News from Andalucia:

Andalucia Life Editorial, July 2008

One Friday evening, whilst in Estepona, Julie remarked that she wished I could be a bit more impetuous at times. The following morning we were on our way to Tangier, I think that was the kind of thing she was talking about.

The editorial allows me to tell you things I cannot put in an article. For instance as we got off the ferry berthed a couple of kilometres from the terminal in Tangier we were descended upon by these chaps all offering to carry our luggage. Every passenger, other than us of course, was soon trotting off trying to catch up with their bags. I was still wrestling ours from the grip of a determined character when I saw a bus with its doors open so we jumped aboard, shedding the tout in the process. The driver was getting quite agitated, sounding his horn, trying to attract more passengers but no, the rest were all into hiking. In solitary style we were transported to the terminal on the service bus for free. On our way back three days later I swear it was the same tout, laid one hand on my bag, looked at me, squealed and ran away. That impressed our fellow travellers no end.

Whilst in Tangier we found out what a solid white line in the middle of the road means to taxi drivers. We were on a high speed tour for a fixed fee, very reasonable actually but the driver had it in his head that the faster he got around the route the more time he would have left to attract other custom. It was he who, noticing that my right foot was periodically grinding its way through the floor in his foot well, took it into his head to give me a driving lesson. He would cross to the opposite side of the road if he came up behind another vehicle so that he could see what was approaching. The solid white line was, apparently, for decoration only and to be ignored. At the last millisecond he would swerve back to his nearside with a cheerful grin, chatting through his rear view mirror to Julie, who was in the back seat, probably telling her in Arabic what a wimp I was. I asked him to stop so that I could photograph some camels grazing in a ruined castle. We sailed straight past. Then I asked to go to some Roman ruins nearby; I am still waiting.

Whilst researching articles I often find interesting asides that lead to me hammering away on the old keyboard. Invariably Julie catches me writing something totally insane or nothing to do with the subject I am supposed to be working on so I tend to get up early and work on these red herrings in the dark. In April I was looking at the origins of Oxford English and came across a most unusual tale that I unravelled in the wee hours. The compilation of the Oxford English Dictionary started in 1857 and was overseen by a committee led by a Professor James Murray. The mammoth task was to find the definitions, origins and date of first usage of all the words in the English language. By 1896 the work was about half completed and the committee decided to honour the major contributors. One, Dr. W.C. Minor, had made over ten thousand contributions over a period of twenty years and had declined many offers to visit the London Philological Society. He had given his address as Broadmoor Manor. Professor Murray was determined to thank him personally so took the train to Crowthorne Station in Berkshire. He was met by a landau and taken to Dr. Minor’s abode, the Asylum for the Criminally Insane, Broadmoor Manor, to give the place its full title. There he found that Dr. William C. Minor was a convicted murderer who had been spared the death sentence in 1872 being a ‘certified criminal lunatic’. He also discovered that Minor was a commissioned surgeon officer in the American army who, by the way, had an aversion to the sight of blood, and was from a very respectable New England family. The full intriguing story of both men and the O.E.D. is told in a book called The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester.

My birthday is close to Christmas and tends to be overshadowed by the greater event. This has never bothered me much but it does worry Julie. Last year she announced that, like the Queen, I was going to have a birthday at a sensible time of the year, the 1st September, so that she could have some fun as well. She even planned my day out to Laguna Village but I vetoed that when I saw the prices and we ended up at the Andres y Maria chiringuito instead. This year she tried to ambush me with a birthday on the 2nd August and announced that as my treat I was taking her to see Julio Inglesias at Las Dunas. I readily agreed, he is one of the few singers, apart from Stephen Lloyd Morgan, oh and Tom Jones, I have heard of. Belatedly I discovered that the tickets for an audience with Julio start at 5,603 Euros. I only want to listen to him. I do not want to share his suite, have a conversation with him or put a deposit on his new villa. I hear Lloyd Morgan is on at The Duquesa Hotel in July, much more my style.