What the Spanish call ‘gender violence’ is a major media issue in Spain. As with paedophilia in the UK, you’d be forgiven for thinking the incidence of violence against women and murder of female partners here was much higher than elsewhere. In fact, they’re on a par with those in the UK and way down on those in Belgium, Germany and Holland, for example. I suspect the real concern is these crimes are on the rise in a society which has undergone a good deal of impressive change over the last 30 years.

It’s a ill wind that blows no good. Or, in this case, a fire. As various measures are being taken here in Galicia to avoid a repeat of last August’s horrendous conflagrations, work in the forests has uncovered 30 new petroglyphs [rock carvings] exposed by the flames. It would have been nice if these could have had Celtic connections but you can’t have everything.

I’ve been known to criticise the EU from time to time but I must say it’s wonderful to be able to read a letter in a Spanish newspaper expressing horror at complaints in Poland that one of the BBC’s Teletubbies is gay. It’s because of the defence of minority interests that the EU is so popular in Spain. And this must be what Turkey hungers for. Or is it the money?

Finally, my apologies to those readers who realised that Fuerteventura is neither a mere pleasure park nor even a city in the Canaries but an entire island. And my thanks to the helpful-if-tetchy reader who’d been able to endure what he felt was the high bullshit quotient of my blog but found this error on my part to be so egregious he finally had to put pen to paper. But my biggest apology must go to the people of Fuerteventura, who are rumoured to read my blog in their hundreds of thousands and to have been very depressed by my carelessness. It’s no consolation to them but I guess I confused Fuerteventura with PortAventura. Which is a pleasure park but in Catalunia. And about as far away from the Canaries as is possible in Spain. I blame those Spaniards who not only confuse their Vs and Bs but also their Ps and Fs. Which is particularly dangerous during live readings of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.