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’

NB: If there’s a RV in brackets after a (paywalled) link, you might be able to read it via a Reader View extension to your browser, avoiding the paywall. If there is no RV, it will mean that the article is free to view or listen to. If there’s RV2, it means a second click on RV might let you see the article though the first RV click didn’t work.

Cosas de España/Galiza

The ever-growing property crisis

• Mark Stücklin gives the opinion I expected on the 2 decrees that failed to get parliamentary approval. (RV). These decrees would have been a catastrophe, not to mention probably unconstitutional. Spain’s problem is that its major cities face far more demand than there is supply. If you ban evictions and cap rents, all you’re doing is disincentivising landlords from renting – which would have exacerbated the crisis. The second decree, in particular, would have made a raft of lease contracts essentially void. It is likely a court would have struck it down.
• One of the factors behind this crisis is the low percentage of investment in public housing in Spain, down to c.2% of GDP, as I recall. There’s been a collapse of public investment in housing in Spain over the last 20 years. Public spending on housing as a share of GDP has been cut in half over the past two decades, leaving the country at the bottom of the Eurozone rankings. Promises are routinely made and routinely broken. The latest one – from the leader of the PP opposition party – is more than a million new homes. Vamos a ver.
• An interesting view: The Spanish PM realises – 3 years later – that he lost the last election.

A primer on Spanish political parties and some election predictions(RV).

The estimable Mac75 on Spain’s dangerously changing weather patterns.

Idealista claims that the best Spanish cities for quality of life are La Coruña and Vigo here in Galicia, though there are many cities around the world which rank higher for this. The good news is that Pv city wasn’t mentioned. Possibly because it’s a terrible place to live, as it lacks a Thai restaurant. . . Inter alia.

The AP9 autopista was closed for 9 hours near Pv city yesterday, when a beer truck and trailer left the road, tipped over and caught fire. The driver escaped death, suffering only mild burns. By coincidence, it happened in a barrio called Dawn(Alba) at 07.22.

Ireland

HT to Lenox Napier of Business Over Tapas for this item: From the 1588 shipwreck to the Armada commemorations at Streedagh: how the “Invincible” fleet forged ties between Spain and Ireland in the 20th and 21st centuries. Four centuries after some 20 ships of the Spanish Armada were wrecked off its coast, Ireland has transformed that catastrophe into a bond with Spain—encompassing shared archaeology, annual commemorations with the Spanish Navy, and even a university award.

Incidentally, many congrats to Lenox on the 650th edition of his very informative bulletin on Spain, which I suspect is more of a labour of love than anything else.

Europe

Reader Perry has kindly supplied this video on the impact of a very strong El Niño this autumn and winter.

The United States of Trump America

Trump in FantasyLand

• I don’t lie. They call me Pinocchio but I don’t lie.
• We finished the war with Iran in one day. We’re staying there to clean up.
• Laura Loomer is a great Republican strategist
• Biden really screwed up Covid
• We’ve done nothing but bring prices really down.
• I could go on for alnhour telling you all the things I’ve done but it would be boring.
• There’s no one to deal with in Iran. There’s no president there. No one wants to be president.
• If the Democrats win, there’ll be a 1929-like depression
• If the Republicans win, everyone will have $5,000 and an economy like the world has never seen before.

It is, of course, beyond comprehension that c.30% of US Americans find all of this credible, even as their economic situation deteriorates further. Like a second marriage – The triumph of hope over experience?

• The other madman in the Cabinet. Video evidence.
• Trumps new best new female friend?

Relevant Books

• Betrayal: Trump, Putin and the New Age of Conquest
• To be published in October. Can be pre-ordered now: Wtf America?!: The Way Out of This Hell and Back to Democracy. On Amazon or here.
• The final pages of Kurt Andersen’s fascinating run through the USA’s history – Fantasyland: How America went haywire. A 500 year history.
• Profiles in Cowardice, by Jacob Weisberg. Cited in this podcast.

Spanish

• Señalar: To signal. To point. To point at. To point the finger at (accuse)
• Removar: To revamp, renovate
• Driblar: To dribble(a football).
• Regatear: Ditto

English

Xeriscaping: The process of landscaping or gardening that reduces or eliminates the need for irrigation. Common in the South.

Did you know?

I heard in a podcast that it takes about 3 months to build a house in the USA, which seems rather short. Perplexity gives these numbers for the UK and Spain:

• UK: 6-9 months
• Spain: 10-18 months. I’ve seen houses in my barrio take a lot longer than that. One or two are unfinished after 10 years, for reasons unknown to me.

Finally . . . You Have to Laugh

A golden oldie . . .

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

The Usual Links

This – from veteran blogger Lenox Napier – is an excellent weekly newsletter (Business Over Tapas) on all matters Spanish. Indispensable for those who needs insights on how and why things happen here.

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. If you do this but don’t read the posts, I will delete your subscription. So perhaps don’t bother if you have other reasons for subscribing . . .

I can also be read on X at Thoughts from Galicia. And on Substack here. I no longer post on Facebook.

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, this link should be useful to you. And this, on the annual costs of owning property here.