Today our local mayor will prove the effectiveness of the council’s river purification campaign by taking a bath in its waters. At least, this is what I thought the headline said. But then I recalled that to have a bath in Spanish is the same as to have a swim. Not many of us, though, do either of these in the full glow of a son et lumière show. Our mayor could clearly teach even Tony Blair a thing or two about ‘eye-catching initiatives’. Or possibly worm-catching, in this case.

For the 5th time in a few years, my water supplier has changed. I know this because I’ve received a letter telling me so. Surprisingly [or not surprisingly these days] the note says nothing of the premium price now being charged on water above a certain volume. But, then, I’ve never received any explanation at all for the huge price increases of the last 5 years. Somewhere there must be a happy compromise between this and the 20 pages you get each year from a British company telling you exactly where all the money has gone and is about to go. Not that you can do much about it in either case, I suppose.

I’ve mentioned a couple of times that, for reasons one can only guess at, Spain has a disproportionate percentage of the EU’s 500 euro notes. These, of course, are favoured by those whose transactions are mainly in cash and I’m indebted to my friend Andrew for the news they’re called Bin Ladens here. Everyone knows they exist but no one has ever seen one.