Awake, for morning in the bowl of night has flung the stone that puts
the stars to flight.

And, lo, the hunter of the east 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/Galiza

Trouble at t’mill for the PSOE government – it loses one of the coalition partners who allowed it to form an administration.

We’re coming up to the sad anniversary of the appalling floods in Valencia. The BBC has an article here and The Guardian here. The VdG had this cartoon today of the regional president Sr Mazón, who’s being kept in his job by the 2 right-wing parties, PP and Vox.

The PP party also features/stars in what is said to be one of the largest corruption scandals in recent European history. It’s called the Gürtel Case and we began to hear about it 16 years ago. However, the accused didn’t go on trial for another 7 years and the final session of the trial is now imminent, after running for 9 years. It’s true that the left-wing party also has its share of corruption scandals but but the PP party takes the gold medal in this competition, possibly because of its much closer links with companies

Also implicated in corruption was the self-exiled king, Juan Carlos, who claims in a book about to be published that the ‘controversial’ sum of $100 million was given to him by the King of Saudi Arabia as a ‘gesture of generosity from one king to another’. Somehow, this ended up in the bank account of JC’s lover. Who, as I recall, refused to give it back, saying that she, too, had received it as a gift. A future Netflix series?

Coming back down to the mundanity of plebeian life . . . More from the VdG on the large increase in our rubbish collection bills: The hike in the tax will force further increases in coming years. The principle imposed by the EU is “The polluter pays”. This has led the government to force councils to pass on the true cost of waste collection and treatment to residents. This has meant double-digit bill increases and sparked protests like those in a town where some businesses will pay up to 10 times more for the same service. Furthermore, the differences between municipalities, or even neighbouring towns, are significant, adding to public unrest.

The mad, bad world of MAGA

Sound at all familiar? . . . There was a vast and rapidly growing system of plunder, expropriation and embezzlement under the Third Reich. It started at the very top, with Hitler himself. To begin with, when the President died, Hitler was able to lay his hands on the his official funds. Expenditure from these had previously been subject to internal audit in the Finance Ministry and the ultimate approval of the Reichstag[= Congress], as had also been the case with the Reich Chancellor’s personal budget. With the effective emasculation of the Reichstag and the removal of any element of critical investigation of government actions by the press and the mass media, not to mention the overwhelming personality cult that surrounded Hitler himself, a cult that brooked no criticism of the Leader in any respect, the way was now open for the expenditure of these funds for any purpose Hitler desired.

Quotes of the Day

• Trump wants you to think Biden was president in 2020. [As he does, apparently]
• We [in the Anglo world at least] are in the middle of a great unmooring, where the undoubted cultural excesses of one era are giving way to the likely even less healthy cultural excesses of the next – including dangerously irrational bigotry and worse. [The pendulum effect, I guess.]
• Everything that Trump does – absolutely everything – goes back to his ego.

Spanish

• Flequillo: UK: Fringe. USA: Bang.
• Savia: Sap, lifeblood.
• Gusanillo: Bug, worm. Itch (to do something).
• Losa: Slab, tile, stone.
• Entre la espada y la pared: Between a rock and a hard place. (Lit. Between the sword and the wall)

English

• Crapsack world: A horrible setting where the jaded notion of “anything that can go wrong will go horribly, horribly wrong” almost always applies, and it corrupts its inhabitants into perpetuating that nastiness against each other. US rider: More succinctly, trying to survive in one of these places is gonna suck.
• Think piece: A type of article that presents an author’s opinions and analysis on a specific topic, often aiming to provoke thought and discussion. It typically includes background information and is meant to explore deeper meanings or perspectives on current issues. [So, not my blog]

Did you know?

This is the carnivorous but photogenic ‘Death ball’ tree sponge, recently discovered in depths of the Southern Ocean, along with 29 other previously unknown deep-sea species. Details here.

You Have to Laugh

Meghan Merkel launches a €55 candle with the ‘signature scent of my family home’. It’s promoted as ‘elevated cosiness that feels like a hug’. Even funnier is that folk will buy it.

Finally . . .

ME AND RYAN PART 3 – VICTORY!

Those of you who are still with me will know that my border collie, Ryan, and I have been engaged in a lengthy struggle for domination of the household. In this, he has been handicapped by the fact that, although he has a high degree of canine intelligence, this is no match for my mix of tactical and strategic genius. Nor can he belt me across the ear when I don’t do what he wants. So it will come as no great surprise that – after a vicious campaign on two fronts – I have emerged the complete victor.

The first front opened up was in the area of food. Ryan succumbed to a dose of flu or something, during which he ate nothing at all. After four or five days of this, more progress had been made in reducing his excess weight than through all the dietary efforts of the last 5 months combined. But I was a tad concerned – not to say annoyed – when, after his recovery, he refused to even consider the dry food he had been eating for the past few years. Presumably he had fingered this as the cause of his illness and was determined to get his diet changed. But I declined to get involved in the messy and time-consuming business of buying and dispensing canned food and simply dished out his dried stuff and left him to it. I was very determined about this and totally unwilling to compromise. After a further four days of a starvation diet, Ryan was down to a more-than-acceptable weight and I decided to soften a little and mix his dry food with canned stuff. I went to great lengths to disguise the presence of the former but he wasn’t having it. In the end, I resorted to reducing his daily feeds from two to one and he caved in. He now has 50 per cent dry and 50 percent canned food. A victory for me, I think you’ll agree!

The second front was in the area of Ryan’s sleeping arrangements. Although I have not caught him a second time on the furniture, there was convincing evidence that he had taken to sleeping on the settee at night, finding it no problem at all to circumvent the measures I took to prevent this – mainly piling small things on the settee to deny him space. I briefly considered confining him to the front porch but decided against this as it would negate his ability to guard the rear of the house.  So for three nights I cunningly arranged chairs in a horizontal fashion on the floor between the dining and the sitting areas so that he would have to stay in the latter. To my great annoyance, this proved notably ineffective as his reduced weight allowed him to leap over the amassed furniture like the puppy he used to be. Luckily for me, I had some guests staying and they hit upon the clever idea of placing a dog blanket on the settee at night and fooling Ryan into believing that this was his bed. In this way, not only would he be deceived into giving up his campaign but I would secure success in my attempts to keep his hairs off the furniture. Another comprehensive victory!

I read recently that, as dogs age, one would notice that they get wiser with the passing of the years. I also read that it wouldn’t be a bad thing to indulge an old dog a little. I reject both of these contentions out of hand, though there’s growing evidence that Ryan has read the same passage and has different views. Indeed, there is a thesis gaining ground that Ryan’s problem is that he no longer regards himself as a dog but as a human. This was first put forward by my elder daughter, Faye, who noticed that – during the Great Food War – he was prepared to eat whatever we were eating, so long as it was given to him in the kitchen. She also pointed out that, when I laid out five towels for five people on the beach, Ryan immediately lay down on the fifth one as I was straightening out one of its corners

From my position of unchallenged victor, I dismiss all this as stuff and nonsense.

On the other hand, if it’s true, who is writing this article, do you think?

My thanks to those readers who take the trouble to Like my posts.

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