Showing posts with label Blogs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blogs. Show all posts
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Referrer spam update
Currently, on the popular posts here there is one for an ancient blog item "Oh Doctor, I'm In Trouble". It has risen to popularity because a referrer spam site has put it there. The one that is doing so is Halloween Witch 2014 blogspot. These referrers come and go and there isn't a lot that can be done about them. Even very mature blogs like this one suffer, though small, new blogs are way more likely to be affected. These referrers are harmless enough but are annoying. If a popular post appears that looks odd, then please don't click on it as that just keeps the referring going. I can't eliminate it though I can take off the popular posts list, which I have in the past for this very reason. Anyone operating a blog who sees information in their page view stats which looks suspicious, e.g. Halloween Witch or any other, should definitely not click on the link. Eventually it will go away, though the chances are another one will come around. The page view statistics are otherwise very genuine. Despite this old blog item having risen to temporary popularity, its overall contribution to page views is minute.
Thursday, March 27, 2014
Spam sites affect page views
If any of you follow the page views info and most popular posts on this blog, you might notice that some pretty ancient and unusual posts enter the most popular list. Usually the most popular ones are just that - the most popular - but what happens, and there really isn't anything that can be done about it, is that spammer sites attach themselves to particular entries and keep on referring them. It's an annoyance. For example, the popularity of the John Hirst case and the balcony fall in Cala Rajada are because of these spammer sites. The rest are kosher; they are popular. Where page views info is concerned, these spammer sites are responsible for roughly 10% of this info at any given time. They come and go. At present, the ones involved are semalt.com and eooznyfz.bloger.index (please don't visit these sites). I can see all this on the back system. They are usually harmless enough, just annoying. So, if you see what looks like or is an old entry, take it with a pinch of salt.
Saturday, November 17, 2012
Great Hiking Blog
Occasionally, I add links to blogs or other sites that are of real interest. A new one is to Steve Murray's blog dedicated to hiking and walking mainly but not exclusively in the Alcúdia and Pollensa area. An abundance of photos plus some brief descriptions and the odd surprise: http://stevosspanishadventure.blogspot.com.es/
(Thanks to the PuertoPollensa.com forum (here) for this blog coming to my attention).
(Thanks to the PuertoPollensa.com forum (here) for this blog coming to my attention).
Sunday, August 29, 2010
This Expat Life: AlcudiaPollensa.blogspot and perceptual gaps
"I'm surprised anyone talks to you." Eh? What?
It's a perception thing, you know. It's what people think you write or think what you might write. I wouldn't talk to me if I did write what people thought I wrote or might write. But the above was said to me the other day, if joshingly, by a local bar-owner.
This blog will be five years old in a couple of months. There have been over 1500 entries. I'm struggling to think of any occasion when I have slagged off a local individual or business, except obliquely; or any occasion when I have broken a confidence. There are things I know, but they won't appear here.
No. One moment. There has been the odd occasion, like with the "Sun, Sea and A&E" lady, but there was that perception thing again, as in had it been read carefully it would have been clear that it was a piss-take, hardly for the first time, of "The Bulletin". I have no reticence in rubbishing something which affronts me with its Palmacalvia-centricity, mistakes and rotten English. And it's the media. Like politicians, political parties and town halls, it's there to be shot at.
I've known this perception thing before. When I was at university I became the one who was most closely associated with a scurrilous publication that was eventually banned when the local police threatened an obscenity charge (and this was just a few years after the "Oz" trial). The only reason why I was thus associated, and I was neither a member of the particular college from which the magazine emanated nor one of its editors, had to do with a higher profile on campus than others. I was personally responsible for only one of the many controversies that the magazine spawned.
The perception thing was also evident when this blog was commended in "PC Advisor". "Thoughtful and witty descriptions of the expat life." The quote needs to be seen in context, but I don't know that the blog has ever been about expat life, other than occasionally specific pieces. And the perception thing blends into the profile thing. You might take that quote, you might take that surprise at anyone talking to me as evidence of high profile, of hanging around bars and hanging on all the gossip and then churning it out - here. Both the perception and the profile are inaccurate. What can also surprise is when I say that I am an habitué of very few bars, and certainly not for the evening piss-artisting, have never been inside many and have never met or had anything to do with so-and-so expat who does, on the contrary, have a high profile.
The perception thing is wrong because the blog is detached. It is this very distance that creates a diversity of subject and an absence of pressure to somehow act as reportage of this "expat life". It is, essentially, observational. A part of but also separate. It is the observation and the diversity which, despite times when I have wondered about stopping, keep the blog going. There simply is no end to what you can write about. Were it about "expat life", were it about the local who's doing this, who's doing that, then it wouldn't have legs, not long-running ones. People would not only not talk, they would also, in all likelihood, be somewhat aggressive. But more fundamentally, I have, despite that perception thing, no interest in being a conveyor of tittle-tattle, a slagger-off of who's been slagging with whom. That said, there is a file of what I presumptuously call the blog's basement tapes: stuff that has been written but which has never appeared. Even these pieces don't name (though it might be possible to assign a name), but they are very much darker or more off-the-wall.
There have been recently, as there have been in the past, some highly satisfying compliments both of the blog and of HOT!. I even received a letter, remember them, from someone who had enjoyed the newspaper. Sometimes, though, I wonder if I don't become self-indulgent, such as with yesterday's piece. I had thought of consigning that to the basement tapes. And then I got a compliment about it (Glen's), as similarly I had one a couple of weeks back from Derek who referred to the more poetic stuff being inspiring. But the danger is I end up taking myself seriously, which would never do. And I might end up understanding who the hell it is I'm writing for.
It's this very unknown, among all the thousands of you who come to this blog, that make it as worthwhile as the compliments. The unknown also as to which pieces might interest more than others. The unknown as to who will be in the inbox on a given day, saying they have been following the blog for this or that length of time. The blog is self-indulgent. By definition, I suppose, most blogs are. But as to people not talking to me, I don't think so, because I guess most don't know what the blog is about, other than by some fault of perception. And I couldn't help. Because neither do I.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
It's a perception thing, you know. It's what people think you write or think what you might write. I wouldn't talk to me if I did write what people thought I wrote or might write. But the above was said to me the other day, if joshingly, by a local bar-owner.
