Thoughts from Galicia: 4.7.17

Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.

- Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain. 

If you've arrived here because of an interest in Galicia or Pontevedra, see my web page here.

Life in Spain:-

• If you're getting ready to enjoy the next (San Fermín) week in Pamplona, you might first want to read this debunking article, in English, from El País.
• If this report is true - and if things progress as threatened - it might soon be safe to venture into the crystal clear waters of the Galician coast. The last time I did this - in 2000 - I put my manhood at severe risk.
• There's an absolute mania for gin here in Spain right now. Not 'gin and tonic' but jintonic. Which comes always with a ludicrous amount of garden shrubbery and such nonsenses as pouring the gin down the back of a teaspoon. All designed, of course, to elevate your 'experience'. Or possibly to justify the premium prices. Anyway, Perry has cited this book on the story of gin in its spiritual home, London. 
• I've mentioned, I think, that inheritance tax in Spain is what the British call a 'postcode lottery'. How much has to be paid depends on which region the legator lives in. It ranges from nil to 11% on an inheritance of €422,000. Or from virtually nothing to 22% on an inheritance of €1m. 

• Not before time, it's suggested that the Catholic Church is going to lose its (medieval) tax exemption in respect of properties being used for economic, rather than religious, purposes. Why any exemption at all, some of us would ask. For one thing, it's not exactly a cash-strapped organisation.
• While the case for taking on Spanish nationality - if you're a worried post-Brexit Brit - might not be as strong as it was, you might still want to get some idea of the written test you'll have to undertake. Seems pretty easy to me . . . .

I have a particular aversion to certain TV ads. I'm making a list and will post it one day. For now, I need to vent my spleen about a UK phone company which is trumpeting of its latest package that it "now comes with European roaming included'. It was always included, of course. This is adspeak for "We've been stopped from profiteering by ripping you off via high roaming charges when the incremental cost to us of giving you this is nil."

Here's a Guardian columnist's take on the latest Trump madness. This sentence rather endorses my view that, if he does go to the UK, he should be met by silence and LOSER placards and banners:- It is important that America sees that its leader is not just unwelcome but absolutely despised. He is not revered as a strongman, he is seen as an unstable despotic loser.

Here in Pontevedra, the local police - one of several different forces patrolling our streets looking to fine motorists - recently arrested a chap for stealing rocks from the city's roundabouts. He was 82 years old.

Finally . . .  Happy Fourth of July Day to all my US readers. 

Today's cartoon:-

Dedicated to Alfie Mittington. . . .

By the way, it's been suggested that Alfie and I are one and the same. And that our enmity is all a joke on my part. I can assure you it isn't. I know where he lives. And one of these days . . .