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

Sixty years ago, sales of antidepressants were low in Spain – usually attributed to the fact/belief that life was ‘different’ here. Things have changed somewhat. El País reports today that: The health of Spaniards is worsening: chronic illnesses, depression, and obesity are on the rise, though smoking is on the decline. Depressive conditions affect 16.2% of citizens—an increase of 1.6 percentage points compared to 2023, which comes on top of the 5.5-percentage-point rise recorded since 2020.

María writes here on Miguel de Unamuno – one of Spain’s most famous philosophers – and his challenge to the Franco regime. Wiki on him here.

This seems to be the way of things these days . . . A stretch of the A54 autopista here in Galicia, will be 4 years late and €30m over the budget. Mind you, the new Centro Comercio in O Vao might only be a year late in construction, though 25 in realisation.

Our ex-Indian restaurant in Pv city is to be yet another tapas bar, called 2 Caminos. I’m pretty sure it’ll claim to be different. From all the other tapas bars, not the Indian.

Europe

Burning in some parts. A tradition going back at least a century or two.

The Middle East/West Asia War

The latest update from Naked Capitalism. Iran hardens its position. No Trump breakthrough as the October surprise?

The United States of Trump America

Trump

• Russia has been fine on Ukraine. It hasn’t been doing much.
• Zelensky doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
• If he’d listened to me, he’d have settled a long time ago.

Others

• White House spokesman Davis Ingle: Donald Trump is laser-focused on maintaining Republican majorities in Congress this November.
• Someone else: It’s not just that Trump doesn’t acknowledge loss. He doesn’t accept loss. I don’t think he understands loss. So, even when he clearly does lose, it is never a loss. He has the ability not just to represent loss as a victory but to create a world, a rationale in which he is the winner. I believe there is no understanding of loss on his part. There is no world in which Donald Trump loses.If Donald Trump were to lose, he would not be Donald Trup.

Pretty good evidence of devotion and stupidity, inter alia: Trump has called the affordability crisis a “hoax” – but inflation has hit his merch store. MAGA hats are selling for $55, a 120% increase from 2015. His “Victory 47” perfume, which debuted in February 2024 for $99, now costs $249. And probably all imported from China, at a fraction of the price.

Michael Wolff tells us here what he thinks will and won’t do after November 3.

A warning from someone else . . . If Democrats seize control of both chambers next month, they’ll have some limited ability to rein in Trump. The three biggest obstacles will be his veto power, a DOJ that will continue answering to Trump, and his power to continue issuing executive orders that bypass Congress entirely. What the midterms could determine, however, is whether the Dems will hold the power of the purse. They could refuse to approve new spending and make it dramatically harder for the president to govern as he wishes. But what we’ve seen so far from his sneering treatment of the judicial branch could well be a preview of the neutering that will continue to go down, no matter who takes the midterms.

Query; In what other universe would Hegseth be a candidate for president in 2028? Even in just in his own befuddled mind.

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. This is not simply a book about Trump. He is the vessel, not the disease – the product of a system decades in the making, fueled by powerful interests, weakened democratic institutions, and a media ecosystem that too often chose access and complicity over accountability. The book confronts the defining questions of our time: How did we get here? Why did so many institutions fail when they were needed most? And what must we do now to defend democracy before it is too late?
• 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.

Russia

It’s reported that a Russian satellite conducted an unprecedented, deliberate and dangerous close approach to a U.S.-registered commercial satellite; reports that it “attacked” it are speculation, not established fact. The closest known estimate is tens of metres, and the satellites subsequently separated without a reported collision.Russia had previously said that commercial Western satellites supporting Ukraine’s military could be regarded as legitimate targets, which makes the incident more politically and militarily significant even without an actual strike.

Spanish

• Escaneo: Scan
• Escanear: To scan:
• Scorchio: Very hot
• Curro: Job, work, jig

English

More words from Vamity Fair of 1850:-

• Pretermit: To omit, neglect, overlook, or deliberately let something pass without mention; in law, it can also mean to suspend or discontinue something.
• Persiffle: To engage in light, teasing, or ironic banter.
• Peculation: Embezzlement, especially the wrongful appropriation of public money or funds entrusted to someone’s care.
• Fuddled: Now befuddled

Did you know?

The world’s first circle/roundabout was installed in New York in 1903 – the Columbus Circle. It was followed in the UK 2 years later in Letchworth. If you want to see the challenge taken to the extreme, visit Milton Keynes in England. It is famously a “roundabout city”: its grid-road system relies on more than 130 roundabouts. So, I lot of déjà vu.

Finally . . . You Have to Laugh

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.