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 . .

HT to Lenox Napier of Business Over Tapas for these 2 items:-

• The wine of the future will be more expensive and will taste different: La Rioja is applying measures to resist the effects of the climate crisis, including high altitude vineyards, adapted grape varieties and a lot of innovation.
• Spain’s first abstract art museum, opened in Cuenca in 1966, as a ‘trailblazing cultural outpost’ in Cuenca

Brussels’ largess . . . The Voz de Galicia today: Half a century of European manna: Roads, high-speed railways, hospitals, schools or scientific and cultural projects. The European Cohesion Funds – celebrating their 50th anniversary this year – have had a transformative effect on countries with lower income levels, so that they can advance towards convergence with the most developed European regions. Galicia is a good example. Our region has received almost €18.5 billion since Spain’s EU entry in 1986. This funding – key to the construction of infrastructures which national governments had postponed – has served to place Galicia among territories in transition, those in the process of joining the club of the most developed regions of the 27. Is it any surprise that the EU is popular in such regions and, indeed, countries. Poland being perhaps the best example.

The USA

How anti-Semitism became a virtue on American campuses: The anti-Israel camps taking over elite universities are a physical manifestation of the DEI agenda.

Quote of the Day

We must acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not only to other men but to the humblest living creature, with his god-like intellect which has penetrated into the movements and constitution of the solar system – with all these exalted powers- Man still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin – Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, 1871. Probably Woman as well.

The Way of the World

The book “May Contain Lies'” is a wonderful litany of the myriad ways in which we can be deceived, and deceive ourselves, Taster: Today the temptation to believe our own truth to the point of collectively deceiving ourselves, hugely intensified by social media and its accompanying polarisation, has become an everyday talking point – the enemy of democracy and, arguably, civilisation itself.

Russia

A case in point? . . .  In Moscow in March, a group of top clergy and pious entrepreneurs from the Kremlin’s inner circle lauded their country’s role as creators of the so-called Russian World. This was defined as a “spiritual and cultural-civilisational phenomenon” stretching far beyond the state’s legal borders, embracing all those who recognised the Russians’ self-imposed mission, which was to restrain evil across the globe. Talk about self delusion . . .

Social Media

A pious exhortation from that book? Social media users, pause and reflect before you retweet. Are you sure this information is right?

English

All strength to their elbows . . . Yorkshire apostrophe fans demand road signs with nowt taken out. The municipal council says the punctuation mark must go to suit computer databases, but grammar purists see signs of falling standards.

Do You Know?

A US study claims that eating pistachios daily can help improve brain function and memory. If that were true, Iranians would be the smartest folk on the planet, and there just ain’t much evidence of that right now. Perhaps the mullahs eschew the nuts and so remain dumb.

Did You know

As some readers will recall, George Borrow was an exceptional English chap and the author of an engaging book, The  Bible in Spain. Reader Perry has kindly sent me this video, which – at minute 5.51 – says a nice word or two about the man.

Finally . . .

Yesterday, the first moth of the year. Today, the first wasp. All downhill now . . .

A young waitress in a cafe I patronise has rather large lips, which currently seem to be festering. But not, apparently, as a result of a cold sore. I wondered if an injection had gone wrong – a thought endorsed by this comment i’ve just read: I recently reported on young women trying to stand out on Instagram by getting lip fillers. Their lips keep inflating en masse, like a dark Roald Dahl story. Madness.

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.

If you’re thinking of moving to Spain, go to one of my early April posts to see a link to an excellent guide on this.