The Crown Prince and his wife, the lovely Letitia, have announced that they’re having their first child in November. El Mundo responded to this long-awaited development by devoting its first 14 pages to the subject. Indeed, its front page headline was that the gender of the child would impact on the revision of Spain’s Constitution. If it’s a boy, discussions can continue at a leisurely pace as he will succeed under any circumstances. But, if it’s a girl, her accession can only be assured by quickly correcting the sexual inequality enshrined in the existing Constitution. At least, I think this is what it said. I was a bit punch drunk from all the saccharine coverage when I plunged into the details of the political aspects.

In my blog of 3 May, I mentioned a sign near the Royal Palace. Here’s the exact [though less-than-perfect] English text, kindly supplied by our friend, Amber:- Attention: It’s commend all visitors of these gardens to pay attention to your wallet, bag, cachpack, etc. It’s not always policemen here. For policia municipal 112. But in Spanish, it reads: Warning: You are recommended to take care of your wallets, bags, backpacks, etc. in these gardens. There are Moroccan, Rumanian, etc. crooks operating here. And there aren’t always policemen here. For the city police, call 112. No beating about the Spanish bush, then.

You may or may not know that today was the Feast of the Holy EU. A flier in my newspaper advised that – as well as an anthem, a flag, a currency and one or two other things, the EU now has this fiesta day in commemoration of the Schuman Declaration of 9 May 1950. I suppose we can look forward to an EU Catechism next year.