Life in Culebrón

I'm going to tell you some things that I think Spaniards think about the British. You may notice the teensy weensy little flaw here. Actually though, when I say what Spanish people think I should change that to what several Spaniards have said to me, over the years, about Britain and the British. So my Englishness is not, really, a handicap. When I say Britain and the British, I actually mean England and the English. Occasionally the Scots get a mention, because of the supposed similarity to the Catalans and because Mel Gibson, like all Scottish men, wore a skirt. No Spaniard I've met has ever voiced their opinion about the Welsh or the Northern Irish.  Lots of Spaniards think that we are the only country in the world that drives on the other side of the road. This belief is usually mixed with an undertone that suggests we English are a bit full of ourselves. After all, don't we use different measures for length and weight too? I know, as do you, that there are about 70 or ...

I read a book last week. In it a young woman has moved to the country, to a small village in the middle of nowhere Spain. She's thinking community and tranquillity. She rents a house and the first thing that she asks her landlord is if he knows someone who might have a dog for her. I was reminded of one of Maggie's stories. Maggie worked with a woman in Madrid who had a Spanish partner. The couple decided to move to the countryside and one of the requisites, one of the first things to do, according to Maggie's friend, was to get a "brute of a dog". In the book the landlord palms the young woman off with one of his own dodgy dogs. Like all good country Spaniards the landlord thinks that it's cruel and unusual to sterilize a pet. The newcomer is from the city though and she takes the dog, for sterilization, to the nearest vet. The description of the vet's office is of a dusty and run down place where the vet is reading his phone and where there are no clie...