It was a local feast day today so, as usual, the firecrackers started going off in earnest at 8.30. This wasn’t so bad but some keen souls had lit the first ones in the hills at 4.30. Probably just before the bastards retired to bed.

Graduates from the same school of diplomacy as the Prince of Monaco are now ripping up their diplomas with alacrity. Last week he ‘torpedoed Spain’s chances’ of the 2012 Olympics by raising the contentious issue of ETA bombs at the final meeting of the IOC. But, not content with this, he’s now declared his support for Gibraltar’s attempt to get a seat on the committee. Needless to say, this has provoked fury in Spain, where he’s now being portrayed as the biggest congenital idiot in a family of clowns. So imagine what would’ve happened if Spain had a real tabloid press!

We’re now coming towards the end of the bull-running in Pamplona. It’s a common feature of these that many of the huge beasts fall over and crash into the barriers on the first sharp corner. So this year the organisers have covered the cobbles with an anti-slip liquid. It’s been a resounding failure. On Saturday, one of the bulls slid so rapidly across the street on its side that it impaled itself on a hoarding and broke a horn. A very expensive occurrence, given the 5 years it takes to get the bulls to their pugnacious peak. Shaving the horns, yes. Sending them into the ring with a broken horn, no.

Teresa The Clumsy Cleaner has a new strategy. Previously, she used to break things, leave them for me to discover and then, when taxed, claim she knew nothing about them. Today she broke a pair of decorative plates then brought them straight to me and said she’d just happened upon the pieces. This might have been more persuasive if I hadn’t heard the crash from upstairs and commented to my sister about it on the phone.

There’s been an awful lot written in the past few days about the qualities of the British people. How ironic, then, to note that a 14 year old boy was today arrested for raping two eight year-old girls and indecently assaulting another, compelling one to ask in how many other societies does this sort of thing occur.