This blog will be five years old in a couple of months. There have been over 1500 entries. I'm struggling to think of any occasion when I have slagged off a local individual or business, except obliquely; or any occasion when I have broken a confidence. There are things I know, but they won't appear here.
No. One moment. There has been the odd occasion, like with the "Sun, Sea and A&E" lady, but there was that perception thing again, as in had it been read carefully it would have been clear that it was a piss-take, hardly for the first time, of "The Bulletin". I have no reticence in rubbishing something which affronts me with its Palmacalvia-centricity, mistakes and rotten English. And it's the media. Like politicians, political parties and town halls, it's there to be shot at.
I've known this perception thing before. When I was at university I became the one who was most closely associated with a scurrilous publication that was eventually banned when the local police threatened an obscenity charge (and this was just a few years after the "Oz" trial). The only reason why I was thus associated, and I was neither a member of the particular college from which the magazine emanated nor one of its editors, had to do with a higher profile on campus than others. I was personally responsible for only one of the many controversies that the magazine spawned.
The perception thing was also evident when this blog was commended in "PC Advisor". "Thoughtful and witty descriptions of the expat life." The quote needs to be seen in context, but I don't know that the blog has ever been about expat life, other than occasionally specific pieces. And the perception thing blends into the profile thing. You might take that quote, you might take that surprise at anyone talking to me as evidence of high profile, of hanging around bars and hanging on all the gossip and then churning it out - here. Both the perception and the profile are inaccurate. What can also surprise is when I say that I am an habitué of very few bars, and certainly not for the evening piss-artisting, have never been inside many and have never met or had anything to do with so-and-so expat who does, on the contrary, have a high profile.
The perception thing is wrong because the blog is detached. It is this very distance that creates a diversity of subject and an absence of pressure to somehow act as reportage of this "expat life". It is, essentially, observational. A part of but also separate. It is the observation and the diversity which, despite times when I have wondered about stopping, keep the blog going. There simply is no end to what you can write about. Were it about "expat life", were it about the local who's doing this, who's doing that, then it wouldn't have legs, not long-running ones. People would not only not talk, they would also, in all likelihood, be somewhat aggressive. But more fundamentally, I have, despite that perception thing, no interest in being a conveyor of tittle-tattle, a slagger-off of who's been slagging with whom. That said, there is a file of what I presumptuously call the blog's basement tapes: stuff that has been written but which has never appeared. Even these pieces don't name (though it might be possible to assign a name), but they are very much darker or more off-the-wall.
There have been recently, as there have been in the past, some highly satisfying compliments both of the blog and of HOT!. I even received a letter, remember them, from someone who had enjoyed the newspaper. Sometimes, though, I wonder if I don't become self-indulgent, such as with yesterday's piece. I had thought of consigning that to the basement tapes. And then I got a compliment about it (Glen's), as similarly I had one a couple of weeks back from Derek who referred to the more poetic stuff being inspiring. But the danger is I end up taking myself seriously, which would never do. And I might end up understanding who the hell it is I'm writing for.
It's this very unknown, among all the thousands of you who come to this blog, that make it as worthwhile as the compliments. The unknown also as to which pieces might interest more than others. The unknown as to who will be in the inbox on a given day, saying they have been following the blog for this or that length of time. The blog is self-indulgent. By definition, I suppose, most blogs are. But as to people not talking to me, I don't think so, because I guess most don't know what the blog is about, other than by some fault of perception. And I couldn't help. Because neither do I.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Cold Comfort - Winter in a Mallorcan house
The afternoon coffee and cake is a German tradition. Walk the promenade of little Germany, Can Picafort, and, in summer, boards outside the bars will invite you to "Kaffee und Kuchen". Be invited into a German-owned house and you will be presented with a jar of coffee and a plate of pastries. A further German tradition is that houses in Germany tend to be like ovens. Germany has cold winters, but its houses and apartments are pretty much air-tight, they are like vaults, nothing can come in, nothing can escape. In Germany, there are laws obliging landlords to heat rental properties to a certain level. No-one, theoretically, be they owner or tenant, should freeze through inadequate heating.
It snowed, after a fashion, yesterday. A brief flurry, at sea level. It looked more like hail, but it was snow, some said. Meteorological definitions didn't matter, save for one - cold. Mallorca, unlike Germany, doesn't have cold winters. Of course it doesn't. Well not on a German scale it doesn't. But it has cold spells. Even during these, like the current one, daytime temperatures at sea level rarely fall to freezing, and when the sun puts in an appearance, it can still feel warm - outside. The problem is not outside, it's inside.
There are new German neighbours. Kaffee und Kuchen. It's a tradition. The icy state of the living-room, for them, most certainly isn't. Surprises there can be for those new to Mallorca: one that most do not bargain for is just how cold it can get and just how cold their newly bought houses might be. I hadn't put on the ski socks (to compensate for the stone floor) and the long-johns (to compensate for the air). The coffee cooled rapidly. Even the cream in the cake seemed to crystallise as though in a freezer.
There was a wood-burner, unused. There was wood, but lying next to it. The cost of wood is astronomical. There were radiators, not on. There has been publicity about the rising cost of electricity. Moreover, the room was large, open plan. The oil-filled radiators give out some warmth, but only so long as you're more or less sitting on top of them, which is not a wise thing to do. "Do not cover" is the warning they all carry. Gas, I said. Eleven euros for a bottle of butane. It might last a week. Possibly. That's not so bad, they said. Certainly against the cost of wood. Mind you, the one dehumidifer, the one that eats electricity, might need to be added to. Someone, a Mallorcan, rubbing his upper arms in a gesture of "qué frío", said the other day that the problem in Mallorca is the damp atmosphere. Clings, he said, in winter. Damp and then sometimes cold, like an invisible fog. This will be why damp course is a rarity, like insulation and double-glazing. All this in a country that is meant to have committed to energy efficiency and the saving of Mother Earth. Don't make me laugh, or make new German neighbours laugh.
