A big welcome to September – when the sun can still be high but our tourist numbers are definitely low. This, of course, is because most of them are Spanish. And it’s simply not done here to take holidays outside late July and August. Even, I suspect, if you don’t have kids who have to go back to school in early September. So, our old quarter will be an absolute delight. As would the beaches, if I had any interest in lying on one.

Our last big fiesta of the year – the Medieval Fair – kicked off last night, with various events down in said old quarter. The one that fascinated me most was a peripatetic group of pipers, drummers, belly dancers, stilted giants and huge dragons. I was particularly taken, as was everyone else, by the beast which had a sort of Bunsen burner coming out of its snout and which belched long flames every couple of minutes. Though I bet I was the only person there wondering just how long it would be before a section of the milling crowd went up in smoke.

Nice-but-noisy Tony next door was drilling his wall until 10.30 last night. But this was OK as, by my rule of thumb, this is equivalent to 8.30 in other cultures. Less acceptable was the fact he took up the task again this morning at 9.30, equivalent to 7.30. On a bloody Saturday. Hence his nickname.

Works by the British artist Damian Hirst normally sell for hundreds of thousand of pounds, even if actually done by his 4 year old. But something he auctioned anonymously last week fetched a mere 300 euros. Which tells you everything you need to know about the art world.

Finally, this report comes from a site called Typically Spanish. But I certainly hope it isn’t . . . A 30 year old man from Salamanca chopped off his own penis and threw it down the toilet because he ‘did not want to sin anymore’.