Today is Dia de Andalucia, a day of celebrating the uniqueness of this beautiful community. In recognition I intend to wear a suit of lights, eat chorizo and dance Sevillanas all day…¡OLÉ!

I love it when we have public holidays here because, like everything else which is supposed to be set in stone they get manipulated. I think we’re second only to Italy when it comes to public holidays, we have sixteen, but we also have what are known as “bridging days”. These are extra days which are tagged onto a public holiday, unofficially, but it’s expected that everybody takes them. So, for example, if a holiday falls on a Tuesday we take Monday as well. If it falls on a Wednesday we take Thursday and Friday off. Seeing as today (Monday) is a holiday everybody took Friday off.

I spent Friday fitting radiators. They’re probably old news everywhere else, but here in the land of the smiling mule ceramic radiators are the new and very exciting “must have”. They’re slim ceramic panels which have two settings, nuclear meltdown or off, BUT they use the same amount of electricity as a light bulb and have transformed Palacio Andaloo into a toasty warm home. Living in a house with metre thick walls is lovely in the summer, but through this winter it was often warmer outside than in!

Andalucia, ¡solo hay una!

A friend asked me yesterday what my favourite opening line to a book was. The only one I could remember (which I misquoted) was “Last night I dreamt I went to Manderlay again”. No prizes for guessing Daphne DuMaurier’s “Rebecca”. It started me thinking about opening lines and made me realise I’m hopeless at remembering them. I scanned through a few books to jog my memory and was surprised at how, just by reading the opening line, the memories of that book came flooding back.

How about, “Mary Ann Singleton was twenty-five years old when she saw San Francisco for the first time”. Any ideas?

I also like, “It’s flu season in my household, which means I’m lying around with a hankie stuffed in my nostrils while friends bring chicken soup and the dogs try to make me feel better by sitting on my head”. No masterpiece, but it sets the tone for the very funny book “If You Leave Me, Can I Come Too?” But my favourite of all time has to be;

“Operating Instructions, insert two long-life batteries, not included.”

Free Arash Sigarchi and Mojtaba Saminejad

link

I took this pic today at a friend's house. The light and shade make me feel like spring is just around the corner.

Susan wrote about one of those lights that come on in the car which make you think the thing is about to blow up. I too have been going through this trauma recently. I drive a Seat Ibiza, the engine of which is made by Volkswagen, so it has some features which are probably useful in Germany, but not here in deepest Andalucia…or so I thought.

We had a very cold snap here a couple of weeks ago. I got into the car to go to work and a light came on to tell me to use the heated rear view mirrors, something I scoffed at when buying the car.  After a quick fiddle I found the relevant switch and viola, instantly clear mirrors. Driving through the country lanes I was surprised to suddenly hear a “bing bong” (Like on an aircraft) come from somewhere. I ignored it. The following day the same thing happened as I drove out of the village, so I decided to stop off at the Seat garage on my way home. I always get nervous when I’m talking to mechanics because they could tell me anything, and seeing as I’m completely clueless when it comes to cars I believe them. The bloke in the garage was sympathetic though, he knew what the “bing bong” was and explained it usually wouldn’t happen here. It seems when the outside temperature drops below 6ºc there is a chance of slippery roads due to surface ice and the “bing bong” is to alert the driver to take extra care. Who knew!

A few days later I was driving again and noticed a light which had been flashing at me for quite some time. The light shows a spanner followed by some numbers. I went again to the Seat garage and asked the bloke what it meant. This time he wasn’t quite as sympathetic. “When this light shows it means your car is ready for a service. The numbers show the amount of kilometres you’ve driven over the recommended amount. In other words Sir, your car was due for a service 1,200 kilometres ago.”  Oops.

I read a blog entry recently which made me angry because it was patronising, so I left a comment. Below is the reply to my comment;

“i did not write this to make people mad... it is just what was on my mind...
In Leviticus 18:22=Do not practice homosexuality; it is a detestable sin.
Also read Romans chapter one verses 26-27.
what i meant by "not judging them" by that i don't treat them like slaves or dis them in their face.. i just tell them my opinion and give them love (the love i am/was talking about is in first Corinthians chapter 13...
when i said that "not to embrace them" meaning not to allow you to marry one another...
i'm still going to pray because EVERYONE needs God and i'm gonna pray for you even though i don't even know you..
i don't expect to change anyones mind about homo's.. i want people to know that there are people that don't agree with everyone.. and that God loves EVERYONE no matter what people think he will ALWAYS love us.. we just have to come back to him and follow his way..
God Bless”

Am I lucky or what!! I have a narrow minded, ill educated bigot praying for me.