There's no natural gas, they enquired. Not outside Palma. It will take them years to run pipelines across the island. Think of all the endless environmental discussions, the politics, the bankrupt state of state finances. And then there was a coincidence. An announcement two days ago that there are indeed plans to develop a gas network. That will teach me to go around saying it would take twenty years. Or maybe that might not be wrong. The announcement also referred to economic conditions and planning regulations. Projects have a habit of taking years to be implemented, and even when there is funding in place, agreement cannot be reached by competing political interests.
There's another German tradition, among Germans who have adopted Mallorca. And this is that they all seem to have read George Sand. A winter in Mallorca, and the health of Sand's poor old husband, Chopin, deteriorated because of the dampness and chill of Valldemossa. But that was when? Some time in the nineteenth century. A long time ago. When they had wood, but didn't have butane or electricity. And when they didn't have double-glazing or insulation, or natural gas.
These things take time, you know.
** (Last night it snowed. Properly snowed. Snowed as in covered the grass.)
Mallorca Daily Photo Blog
And while on matters German, yesterday I met Klaus Fabricius who does the Mallorca Daily Photo Blog (http://mallorcaphotoblog.wordpress.com) and whose work I first came across when I was alerted to an entry explaining and depicting the sea-grass origin of those kiwi-like, oval balls that proliferate on the beaches. If you have not been following Klaus's blog, let me issue a recommendation once more. It is highly informative and the photography is outstanding, as it also is on a sort of sister blog - Plantarium (http://plantarium.wordpress.com).
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
It snowed, after a fashion, yesterday. A brief flurry, at sea level. It looked more like hail, but it was snow, some said. Meteorological definitions didn't matter, save for one - cold. Mallorca, unlike Germany, doesn't have cold winters. Of course it doesn't. Well not on a German scale it doesn't. But it has cold spells. Even during these, like the current one, daytime temperatures at sea level rarely fall to freezing, and when the sun puts in an appearance, it can still feel warm - outside. The problem is not outside, it's inside.
There are new German neighbours. Kaffee und Kuchen. It's a tradition. The icy state of the living-room, for them, most certainly isn't. Surprises there can be for those new to Mallorca: one that most do not bargain for is just how cold it can get and just how cold their newly bought houses might be. I hadn't put on the ski socks (to compensate for the stone floor) and the long-johns (to compensate for the air). The coffee cooled rapidly. Even the cream in the cake seemed to crystallise as though in a freezer.
There was a wood-burner, unused. There was wood, but lying next to it. The cost of wood is astronomical. There were radiators, not on. There has been publicity about the rising cost of electricity. Moreover, the room was large, open plan. The oil-filled radiators give out some warmth, but only so long as you're more or less sitting on top of them, which is not a wise thing to do. "Do not cover" is the warning they all carry. Gas, I said. Eleven euros for a bottle of butane. It might last a week. Possibly. That's not so bad, they said. Certainly against the cost of wood. Mind you, the one dehumidifer, the one that eats electricity, might need to be added to. Someone, a Mallorcan, rubbing his upper arms in a gesture of "qué frío", said the other day that the problem in Mallorca is the damp atmosphere. Clings, he said, in winter. Damp and then sometimes cold, like an invisible fog. This will be why damp course is a rarity, like insulation and double-glazing. All this in a country that is meant to have committed to energy efficiency and the saving of Mother Earth. Don't make me laugh, or make new German neighbours laugh.
There's no natural gas, they enquired. Not outside Palma. It will take them years to run pipelines across the island. Think of all the endless environmental discussions, the politics, the bankrupt state of state finances. And then there was a coincidence. An announcement two days ago that there are indeed plans to develop a gas network. That will teach me to go around saying it would take twenty years. Or maybe that might not be wrong. The announcement also referred to economic conditions and planning regulations. Projects have a habit of taking years to be implemented, and even when there is funding in place, agreement cannot be reached by competing political interests.
There's another German tradition, among Germans who have adopted Mallorca. And this is that they all seem to have read George Sand. A winter in Mallorca, and the health of Sand's poor old husband, Chopin, deteriorated because of the dampness and chill of Valldemossa. But that was when? Some time in the nineteenth century. A long time ago. When they had wood, but didn't have butane or electricity. And when they didn't have double-glazing or insulation, or natural gas.
These things take time, you know.
** (Last night it snowed. Properly snowed. Snowed as in covered the grass.)
Mallorca Daily Photo Blog
And while on matters German, yesterday I met Klaus Fabricius who does the Mallorca Daily Photo Blog (http://mallorcaphotoblog.wordpress.com) and whose work I first came across when I was alerted to an entry explaining and depicting the sea-grass origin of those kiwi-like, oval balls that proliferate on the beaches. If you have not been following Klaus's blog, let me issue a recommendation once more. It is highly informative and the photography is outstanding, as it also is on a sort of sister blog - Plantarium (http://plantarium.wordpress.com).
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Starting Over
Today marks the blog's fourth anniversary - the first archives are no longer online, but they are still there, somewhere, on a disc. It is also two years and one month since the blog became a daily occurrence, save for the occasional planned or unplanned absence.
There are certain questions that you raise - what actually is the blog, how do I find the time, where do I get the "inspiration" to write something every day. Of these, the second is probably the easiest to answer. I just do. Rarely does it take a huge amount of time. What can is redrafting pieces and sometimes junking those I'm not satisfied with and starting over. I've started this piece more than once. The third is also quite easy. It boils down to being open to any sort of tag or lead, be it from the media (of all sorts), what someone says, what one observes. There is no shortage of "inspiration", so long as one keeps eyes and ears wide open.
The first question is the most difficult. Blogs vary in their style and purpose. Originally, many were in effect diaries. And that was pretty much how this one started out. But it has moved on, a long way from that original concept. What it is not, and has never set out or claimed to be, is a news service. That there may be news is generally the starting-point for something broader. But to give an exact definition is hard.
Much of what appears on the internet as personal contributions has found its voice through not only blogs but also social networks and now also Twitter. Defining any of them is not straightforward. Indeed one of the people behind Twitter told "Wired Magazine" recently that "I don't know" would be one of the ways he would define it. In other words, these vehicles emerge and are shaped by those who make use of them. It is the very looseness of purpose that is appealing and stimulating but also unfocussed and potentially dangerous. And by dangerous, I mean a tendency to vilification and vendetta. Blogs, social networks, Twitter are all means of expression and of self-publishing. They should all be approached with responsibility. Unfortunately, this is not always so. Publish and be damned? No. Publish and damn someone or something has become the principle.
