Thursday, January 19, 2006
Spain, The rain in
Well, it chucked it down. Absolutely. Buckets of it. Rain. From the moment we touched down (and possibly earlier) Spain experienced a weekend of more rain that it had seen in about four years.
And I pick that weekend to visit.
Ho hum. Supposedly, Fiona has a mountain range just outside her appartment. The Sierra Blanca. It's meant to be beautiful and dangerous (a lot like me, obviously), but it was simply obscured by cloud (again, a lot like me).
Still, the weather did decide to be a bit fair and stop raining for a couple of hours on Saturday night when we visited Marbella and spent the night eating tapas and drinking small beers. Very excellent it was too.
The really cool thing about Spain is that, unlike the UK, it has banned smoking in public places. You wanna smoke? Sorry Enrique, out in the street you go, amigo. So the night went on undisturbed by the filth that is secondary smoke. This meant that I was able to taste my food untainted by cigarette smoke. And very excellent it was too.
So can someone please explain to me how it is that Spain can ban smoking with apparantly no particluar problems, but our own "must please all of the people all of the time" Government can't get its finger out of the arse of the tobacco companies' collective arses for long enough to pass a law? Bunch of second-rate cowboys.
I could go on, but fear I might irritate one of my emphysemic-smoker readers. I think I've nailed my colours to the flagpole.
Back in Spain, and Sunday morning was sunny. Right up til lunchtime when the clouds came back in and the rain started again. And that's when something leaked and the power went out. Pow! No more electric today folks, bad luck.
So I got in a cab (luckily the payphone was still working) and made my way back to Malaga airport.
Next time, I'll go in the summer. I might be guaranteed some frickin' sun that way...
And I pick that weekend to visit.
Ho hum. Supposedly, Fiona has a mountain range just outside her appartment. The Sierra Blanca. It's meant to be beautiful and dangerous (a lot like me, obviously), but it was simply obscured by cloud (again, a lot like me).
Still, the weather did decide to be a bit fair and stop raining for a couple of hours on Saturday night when we visited Marbella and spent the night eating tapas and drinking small beers. Very excellent it was too.
The really cool thing about Spain is that, unlike the UK, it has banned smoking in public places. You wanna smoke? Sorry Enrique, out in the street you go, amigo. So the night went on undisturbed by the filth that is secondary smoke. This meant that I was able to taste my food untainted by cigarette smoke. And very excellent it was too.
So can someone please explain to me how it is that Spain can ban smoking with apparantly no particluar problems, but our own "must please all of the people all of the time" Government can't get its finger out of the arse of the tobacco companies' collective arses for long enough to pass a law? Bunch of second-rate cowboys.
I could go on, but fear I might irritate one of my emphysemic-smoker readers. I think I've nailed my colours to the flagpole.
Back in Spain, and Sunday morning was sunny. Right up til lunchtime when the clouds came back in and the rain started again. And that's when something leaked and the power went out. Pow! No more electric today folks, bad luck.
So I got in a cab (luckily the payphone was still working) and made my way back to Malaga airport.
Next time, I'll go in the summer. I might be guaranteed some frickin' sun that way...
