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 Galicia/España

The rebellious Catlans are amnestied by ‘a traitor’.

One [political] fight is over, while another has just begun.

Good news for Galicia residents. . . . The VdG today: Un rival de Renfe en Galicia: Llegaron los trenes Avril, con ciertas dificultades y retrasos horarios, y su nueva tecnología de ancho variable podría ser la clave para el fin del monopolio de Renfe en la comunidad. Iryo, la compañía hispanoitaliana de bajo coste, ha puesto sus ojos en las nuevas unidades de Talgo. Desde que llegó a España, en noviembre del 2022, la empresa ya ha transportado a diez millones de personas entre Madrid y el Mediterráneo. Ahora quiere llegar a Galicia.

Portugal

A possibly uplifting – and ground-shifting – development in our neighbouring country.

Europe

Heavy stuff . .

• The 2nd article in a series on Russian ambitions and their impact on Europe: Putin’s master plan for Europe is bearing fruit. The death of Western democracy is now highly conceivable, with a return to authoritarian strong men no longer a far fetched fantasy
• What happens when a Labour Britain meets a semi-fascist Europe? Right-wing movements across the Continent are upturning the political landscape. Professor Costas Lapavitsas, an economist at London University School of Oriental and African Studies and author of “The Left Case Against The EU”, says British progressives have never understood that the EU is a Right-leaning corporatist construct, which has hardwired anti-Keynesian policies into the legal Acquis.

The UK

Those naughty Bulgarians have been jailed and might be deported back to their homeland. Where they’ve surely secreted many of the millions they pilfered and where they will remain local heroes.

France

I think we can safely assume that the French woman who doesn’t think much of M Macron is a right-winger. Though she wasn’t 45 years ago. . . France stands as a chilling warning for the UK today. In 1981, I made a terrible error by voting for the Left because the Right was tired. We’re still paying the price

The USA

A dangerously polarised nation. . . . Views on that trial and its verdict

• Possibly not the majority Democratic voter view . . . Love or hate Trump, this rotten trial is an assault on justice. Trump’s conviction on all counts will tear America’s already fragile political fabric apart from the seams. If so, Mr Putin might manage a smile.
• Here’s The Time’s expert on the USA, with his verdict on the political consequences of Trump’s conviction(s). Get ready for lengthy appeal processes. Poor us.

Elsewhere . .   Throughout the trial, characters so clichéd that they wouldn’t have been out of place in a tawdry Hollywood film filed into the dingy courtroom to give evidence.Among them was a porn star, a tabloid boss with an array of colourful ties, and a duo of tearful former White House aides

Quote of the Day

A limerick’s cleverly versed —
The second line rhymes with the first;
The third one is short,
The fourth’s the same sort,
And the last line is often the worst.
— John Irwin

And one from Edward Lear:-
A crafty young bard named McMahon,
Whose poetry never would scan,
Once said, with a pause,
“It’s probably because,
I’m always trying to cram as many additional syllables into the last line as I possibly can

More below . . .

Did you know?

There were witch trials in Scotland 100 years before the more famous ones in Salem. They involved 150 accusations, copious amounts of torture to extract confessions and 25 deaths. As all the poor women were all accused of bringing atrocious weather, it’s been said that they can be seen as the earliest victims of climate change hysteria . . . .

Finally . . .

Carla Denyer is one of the 2 co-leaders of the UK Green Party. I had to smile at this comment about her press conference yesterday: “Good morning, Bristol!” yelped Denyer, who identifies as a “pansexual nontheist Quaker”. You wonder what Elizabeth Fry would have made of that. Denyer was tiny and spoke in a high-pitched squeak, like a squirrel on helium.

More from Lear . .

There was an Old Man with a beard,
Who said, ‘It is just as I feared!
Two Owls and a Hen,
Four Larks and a Wren

There was an Old Person of Ischia,
Whose conduct grew friskier and friskier;
He danced hornpipes and jigs,
And ate thousands of figs,
That lively Old Person of Ischia.

There was an Old Man who said, ‘Hush!
I perceive a young bird in this bush!’
When they said, ‘Is it small?’
He replied, ‘Not at all!
It is four times as big as the bush!’

There was an Old Person of Ewell,
Who chiefly subsisted on gruel;
But to make it more nice
He inserted some mice,
Which refreshed that Old Person of Ewell.

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.
• 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. And this is something on the so-called Beckham Rule, which is beneficial – tax-wise – for folk who want to work here.
• Mortgage advice.