But two words above tend to give a meaning as to what happens on this blog - looseness and the opposite of "unfocussed", i.e. focussed. These may seem contradictory, but there is looseness in the sense that subject matter is broad while focussed within a context, one of Mallorca and Spain. If one trawls through October's entries alone, there were few specific main features about Alcúdia or Pollensa. But as it says on the tin, the blog is not just about Alcúdia or Pollensa; the focus, the angle is wider. And the subject matters are equally wide - from abortion and smoking to football and the Olympics, but all within a Spanish if not a Mallorcan context.
In this respect, the blog is largely a series of observations - of society, politics, people, places and more. And one situates Alcúdia and Pollensa within a broader framework of these disparate elements. It is, for example, impossible to have an appreciation of local politics without some nod in the direction of what went before, no more so than the Franco period, and of the current politics of language.
More than this, however, I have come to realise that the blog is, to a great extent, a reaction against not only the lameness of much writing about Mallorca but also its sheer absence. To explain. There have been two recent stories - the BNP and Stephen Gately. I considered both of them, but apart from the fact that Gately just so happened to die in Mallorca, there was no obvious Mallorcan or Spanish angle. Why do them? In fact, I have a not uninteresting story about the BNP, one that I have outlined to more than one of you in an email, but I couldn't justify it as a blog story.
Yet both these stories have been given a good airing in the English-speaking press, as do, of course, all sorts of stories that have nothing to do with Mallorca or Spain. I don't criticise this as such, but what I do question is an over-abundance of British and international news and comment at the expense of the innumerable stories that exist either on the island or in the country. In this, there is an additional problem, and it is one of credibility. While I will take note of what a Simon Jenkins, a Matthew Parris or even a Richard Littlejohn might have to say about British politics, why should I take any notice of what someone living in Palma or Calvia might have to say? They are not credible witnesses because they are removed. Their contributions are the hard-copy equivalent of a blogger who wants to get something off his or her chest. In their physical, newsprint guise, they fill space to no great effect, other than as testimony to egoism.
It is this further realisation that draws me to conclude that there is little or no future for the hard-copy English press in Mallorca. The essentially regurgitated nature of British/international news and comment can be found on the internet, as can the primary contributions of Jenkins and the rest. The lack of a more local focus may indeed be better served away from the traditional press and tackled via blogs and the like. The newspaper has become simply a means of packaging or as a promotional tool for it in a different form or for advertisers. The real stories are to be found elsewhere.
I shall press on, but may soon be starting over ... watch out.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - P.J. Harvey and Thom Yorke, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99k8w65v3_I. Today's title - and this was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
There are certain questions that you raise - what actually is the blog, how do I find the time, where do I get the "inspiration" to write something every day. Of these, the second is probably the easiest to answer. I just do. Rarely does it take a huge amount of time. What can is redrafting pieces and sometimes junking those I'm not satisfied with and starting over. I've started this piece more than once. The third is also quite easy. It boils down to being open to any sort of tag or lead, be it from the media (of all sorts), what someone says, what one observes. There is no shortage of "inspiration", so long as one keeps eyes and ears wide open.
The first question is the most difficult. Blogs vary in their style and purpose. Originally, many were in effect diaries. And that was pretty much how this one started out. But it has moved on, a long way from that original concept. What it is not, and has never set out or claimed to be, is a news service. That there may be news is generally the starting-point for something broader. But to give an exact definition is hard.
Much of what appears on the internet as personal contributions has found its voice through not only blogs but also social networks and now also Twitter. Defining any of them is not straightforward. Indeed one of the people behind Twitter told "Wired Magazine" recently that "I don't know" would be one of the ways he would define it. In other words, these vehicles emerge and are shaped by those who make use of them. It is the very looseness of purpose that is appealing and stimulating but also unfocussed and potentially dangerous. And by dangerous, I mean a tendency to vilification and vendetta. Blogs, social networks, Twitter are all means of expression and of self-publishing. They should all be approached with responsibility. Unfortunately, this is not always so. Publish and be damned? No. Publish and damn someone or something has become the principle.
But two words above tend to give a meaning as to what happens on this blog - looseness and the opposite of "unfocussed", i.e. focussed. These may seem contradictory, but there is looseness in the sense that subject matter is broad while focussed within a context, one of Mallorca and Spain. If one trawls through October's entries alone, there were few specific main features about Alcúdia or Pollensa. But as it says on the tin, the blog is not just about Alcúdia or Pollensa; the focus, the angle is wider. And the subject matters are equally wide - from abortion and smoking to football and the Olympics, but all within a Spanish if not a Mallorcan context.
In this respect, the blog is largely a series of observations - of society, politics, people, places and more. And one situates Alcúdia and Pollensa within a broader framework of these disparate elements. It is, for example, impossible to have an appreciation of local politics without some nod in the direction of what went before, no more so than the Franco period, and of the current politics of language.
More than this, however, I have come to realise that the blog is, to a great extent, a reaction against not only the lameness of much writing about Mallorca but also its sheer absence. To explain. There have been two recent stories - the BNP and Stephen Gately. I considered both of them, but apart from the fact that Gately just so happened to die in Mallorca, there was no obvious Mallorcan or Spanish angle. Why do them? In fact, I have a not uninteresting story about the BNP, one that I have outlined to more than one of you in an email, but I couldn't justify it as a blog story.
Yet both these stories have been given a good airing in the English-speaking press, as do, of course, all sorts of stories that have nothing to do with Mallorca or Spain. I don't criticise this as such, but what I do question is an over-abundance of British and international news and comment at the expense of the innumerable stories that exist either on the island or in the country. In this, there is an additional problem, and it is one of credibility. While I will take note of what a Simon Jenkins, a Matthew Parris or even a Richard Littlejohn might have to say about British politics, why should I take any notice of what someone living in Palma or Calvia might have to say? They are not credible witnesses because they are removed. Their contributions are the hard-copy equivalent of a blogger who wants to get something off his or her chest. In their physical, newsprint guise, they fill space to no great effect, other than as testimony to egoism.
