As with the TV, so with the radio here. It seems the only time there's serious discussion is between 8 and 9am. By my rule of thumb, this is equivalent to 6 to 7 in those countries around the world - i. e. all of them - which don't have Spain's unique timetable. If you have to drive at this unearthly hour, it certainly compensates.

One commentator on this morning's program was unsparing in his criticism of all recent governments for allowing an 'utterly artificial boom' to rage away in Spain for more than a decade and for doing nothing to anticipate its end. Looking to the future, he noted that Japan still hadn't recovered from what hit it in the late 80s, implying a similarly long calvario. Or at least via dolorosa. I rather hope not.

Over at South of Watford, Graeme yesterday wrote about cazaprimas, the folk who pile into businesses to get the subsidies that are going. When reading this, I thought of the wind turbines that litter our hills and the massively oversubscribed tender process for the next lot of these monstrosities. And then, this morning, I read of a warning from the relevant British organisation about fly-by-night companies offering to let you salve your conscience and reduce your carbon footprint by installing solar panels on your roof. They point out that, in contrast to cavity insulation [payback in a few years], this would take you a fraction over two centuries to get your investment back. But I guess it could be as low as 50 years here in Spain.

I yesterday labelled the British football world mad. Here's an article on this theme from today's Daily Telegraph, aptly entitled "We're just spectators in a global soap opera."

Galicia

After lunch today, I stopped off at what a friend had told me was a new British pub in Pontevedra. This had a sign over the door saying Dr Livingstone, I presume and turned out to have been designed by a madman with a pile of late 19th century Africana on his hands. Zebra skin stools, sepia photos of natives and mustachioed men in pith helmets, South and East African advertising materials for long-gone British companies, elephant-headed columns, etc., etc. And the beer was Irish and German. Maybe it's a chain and you've seen one but I hope not. I had thought that it would lack authenticity merely because of the absence of aggressive drunks and vomiting females but I was clearly wrong.

I'm rather confused about plans to set up another 13 fish farms along our coast. The BNG Nationalist party seems to be pushing for the first of these to go ahead, against claims from the opposition that the speed is self-interested. But now we learn that an environment group which is allegedly affiliated to the BNG is threatening to take the Xunta to some European court or other because of the ecological impact of these farms, set against very little new employment. I suppose the answer is that the BNG is a broad church, with many constituent groups, all claiming to be left of the socialist PSOE party. Or maybe they plan to stop at one. Especially if they don't form part of a coalition government after the not-quite-imminent elections.

I guess it's pretty inevitable that the wonderful old-fashioned shops in Pontevedra's gem of an old quarter should fall by the wayside. By which I mean the hardware stores, the umbrella-and-knife store and even the religious artifacts store. During the boom years, these became tapas bars, discos bars or bank branches. But now they're simply being boarded up. Que lástima.

It's reported the remains of Neanderthal Man have been found in a village here in Galicia. My guess is they're the antecedents of our neighbours in the hills who keep four dogs perpetually on metre-long chains around the edge of their garden. Actually, it was almost amusing to hear them say last night - when amicably discussing the dogs' propensity to bark all night - that there should only be three. The fourth had apparently been destined for our predecessors but they had welched on the the deal. It turned out to be the biggest offender but, sympathetic as they were to our loss of sleep, they felt they couldn't solve the problem by just hitting it on the head with a brick as they were animal lovers . . . . Just in case there's any doubt, I should stress we didn't even hint at this and my animal-daft partner would happily shoot the owners if they so much as looked meaningfully at a brick.