Nationlists again; The hapless Mrs Miller; Spanish nationalists; Family fights;Estremadura; & Insults

I was saying that nationalists of all colours tend to vilify anyone who dares cross them, Right on cue, the Scots Nats have poured vitriol on a senior member of Nato (by happenstance a Scot) for warning that the break-up of the UK would go down well with, say, Russia. For his sins, he was described as crass, offensive and insulting. But, as they say, there's none so insulted as those who are looking to be insulted.

Still on British politics . . . Maria Miller - the English government minister who got her expense claims wrong - has finally resigned. Of course, given the storm of criticism of her in the media and the growing risk she'd damage Conservative prospects at the next elections, it may well be that David Cameron finally shoved the problematic and reluctant Maria onto her waiting sword. But, anyway, as I said the other day, the consequences of her peccadillos will astonish her political colleagues on the gravy trains of, say, Brussels and Madrid. That said, Mrs Miller leaves the parliament comforted by the huge capital gain she (legally) made on the sale of her 'second property' in London. Though the tax man is reported to be wanting to have a word with her about this. And he may not be as lenient as he was when she was in the government.

As for Spanish/Catalan nationalists, there was a big vote in the Madrid parliament yesterday over whether the Catalans could proceed with their proposed referendum on independence next November. Guess what the outcome was. See here for details.

No huge shock to read that nearly half of all Spanish couples fell out over the distribution of household tasks last year. But it was a bit more surprising, for us Anglos at least, to read that tensions also arose over relations within the family. The Spanish don't like to wash their dirty linen in public so family fights always come as something of a surprise. Strangely, the closer you get to Spanish families the more you hear of these.

Spain's poorest region - Estremadura - has hit on a new wheeze to increase tourist revenue - It's putting homosexuals even higher in its priority than the Chinese. The mayor of Badajoz has stressed that his city "has always been a tolerant place” and that he wants Estremadura to be the destination of choice for gays, lesbians, transexuals and bisexuals from across the continent. These, he believes, are discerning, trendy, adventurous and, most importantly, rich. A sceptical David Jackson has commented - "What the devil he thinks they’re going to do when they get there is beyond me – Estremadura is vast, hot and empty, with the occasional herd of pigs." That said, my daughter and I had a very pleasant trip there 2 years ago and we're not even gay. As far as I know.

Finally . . . you can't be considered a true speaker of Spanish until you're familiar with a fair proportion of its vast range of insults. So here's a list of 221 of them. And a few more in the Comments.