Tough pronunciation; Thanksgivukah; More Gib laughs; Spain is different; More houses; & Caganers galore.

Driving into town yesterday I heard a Spanish broadcaster struggling with that old Anglo challenge of 2 consonants not separated by a vowel. So, Ridley Scott became Ridely Scott. Half an hour later I told a lady in a Chinese Bazaar that I wanted a termómetro rodondo. "Ah," she said,"un termómeto lodondo." The challenges of pronouncing other languages. Thank God it's so easy with Spanish - except, I guess, for the double R. But nothing to match the strange sounds I had to achieve with Farsi all those years ago.

I realise this may be tempting Alfie Mittington to slap me down again but I read that what's happening today won't occur for almost 80,000 years: It's the coincidence between Thanksgiving and the first full day of Chanukah. Or Thanksgivukah, as some are inevitably calling it. Possibly. Last time I looked, Chanukah coincided with Xmas, so it must be a moveable feast. Perhaps Americans will be treating themselves to 2 big turkey meals this November.

Madrid has moved on from yesterday's position on the British diplomatic bag and said that Yes, it's true, a bag was opened and it was, indeed, a diplomatic bag but this was done by a junior officer, who was stopped by a senior officer when he realised what was happening. And when all the Gib governor's letters had been read.You have to laugh.

There are times when Spain marches to the beat of a different drum from the rest of the world. One of these is in respect of surnames. Spaniards have 2 of these (causing endless problems for us uni-named guiris); husbands and wives have different surnames from each other; and their children have different surnames from each parent. Secondly, Spanish kids (and politicians) are marked out of 10, not 100. Then there's the measurement of blood pressure (tensión). As far as I know, the rest of the world uses the convention of, e. g., 125/85. But in Spain this is always 12/8. Which is paradoxical since in other areas - most obviously national surveys - the Spanish tend to take things to the ludicrous extent of 2 decimal points, which I've always suspected of being an attempt to give specious accuracy to the numbers. The other paradox is that the people taking my pressure and telling me it's 13/9 are all using machines which give the results as, say, 131/92. Two riders to all this: - 1. When I say 'Spain', I probably mean the entire Hispanosphere; 2.When I say 'Spain', I could mean only Galicia, as this article suggests the 125/85 convention is also standard in Spain. Then again, see this:- Popularmente, con cierta frecuencia, se expresan los valores de tensión arterial en centímetros de mercurio (en lugar de milímetros de mercurio). Es decir, en cifras 10 veces por debajo de lo habitual. En ese contexto, no es infrecuente oír decir a médicos o pacientes que la tensión arterial de un sujeto normal es de 12-8 o 12/8.   So, pick the meat out of that.

Here's a few more new-ish houses near me which I forgot to include in my recent compilation. Only 2 of the 8 are occupied, which is about par for the course. 

I calculate there are around 40 empty houses in this barrio de pijos in which places used to be snapped up within minutes of going on the market. If that doesn't tell you something about today's Spain, I don't know what will. Will they be quickly sold when the market eventually picks up? Probably but who knows?

Finally . . . a few examples of the bizarre model defecators that go into Spanish Xmas cribs. I'm sure the Pope was as highly amused as Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge. I'd have preferred her sister, Pippa.

What was I saying about a different drum?

P. S. A Jewish friend in the USA has told me it's only about 70 years until the next coincidence of Chanukah and Thanksgiving. Sad but true - You can't trust anything you read in a newspaper.