Amusing that Stanley Payne believes that “the Left has had a super-legitimacy complex, as if it had the right to govern… In this way the Spanish Left does not accept the fact that it might lose, it does not accept any adversaries.” I had understood that since the 2004 elections this belief was the property…
From a piece by Cecil Eby on the not particularly lovely time had by the Abraham Lincoln Battalion in the Civil War: In their time off, the recruits prowled the city; they sampled the local conac [sic], said to have been blended from equal parts of rancid olive oil and low-octane gasoline; and they bought…
An amusing and completely credible post from Avui. Meanwhile Tío Lele has confirmed via a spokesman that he is completely happy with this, the final version of his corporate website. Apparently its brutal emptiness is a metaphor for the intangible aspects of making do without the brand. It would have been nice to include at…
I’ve been merrily dilettanting away recently with a couple of literary robberies and forgeries, so it’s good to see that Zazie over at cocanha found a really great one. What he has are extracts from a book published in 1842 in Porto, Portugal under the promising title, Cartas d’el Rei Don Fernando, O Catholico, a…
Last night reading Josep Rondissoni’s Classes de cuina for the 1930-1 season I came across an illustration of the packaging of one of the various foreign ingredients he uses, Royal Baking Powder. It’s actually called the Droste effect, of course–or at least in Holland. José Rondissoni was a Swiss cook who taught a blend of…
Another strange French trial: Following his master’s death in 1371, Aubry de Montdidier’s dog showed unremitting hostility to his master’s comrade, Richard de Macaire. Charles V ordered the two to fight, and the dog won, thus proving de Macaire’s guilt. (Cyclopedia of Universal Biography, via Google Books)
Rosemary has already been established as indispensable in combating Asiatic cholera. Here’s the proverb upon which such folk medicine may have been based: El que pasa por romero y no lo coge, si le viene algún mal que no se enoje. Adapted: If without plucking twixt rosemary you pass, Don’t bemoan your leaky arse. Sweeter…
Down due to mailbombing of the domain and what appear to be DoS assaults on this blog. Host says I may have to move. Watch this space (I hope I’m not being too literal).
Account of a murder trial at the Old Bailey on January 17 1676: There were two men drinking, and there arose a dispute between them concerning a Spanish word, one affirmed that it was not properly exprest, the other gave him provoking language for saying so, he reply’d, Sir I know not how to bear…
Account of a murder trial at the Old Bailey on January 17 1676: There were two men drinking, and there arose a dispute between them concerning a Spanish word, one affirmed that it was not properly exprest, the other gave him provoking language for saying so, he reply’d, Sir I know not how to bear…