Royal Week In Mallorca

Spain's royals are no different to other royals - those who are of some significance, that is - when it comes to being obliged to do the press photo shoot. And there's no better time to shoot them, so to speak, than when they're enjoying their annual hols by the seaside. This is all pretty normal, but what wasn't last week was the apparent sponsoring by a fashion store. Which one was it, do you suppose? Zara, Armani, Marks and Sparks? Primark perhaps. Probably not.

You might determine that fashion is not one of my strong suits (sic), but even I couldn't fail to notice that there was something of the catalogue about their highnesses and the two nippers as they strolled around the Marivent gardens (minus any citizens getting in the way). Summer casuals with style: it would be something like that I would imagine, were I to pay any attention to the frivolity of fashion sloganising.

The King, being the solitary male in the family group, was rather more bold in the choice of shirt colour than the hoopy, stripy, light estival blues and whites of the royal females, yet even he had succumbed to the subdued subtleties of the fashion parade. So much so that the shirt and trouser combination appeared to have been borrowed from Iglesias (Pablo, that is, and not either of Julio or Enrique). Was this a sign, did one suppose? His Majesty has, after all, had to endure a less than totally relaxing vacation, what with attempting the seemingly impossible, that of finding anyone to run the country. But Iglesias? Hard to believe, given that Podemos turned down the chance of some decent nosebag at yesterday evening's shindig at the Almudaina.

The King will have been able to reacquaint himself with the one Podemista who deigns to show up on these occasions and then only because she's obliged to as the speaker (president) of the Balearic parliament. Xe-Lo, for it is she, does of course have her own fashion line. It's a sort of Mama Cass circa 1967 minus the chemicals. It most certainly won't be a brand that Tizzy will be recommending for the next royal photo opp.

I'm still interested to know, and I've been waiting a year, if Xe-Lo actually took along a doggy bag to the previous Almudaina thrash and filled it with some canapes and the odd bottle of cava and then thumbed a lift to the nearest soup kitchen. She had, it should be recalled, let the King know that money for the reception could have been more wisely spent on the deprived citizens of the city, i.e. those at the soup kitchen(s). In the absence of any official communique from Podemos, I would have to assume that she contented herself with tucking into things on sticks and forgot.

Other royals have also been in circulation. The former king put in what is now a rare appearance in Mallorca because of his sister's eightieth do, and the following evening the various generations headed off to the Land of the Beautiful People for dinner. What is it with reporting on these occasions? The royals were at a "well-known restaurant". Why not just say that it's Flanigan, especially as the name is clearly to be seen in the bloody photo. There again, the hoi-polloi would be unfamiliar with restaurants down Portals way. The place is a bit like Jersey. They put barriers across the road to keep the riff-raff out and demand to see evidence of wealth from a bank statement. Not that there is a great deal of wealth actually kept in banks down Portals way one would imagine.

Then there were the Urdangarin minors, taken off to the regatta by the Queen Mum. Nowhere to be seen were the parents. The Queen Mum was beaming as she always does beam. God bless her, given what she has to put up with. We were informed that the nippers - Sofia and Leonor - would not be at the regatta as they "do not practise sailing". They may well not do, though being seen with the cousins might constitute some awkwardness, what with the business with the parents.

Of all the royals on show, it is possible that Podemos would have taken greatest exception to the King's other sister, Elena, the one who isn't waiting to hear what fate the judges have for her. Elena went to the bullfight. So did her two children. Isn't there something about under-16s not being allowed into bullfights? According to Wikipedia, the daughter, Victoria, isn't 16 until 9 September. If so, then Podemos (and others) might want their say on the matter. Sounds like a case of shooting one's royal self in the foot. Which of course is precisely what Elena's son did, when he was under 14 and not meant to have been using a firearm because of his age. But then, as they say, age is just a number.