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Monday, June 22, 2020

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - Day 97 - Saturday 20th June


[This entry is out of sequence because of the vagaries of my ‘vintage’ laptop where the program froze and nothing worked.  After forcing a ‘quit’ the day afterwards, I discovered that most of the entry had been lost when I eventually started the program up again and tried to find the writing that I had done.
I am going to leave this as I found it, as an example of the tyranny of locking your writing to a machine!]

The day was punctured by explosions as we are reminded that we are working our way towards San Juan when the setting off of petados is encouraged, with kiosks springing up along the paseo selling explosives.  This day and the days around it are the equivalent of Guy Fawkes Day, though with more loud noises than flamboyant fiery inscriptions in the sky.  It is, of course, a nightmare for dogs, though I am (callously) open to the more spindly-legged rat dogs suffering terminal shock as one way of stopping their endlessly squeaky pseudo-barks.
     In previous years the most worrying aspect of the festivities are kids setting off penny-bangers, the sort of things that have long been banned in the UK, but here are probably regarded as a hallowed tradition that some right-wingers will probably urge should be regarded as part of the Patrimony of Humanity – the sort of designation that PP wants connected to bull fighting and other grotesque practices.
     It will be revealing to see just how many people turn up on the beach of Castelldefels as there is a tradition of staying up all night drinking around a camp fire that has been progressively modified over the past few years.  It is now illegal to light fires on the beach and public drinking is always frowned upon in this country.  During a pandemic what sort of physical distancing should be taking place.  What will the police be doing during the festival?  How desperate are people to get back to what they know and love?  It all waits to be seen.

The app for booking my swim seems to have gone a little haywire.  A previous booking for tomorrow has disappeared though the booking procedures for next week still seem to be in place, but with double or even more places available, but I was told that all restrictions had been removed.  This does not seem to be the case, but I am sure that things will be made a little plainer when I go to my swim in the morning.  Or not of course!

Today has not been as productive a day as yesterday and I even found myself dozing off after lunch!  But I have managed to get some of the more basic tasks done, even though the place is still looking a little dishevelled as I have not tidied up my tidying up, if you see what I mean.

I am re-reading some of Steven Saylor’s Mysteries of Ancient Rome on my Kindle and thoroughly enjoying them.

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