I had to meet somebody today in a town I don’t know very well. When I asked if there was a landmark or somewhere easy to find to meet, he suggested the bull ring. For such a small town it has a very impressive bull ring, and seeing as I was early I started wandering around it’s outside. The main gates were open so I went in. It was absolutely beautiful! I’ve been in several bull rings before for concerts etc, but this was like nothing I’d ever seen before. The fighting season starts soon and they were obviously putting the finishing touches to getting the ring ready. I’m always surprised at how small the actual arena is, but being alone in one made me feel so small. The sand covering the ground was new and had just been raked smooth. I was trying to imagine how it must look after a typical fight, with the blood of six bulls spilt on it, but I couldn’t, it just looked beautiful. How can a place so majestic be home to brutal death? How can the grace and bravery of a matador’s performance result in carnage? I’ve never seen a live bullfight, but today I questioned why.

A couple of weeks ago my sister-in-law accused me of turning into my mother. Her actual words were, “you’re becoming just like your mother, boring”. After I picked myself up off the floor I thought about it and decided she was probably right. I’m only admitting this because I just had a call from friends asking us to a Valentine’s party on Monday. My first thought was, “Monday? But we have to go to work on Tuesday.” Most of our friends here are “second-time-arounders� �� so my second thought was “oh no, not another night spent with middle aged people eating each other and thinking it’s SO cool to know all the lyrics to the WHOLE Scissor Sisters CD.” (Something tells me Susan and Henry are going to give me a hard time over this.) Then I was told we had to take a plate of red food, i.e. red for passion. I thought about whipped cream and food colouring…and shuddered. I ended the call by saying the other Andaloo was busy dodging bombs in Madrid till Sunday, so I’d call back when I knew what state he was in on his return.

I look and feel like a rabbit with myxomatosis today. I’ve got a bit of a head cold, and had to be up at sparrow’s fart to get the other Andaloo to the airport so missed hours of much needed sleep. He’s gone to Madrid on a conference. You know, the Madrid that had a bomb go off in a conference centre yesterday? Yes, that Madrid. Hmm I’ll feel better once he’s home, but then again I’m sure he feels the same.

I made the beetroot up.

We’ve been tracking the progress of the cargo we sent to Sri Lanka as part of the local tsunami appeal. Eight containers left here on January 11^th, the shipping donated. The trip took longer than anybody expected because (understandably) any time spent in ports-of-call was kept short, or given “low priority status” to keep costs down. The ship eventually arrived into Sri Lankan waters last week, but was again left to wait offshore because of its low priority status. It was given a time to dock on Thursday of last week, but because it was a public holiday there wasn’t anybody to unload. It finally docked late on Friday and the port authorities went onboard. Unbelievably, (or am I being naïve?) they found a stash of weapons. Somebody, somewhere, presumably in one of the ports-of-call, had added a consignment of arms for the Tamil Tigers. Obviously nothing is going to be unloaded now until every container has been searched by hand.

I don’t think for one minute that this is a unique case. I wonder just how much the ensuing chaos of the tsunami has been taken advantage of.

A few weekends ago we decided to go and have a look at the Roman villas in Medina Sidonia. We’d heard there was a fantastic theatre, and villas which still had intact mosaic floors.

It was a lovely sunny day, and with camera batteries fully charged we set off for a bit of Roman culture. As we were entering the town I saw a sign for the Roman architectural site. We parked the car and set off on foot. Eventually we came to a big building on a small street, with a sign above the door saying Museum Of Roman Architecture. I must admit, I thought it was a bit odd that we were in the centre of the town, and that we were about to go inside a building, but this is Spain and you have to expect the unexpected. We paid the entrance fee and told to go through the doors behind us to the external exhibition area. See! Expect the unexpected and good old Spain delivers. We walked down some steps, then some more, and then some more. We ended up in a dark tunnel. We walked to the end of the tunnel and turned into another one. We walked to the end of that tunnel and turned into a much smaller tunnel. I could see day light, so we shuffled our way along until we came to some steps. We went up the steps and found ourselves at the exit onto the street. HUH? I went back through the entrance and asked the women on the desk where the theatre and villas were? “Merida”, she said. “And where am I?” I asked. “Medina”

So, if you want to see fantastic Roman ruins go to Merida (which is about another five hours drive on from Medina). On the other hand, if you want loads of photographs of the Roman sewers of Medina I’m your man.

Here is a link to some (bad) photos of Merida.