February 2009:
Life
in Spain – Carnival
Carnival comes to the area this month.
It’s all about saying farewell to the meat or ‘carne’
that Catholics give up for Lent.
This year it starts on February 25th.
We Brits may well still enjoy Shrove Tuesday (Pancake Day)
on February 24th, but this day too will be Carnival.
Aguilas, just up the coast from us, is famous for its
lavish processions and fiestas.
From the grand procession of floats and costumes starting
at 6pm on Sunday 22nd, until the following Sunday,
there will be things going on every day: salsa music, dancing,
regattas, and a procession for the children.
Andalucia Day is February 28th which is a bank
holiday and fiesta. The
Spanish have so many fiestas, and keeping track of them all is not
easy. But if
you’re visiting, have fun at Carnival.
David
and I, however, will not be attending the Carnival this years,
we’re heading for Aquitaine where we’ll be visiting Pau, Biarritz and
Saint-Jean de Luz, and Nérac where Henry IV had his castle, and
where we hope to meet up with some friends for lunch.
They live in the Dordogne so are driving down to meet us.
I’ve been working hard since Christmas, so the break will
do me good.
Book
News and Writing
Apparently,
Libraries are doing rather well, thanks to the recession, which is
good news and we certainly don’t want to lose them.
My ranking too has gone up again this year from number 63
in the most borrowed authors, (including children’s) to number
60. Okay, not a big
leap, but it’s heading in the right direction.
Does
anyone fancy reading a book on their i-pod?
You may soon be able to buy the Amazon Kindle in the UK, or
the Sony eReader, or even read an ebook on your mobile phone
thanks to Google. This is what they have to say on the subject:
“From
today, users wanting to read any of the 1.5 million books
currently available on the service can now do so by visiting a
mobile friendly version of the site that has been optimised for
all mobile phones, but in particular the Apple iPhone and the
Google backed G1 Android handset from T-Mobile.
If you use Google Book Search, you'll notice that our
previews are composed of page images made by digitizing physical
copies of books. The system uses OCR (Optical Character
Recognition) software to scan pages so that they now flow on your
mobile browser just like any other web page.”
But
the search engine giant is warning that the free books might not
be completely perfect. What
do you think? Could you curl up to read your favourite author on your
mobile phone? And if
you’re thinking of a beach holiday, sand, water and Amber
Solaire are words which spring to mind.
Still, it’s the Future, or is it?
SWWJ
Last week, quite out of the blue, Penny Legg, the editor of
the magazine for the Society of Women Writers and Journalists (SWWJ)
of which I’m a member, emailed to say she was coming to Spain to
give a talk to Torrevieja Writers’ Circle.
It’s only a two hour drive from my home in Almeria, so on
a lovely sunny day in early February, we met at a delightful
restaurant on the outskirts of Torrevieja.
The group comprised 25 ex-pats who have been meeting for
twelve years, and what a delightful bunch they were.
They began by reading extracts from their work, which
ranged from witty or moving poems to short stories and amusing
travel pieces. After
the coffee break Penny entertained us with the story of her
writing life; how unexpected events can lead to an idea for an
article, such as spotting an elephant in Starbucks.
Clearly versatile and with wide ranging interests, she not
only writes about what she knows, but loves to take courses in
subjects she doesn’t know, so that she can write about those
too. Penny regaled us
with stories of life as a diplomat’s wife in several countries,
including Brussels, Bangladesh and Anguilla. Most of all, she
loves interviewing people from piemaking stockbrokers to the
Commodore of the Queen Mary 2. She finished by talking about the SWWJ, which is open to all
who love to write and sell their work, so drop me an email if
you’re interested in joining.
She also urged everybody to keep a blog.
Now there’s something I must get around to one day.
If only there were twice as many hours in the day.