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
More here from the estimable Max Abroad on the (diminishing) place of bread in Spanish life.
If you employ a domestic worker, you need to know that: Every household in Spain employing a domestic worker, regardless of the number of hours, must have a formal Workplace Accident Prevention Plan in place. Failure to do so risks a fine of up to €49,000. Fortunately . . .The National Institute for Safety and Health at Work (INSST) has created a free online platform to simplify the process. Note: An AI search suggests this new law applies to employees officially registered under the domestic workers regime and is not a general new requirement for all employees in Spain. So, possibly not to your part-time chica who works as a cleaner. BUT: I have also read that the Real Decreto 893/2024 does indeed apply to part-time cleaners. [P. S. The final day for registration was yesterday but the site crashed because of a ‘malicious’ cyber attack.] I’m researching this further.
Down in Andalucía, Chinese shops (bazares) have been found to be money-laundering outfits. I guess this might be true of ours in Pv city too, as the Albanian narcos based in Malaga allegedly managed a “large portfolio” of Asian shops nationwide and Similar
The UK
Good question, after a truly terrible week for the institution – Is running the BBC now an impossible task? And . . . Will there be any (sane) candidates for the vacant top job?
The mad, bad world of MAGA
More insane Trumpisms.
- I don’t know what part of my body the MRI was on but the doctor said it was the best MRI he’d ever seen.
- She’s wacky and a raving lunatic. [Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of his most ardent supporters in the past, who now opposes him on several things.]
Not unconnected with that . . . Some good news at last. Reportedly, various right-wing extremist factions are ‘tearing MAGA apart’.
Some of the world´s leaders have actually made criticism of themselves illegal, not just threatened to. . . In autumn 1938, there was a marked increase in the number of people brought before the Special Courts for criticism of Hitler. I suspect it still happens in Russia.
Guess who – back in the 1930s – was prone to rambling and even incoherent remarks.
Query: Does anyone outside the USA now think we should look to that country for anything? Other than its dollars, of course.
Quote of the Day
In attacking a vital broadcaster [the BBC], the Trump is once again holding others to standards he flouts. He pays little or no regard to the conventional bounds of truth or honesty. To hold him to account for this dishonesty is to cast yourself as an arbiter of truth, which creates the instant and obvious expectation that you yourself must be truthful. Here, then, is the asymmetry: he can lie, but his critics cannot. . . A democratic society cannot function without a broadly accepted body of facts. The US no longer has that; there are red-state facts and blue-state facts; Fox News facts and MSNBC facts. The Watergate scandal that drove Richard Nixon from office would barely make a dent in today’s US: the right would simply deny the evidence, cheered on by its media allies . . . Trump’s disregard – for the public good as much as for truth – gives him tremendous power. So often he fights an opponent who is hamstrung by values he freely ignores. . . If the target is the media or the Democrats, the Maga base will reflexively give Trump the benefit of the doubt. But the Epstein scandal is different. Which is why the White House is currently straining every sinew to prevent the House of Representatives voting next week for a full release of the justice department’s Epstein files, a motion likely to be backed by several rebel Republicans who know how much this matters to the base. . . Epstein is the one battlefield that’s level – and the prospect terrifies Trump.
Spanish
- Estar como una cabra: To do something bizarre, a little out of the ordinary/nuts/crazy.
- Desmesurado: Excessive, disproportionate, etc.
- Caña: 1. A glass of draft beer, 2. Sugar cane, 3. The reed of wind instruments, 4. A fishing rod, 5. A licor, and 6. The bit of the leg between the knee and the ankle. The shin bone (tibia), I guess.
English
A couple of obsolete terms . . .
- Grig: A lively, bright person. ‘as merry as a grig’.
- Trusatile: Something that might be pushed; worked or driven by pushing. e. g. a wheelbarrow
Did you know?
Romance scams are on the increase. Last year, more than €120m was lost to these in the UK alone. An astonishing example here. The bastards are clever. And patient.
You Have to Laugh
Farewell to a mother-in-law
He stood on his head by the wild seashore,
And danced on his hands a jig;
In all his emotions, as never before,
A wildly hilarious grig.
And why? In that ship just crossing the bay
His mother-in-law had sailed
For a tropical country far away,
Where tigers and fever prevailed.
Oh, now he might hope for a peaceful life
And even be happy yet,
Though owning no end of neuralgic wife,
And up to his collar in debt.
He had borne the old lady through thick and thin,
And she lectured him out of breath;
And now as he looked at the ship she was in
He howled for her violent death.
He watched as the good ship cut the sea,
And bumpishly up-and-downed,
And thought if already she qualmish might be,
He’d consider his happiness crowned.
