Like
all of my neighbours, I've been known to put an unusual item or two
alongside our communal rubbish bins, to be collected by the nightly
truck or picked up by the local gypsies. But someone was extra cheeky
last night and deposited the ex-contents of his/her bathroom – a
sink, a toilet and a (broken) bidet. Someone, though, must have found
them useful, as they weren't there tonight. So I think I'll make them
a present of my old microwave tonight. At the moment it's an
inconvenient trip-trap in the garage. Incidentally, the only dumping
that really annoys me is that of bags of hedge clippings that fill up
the contenador, despite the notice saying they're not to be
left there. OK, there's no municipal dump so they're hard to get rid
of but there must be a better way than this. A compost heap?
As
I was emptying my post-box this morning, the lovely Amparo emerged
from next door. Shortly after, came her husband Toni:-
COLEEN!
HOW ARE YOU?
Deaf
apparently. How are you, Toni?
GOOD.
GOOD. LEESTEN, I CUT MY HEDGE YESTERDAY AND SOME OF THE CUTTINGS FELL
ON YOUR SIDE OF THE FENCE.
Yes,
I know.
I'LL
COME ROUND THIS AFTERNOON AND COLLECT THEM.
No,
don't worry Tony. There's not many.
OK.
OK.
Yesterday's
election results in conservative Galicia were everything that the
Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, would have wanted. Despite the cuts
and the tax increases, his PP party not only retained its absolute
majority but also increased the number of its seats in the regional
parliament. Galicia is often included with Cataluña and the Basque
Country as a region with secessionist demands but the nationalists
have only 21% of the seats, split between two feuding parties. Their
percentage share of the vote is even less.
Up
in the Basque Country, things were rather different. The two
nationalist parties were first and second in the voting and will now
negotiate a coalition. Which will surely be more of a problem than Sr
Rajoy is letting on. Especially if November's elections in Cataluña,
as expected, bring a resounding victory for secessionist parties
there.
As
I regularly say, who on earth would want to be Prime Minister of
fractious and fissiparous Spain? What chance independence referendums
in 2014, at the same time as Scotland's? Whether Sr Rajoy wants them
or not.
Driving
in Spain
1. If
you find yourself on the inner lane of a roundabout, heading
straight on, and someone comes from your right, crossing dangerously
in front of you, it's you who's in the wrong. The inner lane is
reserved for drivers doing a U-turn. You will be fined otherwise.
2. Does
anyone know what the law is relating to flashing amber traffic
lights. My understanding was that one could proceed but should let
people cross if there were any. But I've never seen any Spanish
driver stop for pedestrians.
Finally
. . . Interesting to see that the UK politician, Andrew Mitchell, has
finally resigned for, allegedly, making nasty comments to a couple of
policemen. Things are done rather differently here. When a town hall
car was clocked at 150kph near Sevilla at a time when the mayor was
on his way to a meeting there, the council said they couldn't provide
details of who'd been driving the car as the records for that day
were not clear. Possibly because they no longer existed.
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