It is this further realisation that draws me to conclude that there is little or no future for the hard-copy English press in Mallorca. The essentially regurgitated nature of British/international news and comment can be found on the internet, as can the primary contributions of Jenkins and the rest. The lack of a more local focus may indeed be better served away from the traditional press and tackled via blogs and the like. The newspaper has become simply a means of packaging or as a promotional tool for it in a different form or for advertisers. The real stories are to be found elsewhere.
I shall press on, but may soon be starting over ... watch out.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - P.J. Harvey and Thom Yorke, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99k8w65v3_I. Today's title - and this was?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Saturday, May 30, 2009
This Much Is True
The Pollensa music festival is one of the cultural highlights of the local summer. This is not a thing for the hoi and the polloi, the general riff and the general raff of lager and chips; this is the extreme sophisto wing of musical culture in the northernmost parts of the island, nary a karaoke machine within the vocal carry distance of a Leona Lewis wannabe, not one tribute act an Abba-ing or a Take That-ing. This festival, started not by a Mallorcan but by a Mancunian, Philip Newman, is classical heavy, pop lite, or usually pop non-existent. However, once in a while, up pops a pop sort of act. When I say pop, I mean old rocker or, in the case of Tony Hadley, old new romanticist. And why should I mention Tony Hadley? How sharp of you. Very good question. Why would I or indeed anyone mention the Hadster? The answer lies in the fact that he is in a short line of long-ago pop/rock artists who have been invited to appear at the Pollensa festival. The line is so short, it comprises only one other - Roger Hodgson - and he was a replacement for Paul Carrack.
The question is, of course, why book Tony Hadley? Here is a singer set adrift, sent into a rock winter Russian front, consigned to be the Rudolf Hess of the pop world, ever associated with Spandau, languishing in the long-years of the incarceration of memory bliss of Musclebound and Through The Barricades pop-Lebensraum, but without having been the führer behind the whole gig, a role reserved for the foppish Adolf of the Spans, Gary Kemp. And when the Kemp twins decided to go and play at being Krays and Martin ended up leaving it aht, you slag, on Albert Square, Tony ceased to register either on the pop charts or in the pop stratosphere, save for endless plays of "Gold" on Capitol Gold or as the mind-numbingly unoriginal theme accompaniment to athletics championships.
A clue perhaps as to the question, why Tony Hadley, may exist on his website*. For there, if you go to "calendar", you will find that rare is a box per day that contains anything other than a number. For the whole of May, just one event: "opening couture brasserie, delicatessen and food hall, Neptune Quay, Ipswich". There we go, everybody, Ipswich, and not even a vocal performance by the sounds of it. Let's just put it this way, Tony's calendar does look a little light, though to be fair it fills up in the autumn because of course the Spans will be on their comeback tour. But till then, very little. Indeed there is so very little, that if you go to the month of July, and look at day 11, which is when Tone is due to appear, you will find ... only the number eleven, no more, no less. No mention of Pollensa, a music festival, Mallorca, nothing, nada. Perhaps it's not been updated. Don't know, but this much is true, as the title says today, as he appears on the festival's running order.
* http://www.tony-hadley.com/
(As Hadley is due to be appearing with the Barcelona Jazz Orchestra, I imagine he will be reprising his jazz-swing phase from the "Passing Strangers" album, so don't necessarily expect Spandau. See the WHAT'S ON BLOG - http://www.wotzupnorth.blogspot.com - for a full schedule of concerts. Oh, and before anyone thinks otherwise, Tony Hadley was and is a damn fine singer.)
I should tell you that there is another version of this blog. I started it fairly recently through another blog provider, i.e. Wordpress, the reason for doing so being primarily as a sort of back-up but also so I could see how Wordpress works, and it works quite well, having certain standard features that the Blogger system doesn't. Anyway, while this "mirror" gets barely any visitors as it will not rate in Google to the extent that this original does, and is also not linked, it has had some visitors, and one - at least one - has stumbled across it through a string word search, probably through Google. I know this because one of those standard features tells me so, and the most popular (a slight exaggeration I feel) searches have been "jellyfish Mallorca" and ... "nude Nordic walking". Seriously, nude Nordic walking, which I did refer to in some jest several days ago. Clearly, though, such a thing does attract some interest. Each to their own.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Beach Boys: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6Hryc5t2wQ&NR. Today's title - ok, so Spandau Ballet, but who sampled it and made a terrific record in the process? The title of this is contained in the above.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The question is, of course, why book Tony Hadley? Here is a singer set adrift, sent into a rock winter Russian front, consigned to be the Rudolf Hess of the pop world, ever associated with Spandau, languishing in the long-years of the incarceration of memory bliss of Musclebound and Through The Barricades pop-Lebensraum, but without having been the führer behind the whole gig, a role reserved for the foppish Adolf of the Spans, Gary Kemp. And when the Kemp twins decided to go and play at being Krays and Martin ended up leaving it aht, you slag, on Albert Square, Tony ceased to register either on the pop charts or in the pop stratosphere, save for endless plays of "Gold" on Capitol Gold or as the mind-numbingly unoriginal theme accompaniment to athletics championships.
A clue perhaps as to the question, why Tony Hadley, may exist on his website*. For there, if you go to "calendar", you will find that rare is a box per day that contains anything other than a number. For the whole of May, just one event: "opening couture brasserie, delicatessen and food hall, Neptune Quay, Ipswich". There we go, everybody, Ipswich, and not even a vocal performance by the sounds of it. Let's just put it this way, Tony's calendar does look a little light, though to be fair it fills up in the autumn because of course the Spans will be on their comeback tour. But till then, very little. Indeed there is so very little, that if you go to the month of July, and look at day 11, which is when Tone is due to appear, you will find ... only the number eleven, no more, no less. No mention of Pollensa, a music festival, Mallorca, nothing, nada. Perhaps it's not been updated. Don't know, but this much is true, as the title says today, as he appears on the festival's running order.
