Let's Have a Ball

Elise wanted some basil the other day. Not he of Fawlty Towers fame, but the herb: she adds it to tomatoes, pasta, and various other concoctions.

She likes to use fresh basil, so I had to take her to one of the local garden centres, Naturplant, to buy a plant. And a very nice plant it was, too (actually, she bought two).

While we were at the garden centre, we also took a look at the cacti. They usually have a good selection of small cacti and now was no exception. This time, however, they clearly had recently had a delivery of larger cacti. Elise called me over to see on, a beautiful Echinocactus grusonii.

Well, we hadn't intended to buy a cactus, but this was an excellent specimen and the price was also right, so it didn't take us long to decide to purchase it.

The Echinocactus grusonii has a diameter of just about 55 cm. and a circumference of about 170 cm., so it's quite a size. The person who delivered it estimated it to weigh at least 40 Kg. I estimate it to be between thirty and forty years old.

Popular names for Echinocactus grusonii include Golden Barrel Cactus, Golden Ball, or, my favourite, Mother-in-Law's Cushion.

If you'd like to learn more about the care of Echinocactus grusonii, the best site I've found is this one.

A while ago we visited Cactus d'Algar, a wonderful botanical garden at Callosa d'en Sarrià (inland from Benidorm, close to the Fuentes del Algar) devoted to cacti. There we saw this huge field of Echinocactus grusonii:

Elise will have to buy a lot more basil for us to reach that stage!

Now, about the repotting…

All Quiet on The Belgian Front

We were back in the hospital today to have a chat with the surgeon who performed the operation on Elise last week and then to have the staples removed. All fine; no complaints.

We had a cup of coffee there after having had Elise de-stapled and cleaned up. The packet of sugar came with a good message again: "El que quiere hacer algo encuentra un mediao, el que no, una excusa."

That translates to "He who wishes to achieve something will find a way; he who doesn't will find an excuse."

Makes me think of all the foreigners here who still can't speak Spanish after having been here for several years: they, too, find plenty of excuses. Agreed, it is difficult to learn a foreign language when you are not actually living in a country in which that language is spoken, but when you are surrounded by millions of native speakers…

Anyway, to eliminate all possible excuses, there's a great new free way to learn Spanish, wherever you are in the world. It's called Say Something In Spanish. Of course, it's not a miracle course and some effort will still be required, but it's by far the best way that I know of learning a language without actually immersing yourself in the language.

If you understand Welsh and you'd prefer to learn through a Welsh medium, simply go to Say Something In Spanish Cymraeg and you'll be in your element. (This is also a great way to practise your Welsh, of course!)

Oh, and if you want to learn Welsh, then try Say Something in Welsh. Ardderchog!

Sweet thoughts

We received a call from the hospital last Wednesday to tell us that Elise could go in for her hiatus hernia operation on Thursday, instead of Friday. As a result we were up far too early on Thursday morning in order to be at the hospital by seven-thirty and by eight-thirty Elise was in a bed, being wheeled in the direction of the operating theatre.

All went very well. Amazing, really, just five small cuts, three of about half a centimetre and to of about a centimetre. Elise was walking around on Thursday afternoon and we were back home by Friday evening.

I stayed at the hospital, too, and whilst there I ate at the restaurant. Excellent food and excellent coffee. The sugar that comes with the coffee is provided in paper sachets and each sachet carries a little piece of wisdom. The one shown here reads, "Más vale ser un loco feliz, que ser normal y amargado." This translates to "It is better to be a happy fool than normal and bitter."

Very true.

46 (más o menos…)

Here's the international version:

Penblwydd hapus i ti
Joyeux anniversaire
Happy birthday, Elise
Cumpleaños feliz


Ah, yes, another year has passed, and so SWMBO celebrates her 46th birthday (with apologies to Eric Morecambe, they are all the right digits, but not necessarily in the right order).

The event was duly noted a few days ago with a trip to El Corte Inglés in Elche, one of Elise's favourite hideaways, where she bought numerous items to soften the blow, including yet another handbag to add to the collection.

To celebrate even further (is there no stopping?), she goes into hospital on Friday for a hiatus hernia operation. Hopefully, she will be back home by Saturday evening and all will once again be well with the inner workings.

Gelukkige verjaardag, Elise!

