More bike news in this morning’s Periódico, which reports that council propaganda overstates the actual bike path network by 50%, and that only 14% of it is adequate, a figure which sounds plausible to me. And, as Ecologistes en Acció point out, even when a path is OK, it’s likely to be rendered unusable by…
Well, kind of, notes Technologies du Langage: you’ve got to call them “blocs” or “bloc-notes”. Jean goes on to note that “bloc” is already used in heaps of other meanings… If one had wanted to create “French” French at all costs, it seems to to me that carnet (“notebook”) would have been a better reflection…
I haven’t the faintest idea whether “nitty gritty” originated in the slaveships (“no te grites”, stop moaning? Nope) and thus should be avoided by good folks or whether it’s an American Indian training service, but I did like the following gangster talk: “Noo, man! Mi an di man fos taak boo dat, man, aa sins…
The right is perturbed because men are getting married on Los Lunnis. Their objections are historical rather than theological–no one’s suggesting we respect Genesis 24:3 and 38:6 and allow fathers to select girlies for their sons–and their problem is that the world has moved on. I’d regard myself as a natural PP voter (although that…
I hope that machine translation doesn’t get too good, too fast. It’s good to hear that separatist Rafel Homestead is taking flowerpots seriously (the Lads already have two devices now): his wine-producing colleagues further south opposed them as an Espanyolista attack on the local economy.
Since I’m arsing around this morning, here’s some more chicken news. There’s a good story developing up in Pont de Molins, a small village near Figueres, at the moment, where Adela Sánchez has been put on trial accused of murdering Mercè Catalán’s rooster, Matildo. Adela and her daughter, Paqui, had previously sat up at night…
I haven’t seen cockfighting in Spain, but to judge by this report there’s still a fair amount of it about. Here, however, the authorities are trying to stamp it out, while in Cuba they’re running the show: Police operation in the farming district of Las Mercedes SANTIAGO DE CUBA, February 12 (Antonio Alonso, in collaboration…
Teresa Amat has uncovered an extraordinary document (PDF) produced by the Catalan language police and the Catalan Women’s Institute (which, unlike its British namesake, does not make jam). Its slightly puzzling premise is that language is a mirror of society, and by changing the mirror we can change society, and its creators believe that their…
The French are going to reject the Euroconstitution, and for some reason this is worrying some Brits. There’s some interesting anthropology in this post by Jon Henley, and here‘s a contrasting piece from a couple of years ago. (There’s a much more exciting effort from Boris Johnston here (free reg), which includes the following: The…
I haven’t seen Entre el roig i el negre (“Between red and black”) yet, but hope to soon. It’s the diary, apparently genuine, of one of the anarcho-syndicalist gunmen who, when war broke out in July 1936, set out to exterminate the clergy and the Catalan upper middle class, virtually none of whom had anything…
Shop deliveries free on foot in Leeds LS1-8 & LS13. Dismiss