How
petty and counter productive of Madrid to veto the attendance of
Queen Sofia at Liz's grand lunch, especially as they're cousins. This
is because of some piddling dispute over the attendance of William
and Kate at celebrations of the jubilee in Gib. And this from a
government whose first act in coming to power was to end the
tripartite negotiations which had gone well for a few years. Pathetic
posturing fools.
Which
reminds me . . . The Falkland Islands changed hands many times before
they became British in 1713. The British took them from the Spanish,
who'd nicked them from the French. In the process, the name changed
from Îles
Malouines to Las Malvinas and then to The Falklands. Needless to say,
Argentina has never owned them, despite various attempts to plant a
flag.
I've
mentioned Spain's vanity projects and hugely expensive under- and
unused airports. Well, now comes the news that the government is to
partially close at least 30 of the country's 47
state-run airports. Hard to believe but some of these are fully
staffed despite not having any flights. Only in Spain? I know it's
hard to sack civil servants. But impossible?
And
here's news that may or may not be a joke. Spain's Eurovision entry
has been ordered to 'not win'. On the grounds that Madrid couldn't
afford to host next year's event. I would have thought that, given
Spain's record in this competition, this instruction was utterly
superfluous.
And
now some very local news -
A worker at a branch of the La
Caixa
bank in Vilagarcía de Arousa, Pontevedra, has fled after taking a million euros. The
man worked in the debt collecting
department, chasing late payers. Perhaps he's run off to buy an airport. Or 30 of them
Some
time this summer - you don't need to know when - London's Hayward
gallery will host Britain's "first
exhibition of art that explores invisibility and emptiness, with
around 50 [interchangeable, I guess] works by artists including Yves
Klein, Andy Warhol, Yoko Ono and Maurizio Cattelan." "This"
insists the director, "is not a joke." Obviously not, as
there'll be the piece of [blank] paper that an artist stared at for
1,000 hours over a period of five years, as well as evidence of the
movie that was shot without film in the camera. Sounds like a
must-see; though you won't be able to buy the tickets with invisible
banknotes. Damien Hirst is not exhibiting as his blank canvases were found
to have been produced by one of this factory workers. More here.
Finally
. . . On Sky News yesterday, they were discussing how to stop
the supermarkets diddling you with their special offers. After the
four Sky folks had all had their say, the only male there introduced
an expert with the comment:- " I have lady here with big tips."
Which brought proceedings to a momentary halt.
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