Dawn

Dawn

Saturday, January 24, 2015

Fascist laws; A fascist state; LATs; Easy Chaucer; Beggars in Springfield and Ponters; & January flowers

Spain's criminal code is being revised by a right-of-centre government which seems to fear - perhaps rightly - an imminent popular uprising. The reforms are supported by no other party, so stuff consensus. Amnesty International has condemned them as as "a serious setback", which they surely are. But will they were rolled back if a socialist government gets back in? As for our new wonderparty, Podemos, I think we can assume the answer to this is Yes, if later this year it gets the support indicated by the current polls. Which probably isn't very likely.

Talking of right wing tyranny . . . Funny to see the (very) late King of Saudi Arabia being lauded by David Cameron as 'a man of peace'. Could this be the same man who ran a country viciously vying for regional supremacy with Iran and financing the Sunnis in Syria in the process? Not to mention the egregious Sunni ISIS, or whatever they're called this week. We'll be praising his human rights record soon.

I've long thought that the best cohabitation arrangement would be side-by-side cottages, connected by a shared door, with a bolt on each side. A couple of friends did buy two side-by-side Cheshire cottages but chickened out and knocked out the connecting wall, and its invaluable door. But, anyway, the world is now catching up. I hear that 'living-apart-together arrangements' (LAT) are the coming thing. It's not a guarantee of success, of course, and next-door-neighbours, Ms Bonham Carter and Mr Burton, have allegedly since split up. See here and here.

If you can't hack Chaucer in the original 14th century English and don't want to read him in modern English that loses the metre and the rhyme, this is the guy for you. He's very helpfully put a lot of The Canterbury Tales into a form that merely updates the spelling. Terrific stuff and he deserves a medal. Even if he is American.

In a Simpsons episode I saw this morning, Homer is told there are only 6 types of beggar:- bad musician; mixed up (army) vet.; cripple; fake cripple; religious zealot; and crazy guy. His friend has obviously never been to Pontevedra. Or any other Spanish city for that matter.

Finally . . . Discounting the bits of my bougainvillea which have never died, this is the first flower of the year in my garden. Except, I think it's probably a weed. But . . . As a weed is simply defined as "A flower growing in the wrong place/garden", I have the power to decide that, in my garden, this weed is a welcome January flower. It will very soon be joined by the also-yellow mimosa blooms.


And I've named it "yellowbell", for pretty obvious reasons.

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