* http://www.tony-hadley.com/
(As Hadley is due to be appearing with the Barcelona Jazz Orchestra, I imagine he will be reprising his jazz-swing phase from the "Passing Strangers" album, so don't necessarily expect Spandau. See the WHAT'S ON BLOG - http://www.wotzupnorth.blogspot.com - for a full schedule of concerts. Oh, and before anyone thinks otherwise, Tony Hadley was and is a damn fine singer.)
I should tell you that there is another version of this blog. I started it fairly recently through another blog provider, i.e. Wordpress, the reason for doing so being primarily as a sort of back-up but also so I could see how Wordpress works, and it works quite well, having certain standard features that the Blogger system doesn't. Anyway, while this "mirror" gets barely any visitors as it will not rate in Google to the extent that this original does, and is also not linked, it has had some visitors, and one - at least one - has stumbled across it through a string word search, probably through Google. I know this because one of those standard features tells me so, and the most popular (a slight exaggeration I feel) searches have been "jellyfish Mallorca" and ... "nude Nordic walking". Seriously, nude Nordic walking, which I did refer to in some jest several days ago. Clearly, though, such a thing does attract some interest. Each to their own.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Beach Boys: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6Hryc5t2wQ&NR. Today's title - ok, so Spandau Ballet, but who sampled it and made a terrific record in the process? The title of this is contained in the above.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
The Heavenly Stars, The Heavenly Stars
Three days before Christmas, and you might expect that bars, restaurants and shops would be alive with Yuletide muzak. Some are, but yesterday there was another form of song - if song is the right word. Singing by numbers. Small children, trussed up as though at a wedding or communion or junior Strictly Come Dancing, hold numbers and chant them as they cross the stage with almost reverential and quasi-religious but flat Gregorianism. This is "El Gordo", the annual lottery - the fat or big one - and its marathon presentation; fatuous and bloated might be more accurate. Tuneless and monotonous, how can noventa cinco or cuarenta tres be made melodic. The answer is that they cannot. Only if Leonard Cohen had penned a song of the times tables and found it Cowell-ised as a number one might numbers be the stuff of popular song; and even then it would be doubtful. Wherever one went yesterday, there, in a corner, was a TV set with these mini adults and their grating alleged singing. Even my bank manager(ess) was following it on the internet. It does perhaps come to something when senior bank staff are hanging on the very number of the lottery. There is not a lot of business, she admitted to me. Someone, or some people, will have had their prayers answered yesterday. The tickets cost that much that syndicates in local neighbourhoods comprise the majority of the gamblers. I was not one to have had any prayers answered, as I hadn't offered any; I didn't have a ticket. Mallorca and Spain came to a stop for some of yesterday. The efforts of the national football team may have done similarly at the end of June this year, but that achievement and expression of national pride was nothing compared with the prospect of millions of euros. Hark the herald lottery sings.
It shouldn't surprise me, but it does. The people who contact me and where they are from. By definition of course, the internet is world-wide, and so are those who follow the blog or come to it. The other day I had another contact from Australia. A chap called Stephen who had come across what I had done about the "politics of language" and tourism. He is doing a PhD in just that subject. Fascinating stuff, at least I thought so, and no doubt so does he and his academic supervisor. So, in the spirit of this global reach, may I take the opportunity to wish all those of you, from whichever country, who come to this blog and support it with your comments and feedback and just your reading, a very happy Christmas. And maybe even one of you has won a local lottery. A few days off; I shall be back on 27 December unless something major happens in the meantime.
The forecast suggests a change for Christmas Day, but at present it is clear. And at night the sky is a magician's show. The heavenly stars glow and vibrate. It is close to freezing, and one can almost imagine snow, the saw-teeth of holly and a choir of all is calm, all is bright. As the evening becomes tomorrow, the road is silent. The pines at the edge of Albufera appear as genial fluffy clouded puff-monsters silhouetted in the darkness. A night bird calls. And the power station throbs, a lowing cow by a distant manger. There goes a late plane across the speckled blackness and now a shooting star. It races from nowhere and disappears as quickly as it arrived. And once again it is silent, a silent night, and the heavenly stars twinkle on, and maybe that shooting star was something, someone, else. Who knows? Maybe it was him, a bearded man with large boots. Happy Christmas, everyone.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Bruce Hornsby (And The Range). Today's title - a line from what was this blog's song of the year in 2007.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
It shouldn't surprise me, but it does. The people who contact me and where they are from. By definition of course, the internet is world-wide, and so are those who follow the blog or come to it. The other day I had another contact from Australia. A chap called Stephen who had come across what I had done about the "politics of language" and tourism. He is doing a PhD in just that subject. Fascinating stuff, at least I thought so, and no doubt so does he and his academic supervisor. So, in the spirit of this global reach, may I take the opportunity to wish all those of you, from whichever country, who come to this blog and support it with your comments and feedback and just your reading, a very happy Christmas. And maybe even one of you has won a local lottery. A few days off; I shall be back on 27 December unless something major happens in the meantime.
The forecast suggests a change for Christmas Day, but at present it is clear. And at night the sky is a magician's show. The heavenly stars glow and vibrate. It is close to freezing, and one can almost imagine snow, the saw-teeth of holly and a choir of all is calm, all is bright. As the evening becomes tomorrow, the road is silent. The pines at the edge of Albufera appear as genial fluffy clouded puff-monsters silhouetted in the darkness. A night bird calls. And the power station throbs, a lowing cow by a distant manger. There goes a late plane across the speckled blackness and now a shooting star. It races from nowhere and disappears as quickly as it arrived. And once again it is silent, a silent night, and the heavenly stars twinkle on, and maybe that shooting star was something, someone, else. Who knows? Maybe it was him, a bearded man with large boots. Happy Christmas, everyone.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Bruce Hornsby (And The Range). Today's title - a line from what was this blog's song of the year in 2007.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Pour A Cup Of Black Coffee
Rafael Nadal, no sooner having been co-opted as the promotional face of Mallorca and the Balearics (actually, I think it still has to be fully ironed out, but it's on its way), now gets himself hauled into some other campaign. And that is? Well, get this one. There is this thing called "Café per la llengua" which is being launched by the Catalan promoters - Obra Cultural Balear. What it boils down to is that people will be encouraged to go along to their local café, have a coffee (or presumably any other drink) and talk in Catalan. Seriously, that is what this campaign is about. Am I missing something here? What language do many, perhaps most Mallorcans speak when they're having a coffee or indeed not having a coffee? Catalan, or rather its Mallorquín dialect. When I go into a local café, yes you may get some Castilian but generally they're speaking Catalan. So why do they need a campaign? And moreover, what are Nadal and his uncle-trainer doing getting involved? Yes, they are Mallorcan and yes they no doubt speak in Mallorquín with each other, but if, on the one hand, you are the international face of the island, with all the connotations that this has, why, on the other, contradict that internationalism with some parochialism. It all sounds a bit political, and I'm really not sure Nadal should be going along with it. But ultimately, what is the point of it? And there is something vaguely creepy about a campaign that, in the social setting of the bar or café, promotes one language over another.
