Summer clothing; Turismo wars; Spain's Canutes; The bulls: & Evolution

Walking in and out of town once or twice a day, I have plenty of opportunity to study folk. And what I've noticed this week is that there are no young men wearing skin-tight micro-shorts. On the distaff side, however, it's another story. But, then, men don't generally wear skin-tight trousers, do they? With the possible exception of hipsters. And neither men nor women wear niqabs. What this says about modern European society I have no idea.

Last week I showed 5 Irish ladies to the Turismo and they told me later it'd been pretty useless. I thought of them today, when I had this conversation there:
I got some leaflets on Galician cities from the exhibition in Plaza España last week but when I got home I realised I'd picked up the Gallego versions. Have you got them in Castellano?

No, we haven't got them at all.

Why's that?

Well, they were issued by the Galician Xunta Liberation Front. And we're the Pontevedra Liberation Front. [Or words to that effect].

Certain sections of Spanish commerce act rather like Britain's medieval guilds - they combine (in associations or unions) and call on the government to stop whatever they see as unfair (desloyal) competition. And why not - it usually works. As threats to traditional business continue to arise from the internet, we'll surely see more of these attempts as self-interested containment. For now, we have the taxi drivers and the hoteliers, who both think they can not only swim against the tide but also turn it back. Fat chance.

Despite being vicious killing machines, the bulls that run to their place of execution in Pamplona are not normally aggressive on the way down. This is because they gambol along the narrow streets in a small herd of themselves and a few cows, pretty oblivious to the crowds around them. Which is why so many people risk it, of course. Trouble arises when a bull gets separated, becomes disorientated, turns round and heads for all the unfortunate braves who've just got down from or crawled under the fences to run to the bullring in complete safety. At times like this, the chances of a lone bull killing someone soar. Today, however, something different - but almost as dangerous - happened. A bull got ahead of the cows and at the first corner/logjam scored an easy hit. Finding that he liked this, he then went for everything in his path, tossing body after body into the air. Two people were gored. But it could have been a lot worse.

Finally . . . Did you know that only a third of the USA population believes that life evolved through natural selection.