This year is the 60th anniversary of the first appearance of the bikini. On French women, apparently. This, of course, is a godsend for the Spanish media. I wonder how many times I’ll get to see Ursula Andress in all her glory.

Moving on to more dangerous ground – I mentioned yesterday that books in Galician didn’t seem to be selling like hotcakes during this week’s book fair in Pontevedra. One possible reason for this is that reading is a very middle class habit and – in contrast to Catalan and Basque – Galician is not a middle class language. To be frank, the better off here appear to regard it as the language of the peasantry. And, of course, of fervent young ‘nationalists’. Some of whom might well now send me their heartfelt views on my intelligence.

I had some visitors earlier this week who asked if it was normal for the family on one side of me to sit talking loudly in their garden until 1.30am and for the family on the other side to return home in full throat at 2am and keep their shouting/crying kids up until 3am. What could I say? If they’d asked me today, I could have cited the chap in Alicante who, at 3.35am on Tuesday morning, got so fed up with the noise being made outside his window by two youths that he shot them. Perhaps I should supply shotguns for my non-Hispanic guests.