PUERTO POLLENSA - BUS STATION
I should have added yesterday that the mayor is now also thinking of moving the bus stop by the marina to a position by the municipal offices. This, I suppose, makes some sense as it would mean buses would not need to come right into the centre, or would they? It would depend how they were routed, but if they were to use the disaster area that is the Calle Vicente Buades (the road in front of the municipal buildings), or indeed Calle Roger de Flor (the one that runs parallel to it) they're going to have to re-do both the roads, you would think - which would be no bad thing. The obvious route, though, would be to use the bypass and then terminate by the municipal buildings. I don't know, that doesn't sound such a bad idea, but it would cut out the bus stops on the Calle Juan XXIII if the bus were to come straight along the new road and carry on the bypass at the Eroski roundabout. And indeed, what about the stops on the front line? Are buses among the "heavy traffic" that is meant to now only use the new road? Hmm, not sure this is all being thought through. Nothing new there, then.
BLOG STUFF
Just to say that a new entry to the links section is one for a new forum - The Mallorca Forum. This is something from Hollie, who used to live in Alcúdia, and knew the likes of John and Lynne at The Highlander and Ben and Sara, as in who are now Bellevue Ben and Condes Sara. Recently, a link was also added for Puerto Pollensa.com's forum, and these both follow a pattern as the policy - such as it is - is to admit forums, blogs, myspaces, i.e. small or part sites as opposed to full sites, though there are exceptions, such as for the newspapers. Anyone with something along these lines, assuming it's appropriate, can email me if they wish to be listed.
And on a blog theme ... I was trawling through some of the very old archives of stuff that is no longer retained here, and I found this for 14 December 2005:
"Well, this could be good news indeed. Yesterday MPs in the Balearic parliament voted in favour of forming a body to monitor all-inclusive hotels. Driven by the opposition parties, who believe that such hotels are bad for the economy, the ruling PP (some of whose MPs voted in favour) have to confront the fact that they have not realised the potential harm that all-inclusives can and do cause. Former Tourism Minister Alomar spoke of a “low-quality product” in leading the move."
The ruling party is no longer the PP of course, but I wonder - whatever happened to this, do you suppose?
DIGITAL POLLENSA
Following the recent inclusion of Alcúdia in the signal coverage for the impending switchover to digital television, Pollensa is now also on-stream. The change will occur at the end of next year. It's basically the same as in the UK, so TVs will have to have the appropriate gadgets or be compatible. There is in fact quite a good article on this in the current "Euro Weekly" (one of the newspapers linked). So, anyone locally needing some background, go to the site and you'll find the article. You need to go to Virtual Newspaper then click the Mallorca version and press the forward button to page three.
DOGGY BAGS - UPDATE
Seamus emails me from England to say that you can get 125 doggy bags for 99 pence. So, for those of you struggling to get them locally, stock up when back in England. Maybe something could also be done about cats that piss up against the front-door shutters. What was that, thought I, yesterday morning? Either a cat, a dog or a very short person.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Smokey Robinson (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qV7XlZPdzZI). Today's title - I've used this song before, but it's such a corker, here it makes a reappearance. Girl group.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
PUERTO POLLENSA - BUS STATION
I should have added yesterday that the mayor is now also thinking of moving the bus stop by the marina to a position by the municipal offices. This, I suppose, makes some sense as it would mean buses would not need to come right into the centre, or would they? It would depend how they were routed, but if they were to use the disaster area that is the Calle Vicente Buades (the road in front of the municipal buildings), or indeed Calle Roger de Flor (the one that runs parallel to it) they're going to have to re-do both the roads, you would think - which would be no bad thing. The obvious route, though, would be to use the bypass and then terminate by the municipal buildings. I don't know, that doesn't sound such a bad idea, but it would cut out the bus stops on the Calle Juan XXIII if the bus were to come straight along the new road and carry on the bypass at the Eroski roundabout. And indeed, what about the stops on the front line? Are buses among the "heavy traffic" that is meant to now only use the new road? Hmm, not sure this is all being thought through. Nothing new there, then.
BLOG STUFF
Just to say that a new entry to the links section is one for a new forum - The Mallorca Forum. This is something from Hollie, who used to live in Alcúdia, and knew the likes of John and Lynne at The Highlander and Ben and Sara, as in who are now Bellevue Ben and Condes Sara. Recently, a link was also added for Puerto Pollensa.com's forum, and these both follow a pattern as the policy - such as it is - is to admit forums, blogs, myspaces, i.e. small or part sites as opposed to full sites, though there are exceptions, such as for the newspapers. Anyone with something along these lines, assuming it's appropriate, can email me if they wish to be listed.
And on a blog theme ... I was trawling through some of the very old archives of stuff that is no longer retained here, and I found this for 14 December 2005:
"Well, this could be good news indeed. Yesterday MPs in the Balearic parliament voted in favour of forming a body to monitor all-inclusive hotels. Driven by the opposition parties, who believe that such hotels are bad for the economy, the ruling PP (some of whose MPs voted in favour) have to confront the fact that they have not realised the potential harm that all-inclusives can and do cause. Former Tourism Minister Alomar spoke of a “low-quality product” in leading the move."
The ruling party is no longer the PP of course, but I wonder - whatever happened to this, do you suppose?