He watched till beneath the horizon’s edge
The ship was passing from view;
And he sprang to the top of a rocky ledge
And pranced like a kangaroo.
He watched till the vessel became a speck
That was lost in the wandering sea;
And then, at the risk of breaking his neck,
Turned somersaults home to tea
– Walter Parke (about whom I can find nothing).
Finally . . .
I can’t help wondering if this is a good name for a (brown) chocolate drink in Spain . . .
Reminds me of the Rolls Royce that was called Silver Mist in Germany . . .
And of the Spanish disrespectful phrase: Me cago en la leche . . . BTW . . No point asking an AI engine to translate that. And Google just gives it as Damn it! Yeah, well . . .
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Thoughts from Pontevedra, Galicia, Spain 
To be just a little more precise Estar como una cabra is a state not an action so rather than to do would be better translated as Mad as a bix if frogs (see what I did there – kept the animal theme going 😁) David done with WordPress
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Es increíble las estupideces que dice Trump. Sobre su resonancia magnética , no sabe en que parte…y el médico se quedó impresionado…en fin . No entiendo ni como pueden convivir con él sin perder los nervios.
He leído atentamente el artículo sobre las estafas románticas. Realmente provocan problemas muy graves en quien las sufre y su familia. Dicho esto. Es algo que ya tiene muchos años, aparen por todas partes, siempre se identifican como hombres ( en estos casos ) que tienen buenos trabajo con profesiones relevantes, suelen ser viudos y con un hijo pero ya hay otros perfiles, una de las profesiones más utilizadas son las de militar, más tarde cirujanos pero militares, ingenieros de petrolíferas, en diferentes países donde mas en EE.UU. pero ya aparen europeos dicen…que tambien trabajan en lo mismo, se interesan por ti y te preguntan cosas personales de tú vida privada, la primera es preguntarte si estás casada, si tienes hijos, dónde vives, en qué trabajas . Evidentemente cuando una persona está pasando un duelo por un mala relación anterior o abandono, está vulnerable pero cuando alguien que no te conoce te manda fotos falsas, de un Continente a otro, fotos de una casa , te cuenta su vida como quiere y tú escuchas lo que quieres oír, es muy halagador pero muy fantasioso y ya cuando te pide fotos en base al amor que siente por ti…ya es para como mínimo desconfiar. Y ya el colmo es cuando te pide dinero, te chantajea desapareciendo…vuelve porque save que tú estás esperándolo y pide más dinero. Es una estafa en toda regla. Nunca has visto a ese hombre del que te has enamorando. No puedes far datos a un desconocido, ni hablar de tu anterior relación, ni darle ningún tipo de información. Porque la ruina llegará, no hay un novio que quiera casarse contigo, ni nada parecido. Como a mi me ha pasado varias veces, que de repente alguien contactó conmigo, siempre con esas profesiones, sólo una vez, uno me pidió dinero era una cantidad pequeña a lo que no hice ningún caso. A los demás ya no les dió tiempo a pedirme dinero porque sus mentiras eran fragantes, yo le hubiera respondido, dámelo tú a mi, que ne hace falta. . Es que no se debe de hablar con desconocidos de los que no tienes ninguna información, ni datos, ni fotos, ni dinero.
Las estafas se multiplican y estas son antiguas. Lo peor es cuando se hacen pasar por uno de tus hijos y aún encontrándolo raro, piensas está en un apuro, son pocos días y me lo lo va a reponer ya, resulta que ni en el banco presencialmente, activan los protocolos de fraude que tienen como la policía y te arruinan.
También te llegan multas de La DGT cuando no tienes coche, en mi caso pero en otros no saben si es por radar, otros clonan matrículas y le llegan al verdadero propietario del coche, la multa, eso le ha pasado a una amiga mía, es ingeniero investigó , pero acabó yendo al juzgado. Los delincuentes siempre van por delante de la policia o de la ley.
Avisan continuamente tiene de las inversiones.
Es cierto que estar vulnerable te hace cometer grandes errores.
Las relaciones intercontinentales ( dónde no conoces quien está al otro lado ) no van a ser reales. A cualquiera nos puede pasar cualquier cosa pero muy atentos porque mienten cuando hoy te dicen que son cirujanos y al dia siguiente te dicen que son ingenieros porque ya se han olvidado de lo que dijeron el día anterior. Yo les entiendo , en inglés y llamarles mentiroso, me bloquean y sobre todo cuando les dices que les vas a denunciar. Eso después de haberle dicho que no tienes interés en hablar con ellos.
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