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

Here’s The Corner’s – right-of-centre – take on the latest controversial political development.

And here’s The Corner on the government’s concern about a Russian hand behind a Hungarian attempt to take over Spain’s rail manufacturer, Talgo.

In this country of ‘low ethics’, this just had to happen, barefacedly it seems.

Back in 2012, the government quietly introduced the horrendous Model 720, on the reporting of overseas assets. Aimed at cheating Spaniards, it actually hit the low-hanging fruit of foreign residents. After a mere 10 years, the fines it created were declared illegal by Brussels. Here’s the latest development in this nasty saga.

A nicer link – to beautiful villages to visit this spring. One of these is Combarro, 9km from Pv city. But I’d give that a miss, if I were you. I’m reliably informed that the winter I’ve been missing is almost as continuously wet as my first in Galicia, 2000-2001. Avoiding this has been the silver lining to my current cloud.

Portugal

As elsewhere in the EU, the far right is gaining strength. Amusing to read that: Ikea recently used advertising posters for a bookcase with the slogan: “A good place to stash books. Or to stash €75,800.” The sum refers to the amount of cash police found stuffed in envelopes on bookshelves in the office of the PM’s chief of staff last year during a corruption investigation.

The UK

Things are certainly bad but surely not quite this bad . . .

France

M Macron is not a popular chap at the moment, either with his citizens or with others . .

• The Germans are angry with his recent bellicose statements, and
• AEP labels him here a tragic figure. But adds: The incomprehensible President’s falling star is no cause for celebration.

Russia

This is the article that should have been linked to under this heading yesterday . . . Apologies for that, to the one reader who might have tried to read it.

Quote of the Day/The Way of the World

It is a strange and alarming reflection on our modern society that the definition of a man is now a politically contentious issue, and especially in the context where our gifted [UK] legislators have potentially created a situation where it could become a criminal offence to call a pretend woman a man, and some police forces are being instructed that it is.

I so wish I could read a history of politics written in 2124.

Did you know? . . .

Madness comes in many forms. Here’s one of them. [Is there an uglier dog on the planet than this one?]

Finally . . .

A performative poet of Hibernia
Rhymed himself into a hernia.
He became quite adept
At this practice, except
For the occasional non-sequitur.

— Tom Stoppard

The aphorisms of 18th-century German physicist Georg Christoph Lichtenberg: What makes a prolific author is often not his great knowledge but rather that fortunate relation between his abilities and his taste, by virtue of which the latter always approves what the former have produced.

The Usual Links . . .

You can get my posts by email as soon as they’re published. With the added bonus that they’ll contain the typos I’ll discover later. I believe there’s a box for this at the bottom of each post. I guess it’s logical that this doesn’t appear on the version given to me . . .

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.

For those thinking of moving to Spain:- This is an extremely comprehensive and accurate guide to the challenge, written by a Brit who lives in both the North and the South and who’s very involved in helping Camino walkers.