Thoughts from Heald Green, Cheshire, England: 18.10.19

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

                  Christopher Howse: A Pilgrim in Spain

Note: One or two of the items below have been borrowed from Lenox Napier's Business Over Tapas of yesterday.

Spanish Politics

• Here's an overview on the Catalan mess from the NY Times, positing the right question. To which no one really knows the answer. 
• Meanwhile  . . . The riot report card.

Spanish Life

• Incredible Spain:-

1. A cliffside abbey. 
2. Divers stunning places.

• This article on Spanish eating and drinking habits claims that, if you spend a while in Spain, then at some point you'll inevitably find yourself with a large glass of Calimocho. Well, maybe if you're below 35. It also talks of 'green grocers', who are presumably in the van of one of today's movements. And possibly also woke. Maybe even XR.
• Talking about people being ahead of the herd, here's a welcome report from the city of Alicante.
• Useful for drivers? BTW . . . The Spanish law is harsh. In the UK, you're given time to display your licence at a police station. But, then, there isn't the same obsession with proving your ID in the UK as there indubitably is in Spain. In the USA, things might well differ from state to state.

The UK/The EU/Brexit

• Richard North is considerably less euphoric than most this morning. Click here for his sprays of cold water, as he tries to peer through the murk in search of possible/probable outcomes. You might lose the will to live before the end of his post.
• The Local reminds us here of what a Brexit deal will mean for Brits resident in Spain

The USA

• Shysting at its very best. All premised on the imminence of the End Time(s), which have been coming for quite a while now. And have led to several major disappointments. But rarely embarrassments. Let alone apologies.

Spanish

• Word of the Day: Quejona: Complainer; whiner; moaner. Oddly, I can't find this in the Royal Academy's dictionary, where quejoso/a is preferred. But there are synonyms here.

English 

• A chap on the radio said he was couth, kempt and shevelled. Thus describing himself with 3 words no longer used in British (nor American?) English. Though you might stumble across one in an Indian newspaper, I guess.

Finally . . .

• I was in Liverpool again yesterday. Such is the pace of construction there that I was convinced the several new tall buildings on the right as I moved from Wapping Street to Upper Parliament Street hadn't been there the previous week. 
• And, while stopped at the traffic lights on the latter street, I snapped this:-

My impression is that much of this residential development is for the ever-growing student population. Though maybe not in (luxury-oriented?) Parliament Square.