End-of-year words.

- Three eggs?
- One to glaze the croissants, the others for the Guardia Civil patrol’s hangovers.

Who’s the bigger glutton, Tony Blair or Queen Eleanor?

2005 is pork barrel year for defence minister José Bono’s home region of Castilla-La Mancha. This should help mend relations between the local socialists and Madrid, which had become strained over water redistribution policy.

I think Juanjo Seixas is promising to extract a usable font from this chocolate factory sign. I hope he also tells us more about the history of this kind of lettering in C20th Spain: did standards emerge at an early stage, or did people continue to do their own thing until quite recently?

Two Aragonese exclaphemisms

Sartorial contrast in Spain’s civil wars

… and the roots of Spanish Christmas.

If another 20 North African criminals were to suddenly appear on Escudellers at this moment, and if they were able to sing and dance, then they could put on my favourite pantomime.

José Antonio and José María on hairdressing and the Nazi peril.

“Respectable types were the tightest of all”

José Antonio and José María get dressed.

… in Tiana with Gabriela the (bilingual) whore (click):

… courtesy of white van man in La Granada del Penedès:

In Plaça Jaume I in Vilafranca del Penedès, with the Three Kings creeping up on a haute blonde Mary:

In the town hall of Les Cabanyes del Penedès, on this walk:

In La Granada

In Pacs del Penedès, on this walk:

“It is an overwhelming and barbarous dance. “

Tunisians, doves, Seattlians

François Grin (.doc): “On balance, the rates of return to English are likely to decline in the long run, in the same way as the ability to read and write, having become commonplace, no longer attracts wage premiums. Therefore, people will have an economic incentive to invest in the acquisition of additional languages, and it [...]

There’s a much-needed piece by Manuel Trallero today reminding us that, while we busy ourselves with the victims of 11-M and the Civil War, politicians of all complexions have quietly left the survivors of the 1987 ETA attack on the Hipercor supermarket up on Meridiana to rot. (Via Notes al marge.)

Tribute to Boer separatism.

… should be renamed “the Austro-Hungarian”

Vilafranca’s revolutionary socialists, predicting a camp future for their better-shaven friends from the seaside.

1st prize winner in Vilafranca del Penedès’ 4th annual cockerel competition, with admirer.

Council-owned bar, Les Cabanyes del Penedès, Catalonia, Spain.

My inner yogi/Is gonna like this bogie

“Er, excuse me, I’m an immigrant and I don’t think I’m a victim.”

The right-hand seat cover is slightly unclear, unfortunately. (Seen on the Sant Just-Molins walk.)

Exclusive photo of darling little pony CRUSHED beneath the wheels of a JUGGERNAUT.

Boxers, chickens, football

Thanks to Karim for the link-back.

The info now includes links to a map and transport information, since no one seems ever to have been to Cornellà, even when José Montilla was still mayor.

A lot of people still believe this, and a lot of people have a powerful vested interest in them continuing to do so.

There’s some good stuff on Gays Abroad.

eCuaderno on the Spanish press’s RSS-lag.

The Spanish securities market commission wants an end to politicising of its activities, it says. So why, then, with the referendum two months away, is it displaying a prominent link on its homepage to a government pro-European constitution site?

A 1932 Francis turbine in rural Catalonia.

Either I’m going crazy or La Retaguardia’s find-a-home-in-four-steps tool doesn’t work on any browsers. That’s quite an achievement.