A Couple of Shakes

We live in a reasonably active area, at least as far as seismic activity is concerned. And earthquakes have no respect for a good night's rest, so at about twenty past five this morning, we were shaken awake by quite a good rumble. The epicentre of this nocturnal motion (if you'll pardon the expression) was literally just up the road form us, as can be seen in the map to the left (click on it for a larger image), provided by the Instituto Geográfico Nacional. The maximum magnitude was 2.8 and here in El Raso it was probably about 2.7. Not bad for a night's work.

As if that wasn't enough excitement for the day, this afternoon, at about twenty-five past three, there was a nasty little blip, which felt as if it was just below us. This time the epicentre was first reported by the Instituto to have been just off the coast, next to the lake at the bottom of El Raso, but that information was later corrected, to place the epicentre to the north-west of Guardamar, as can be seen in the following map:

This rumble had a magnitude of 3.2.

Who knows? There might be more to come, so batten down the hatches; make everything ship-shape and Bristol-fashion.

A whopper of a wasp

Megascolia maculata flavifrons (female)

We are fortunate enough to have a rather unusual visitor to our garden, namely a mammoth wasp, or a Megascolia maculata flavifrons. I believe that this is the largest wasp in Europe.

And it really does live up to its "mammoth" name, for it is at least 5cm long. In fact, I have spotted two individuals, the larger one at 5cm or more and a smaller one that is perhaps 4.5cm long. Both of them are impressive creatures.

Both of them are also females. The body of the female mammoth wasp is black with large yellow markings. She has strong wings, tinged with amber, resembling the skin of an onion, showing crimson in the variegated light. Her legs are coarse, with a knotted appearance and are very hairy. She has a huge body and a powerful head, which is well protected by a hard skull. Her flight is quite low and is surprisingly quiet for such a large insect. The male mommoth wasp, which I have not yet seen, is less colourful and of finer frame.

The mammoth wasp does not attack humans (no European wasps do, except out of self-defence, so stop waving your arms about). Instead, it hunts out the larvae of the rhinoceros beetle (Oryctes nasicornis), which it paralyses with its sting in order to lay a single egg in the beetle's body. When it emerges, the larva of Megascolia then devours that of the Oryctes.

Size comparison with ordinary wasp (Vespula vulgaris)

And here's a little video (the quality is far better than the preview image).

Home from Belgium

We have been away for a few weeks. Because of the health problems last year, we were unable to make our usual late autumn visit back to Belgium, so it really was time to do so. I didn't fancy the queuing up at airports, not to mention the getting up at unearhly hours of the morning in order to catch a plane with a take-off time of 06:30, yes six-thirty in the morning and you're supposed to check in a couple of hours beforehand. Instead, we planned on driving up, but on taking our time in doing so.

And that's just what we did.

The first night, we stopped in Tarragona, after an easy drive of some 500 Km. Then on to Montauban, aother 500 Km or so, an a night at a chambre d'hôtes (not wonderful, given the price). We had hoped to visit a few bastide towns in the area, but the weather was really bad—cold and wet—so we had a hot chocolate in one and drove on to Sorges, supposedly the truffle centre of the world, where we spent two nights in the wonderful Auberge de la Truffe, a place that was right up SWMBO's street. Food, glorious food (says she). An extensive evening meal upon our arrival on Friday evening, a visit on Saturday morning after breakfast to the market of Périgueux, in the company of the chef (not SWMBO, but the actual chef of the Auberge), dinner that same evening, breakfast on Sunday morning, followed by a visit to the truffle museum, and a final two-hour-long lunch to send us on our way.

And our way took us to Senlis, just past Paris, where we stayed the night before proceeding the following morning to our apartment in Belgium.

Surprisingly, the weather in Belgium was much better than we had anticipated from the horror stories we had heard during the months leading up to our departure. Indeed, we had several sunny days, with balmy temperatures, so nothing to complain about, even if the general impression was rather grey.

Anyway, thanks must go to Marleen and Danny, Robert and Godelieve, Jean-Pierre and Rita, Christiane, Frans and Marie-Christine, Jan and Nicole, Luc and Monique, and anyone I might have forgotten, for making us feel welcome once again in Belgium.

Our journey back to Spain followed a similar path (excluding Montauban), though we made a slight detour in order to be able to visit Oradour-sur-Glane, the village destroyed in 1944 by German troops, who also killed 642 civilian inhabitants. The day was dull and miezerig, but that suited the sombreness of the place, where the ruins still stand, many with household effects still in them: almost each house seems to have a sewing-machine. I have made a small website about our visit to Oradour-sur-Glane; you can visit it here.