oligopolistic automakers’ who are used to making ‘obscene profit margins’ on these now face an ‘existential threat’ from Tesla’s pricing of its imminent truck. Nice for the customers.

Russia

President Putin says the use of cluster bombs is ‘criminal’. Given what he’s responsible for in Syria and Ukraine – not to mention his domestic repression and his threats to unleash nuclear weapons – this is cognitive dissonance on a vast scale – assuming he really believes what he’s saying. A big If. The domestic gallery is what he’s playing to, of course. Not a nice man. Has Russia ever had a leader who was?

The Way of the World of Biology

Some scientists fight back here against the current ‘poisonous’ political ideology. A Summary: Biology faces a grave threat from “progressive” politics that are changing the way our work is done, delimiting areas of biology that are taboo and will not be funded by the government or published in scientific journals, stipulating what words biologists must avoid in their writing, and decreeing how biology is taught to students and communicated to other scientists and the public through the technical and popular press. We wrote this article not to argue that biology is dead, but to show how ideology is poisoning it. The science that has brought us so much progress and understanding – from the structure of DNA to the green revolution and the design of COVID-19 vaccines – is endangered by political dogma strangling our essential tradition of open research and scientific communication. And because much of what we discuss occurs within academic science, where many scientists are too cowed to speak their minds, the public is largely unfamiliar with these issues. Sadly, by the time they become apparent to everyone, it might be too late.

English

Is there a more dishonest – or at least disingenuous – phrase in English than We care about your privacy?

Spanish

Una bomba de racimo: A cluster bomb.

Did you know?

The history of vinegar in Spain.

Finally . . .

Maternal phrases of yore . . . Helped by readers, I’ve recalled* more of my mother’s favourite admonitions/sayings to her 4 kids:-

• Go and have a ‘good wash’. (In the days before showers)
• Have you washed behind your ears?
• Have you changed your underwear?
• So, it was Mr Nobody again, was it? (When no one owned up to something)
• Well, you know what thought did? He followed the dust-cart when he thought it was a wedding.
• Well, I’ll go to the foot of our stairs. (An expression of surprise. No idea of its origin)
• Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about.
• Were you born in a barn! (Exclaimed if a door was left open at cold times of the year).
• You make a better door than a window. (If you stood in front of the TV)
• You’ll laugh on the other side of your face in a minute.
• He’s gone to see a man about a dog. (When we asked where our father was).
• What did your last slave die of? (To which the riposte was ‘Giving cheek’)

*Truth to tell, I noted them down in 2018, a year before she passed away, aged 94.

To amuse . . . A lovely article from The Times of 100 years ago – on estate agents/realtors.

For new readers:- If you’ve landed here looking for info on Galicia/Galiza 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.