DIGITAL POLLENSA
Following the recent inclusion of Alcúdia in the signal coverage for the impending switchover to digital television, Pollensa is now also on-stream. The change will occur at the end of next year. It's basically the same as in the UK, so TVs will have to have the appropriate gadgets or be compatible. There is in fact quite a good article on this in the current "Euro Weekly" (one of the newspapers linked). So, anyone locally needing some background, go to the site and you'll find the article. You need to go to Virtual Newspaper then click the Mallorca version and press the forward button to page three.
DOGGY BAGS - UPDATE
Seamus emails me from England to say that you can get 125 doggy bags for 99 pence. So, for those of you struggling to get them locally, stock up when back in England. Maybe something could also be done about cats that piss up against the front-door shutters. What was that, thought I, yesterday morning? Either a cat, a dog or a very short person.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Smokey Robinson (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qV7XlZPdzZI). Today's title - I've used this song before, but it's such a corker, here it makes a reappearance. Girl group.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Thursday, September 11, 2008
I Saw The Sign
The will it close, will it not close confusion continues regarding the frontline road from Llenaire into Puerto Pollensa. There was a letter to the "Ultima Hora" newspaper the other day about the projected closure and also about the new bypass. Unfortunately, it was in Catalan, but I get the gist. Lack of information as to the exact plans of the town hall, was the bypass really necessary; that sort of thing. It also mentions, as I pointed out a while back, that there is a sign at the roundabout as one comes from Alcúdia that directs traffic into the centre along the very road that is meant to be closed at some point. In other words, it doesn't direct traffic along the bypass, unless, that is, you want to go to Palma perhaps.
I have been along the bypass a few times now. It's a joy. There's hardly any other traffic. Of course there will be if the coast road is closed, but if it isn't, then the letter-writer's complaint as to the destruction of the area around Llenaire, brought about by the hugely expensive bypass, has some substance. As for that sign, a few days ago there was a sort of blue bin-liner affair attached to it with an arrow pointing towards the bypass. I presume that it wasn't official, and that some wag had put it there as a way of making a point to the town hall (or whoever is responsible for road signs). Even if the frontline remains open, why not send traffic along the bypass? You can get to the centre just as easily; more easily in fact. Anyway, this temporary bin-liner sign is no longer there, and just to emphasise how much the town hall recognises that everyone is still of course using the coast road, there is another sign, a damn great big one across the road that announces this weekend's fisherman's fair in Puerto Pollensa (see the WHAT'S ON BLOG - http://www.wotzupnorth.blogspot.com - for information).
They seem to have a bit of a problem with road signs here. The classic road sign that isn't a road sign by the Hiper supermarket in Puerto Pollensa is one of the finest examples. What it is, is a warning road sign, intended to tell you to get into lane for the real road sign at the lights some 100 metres further along - around a slight bend, so conveniently you can't actually see that there are other signs and a junction. What happens therefore is that the uninitiated slow down or stop, get confused, cause the driver behind to get mad, and then maybe proceed or go left or right, which is not what you should do.
Then there is another bypass. The one that goes at the back of Bellevue in Puerto Alcúdia. This road is similarly lightly used. It may take you out of your way, but in summer it is much quicker to use it than crawl along the carretera in order to get into the centre of the port or to go to Alcanada or the old town. The only problem is that the sign at the roundabout directs traffic to Palma and Sa Pobla, which is fair enough, but it neglects the bypass possibility. Moreover, at the next roundabout the sign for Palma directs you along the road to Sa Pobla, the old one by Albufera; the old one with that bridge where it is one-way traffic. What it does not do is direct you along the bypass to Palma, which is by far the simpler route. As one enters Alcúdia from the motorway, the bypass is similarly poorly signed. It says Can Picafort and Arta. Again, this is fair enough, but it fails to therefore inform the driver that this is the road for, for example, Hidropark and Bellevue, to say nothing of Playa de Muro. For the tourist especially, these signs are, shall we say, less than useful.
WHAT WAS YESTERDAY?
The day England became World Cup favourites? Bloody hot, the consequence of all that air being sucked in from Africa? Well, one of these. It was also the "day of the tourist". If you are a tourist, congratulations, you have a day named after you. It was Puerto Alcúdia's day of the tourist. Did anyone know? Anyway, there were sports, arroz brut (bet that went down well with the Bellevue crowd), and musical "spectaculars", among which was a performance by the omnipotent Beatles tribute - Beatlejuice. And they are omnipotent. Everywhere you go, these non-lookalikes are to be found. With the greatest respect to some friends with whom I spent an evening being serenaded over a meal by said Beatlejuice, I found them singularly underwhelming. They liked them. There again, I'm none too taken with most, if any, tributes. What do I know. There again, I'm not a tourist. Wasn't my day.
AND WHAT IS TODAY?
The day for a hangover after England's glorious victory? The anniversary of you know what? Both. It also marks a 600.
Mention of those signs by Hiper brings me to the fact that this entry is the 600th on the blog. One of the earliest entries spoke about these very signs. You won't find that entry any longer as I've started a process of deleting old archives. The blog's just got too big. Accordingly, the stuff for 2006 now starts in July of that year. Some of the old stuff may well be worth revisiting at some point and re-doing. Anyway, as this is number 600, I'd just like to say thanks to all of you who come here. I had never anticipated that making entries daily back in October last year would have had so much impact. I have had those who tell me they are "too addicted" to the blog or who look at the blog as the first thing once the computer has been powered up. It is quite nice to know that. It's also nice to get comments that the blog is "refreshing", "very good incisive stuff" and an "antidote to some other sites where the sun always shines on the sangria". So to all of you, once again, thanks a lot. I very much appreciate your time in both reading the blog and contacting me. Do keep sending your emails, comments, observations, disagreements, and answering the odd quiz question. Which brings me to ...
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Racing Cars (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7xEfNrXOLg). The vocals on the video are not very clear. Today's title - Swedish.
Oh, and today is also someone's birthday - HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KAREN!
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
I have been along the bypass a few times now. It's a joy. There's hardly any other traffic. Of course there will be if the coast road is closed, but if it isn't, then the letter-writer's complaint as to the destruction of the area around Llenaire, brought about by the hugely expensive bypass, has some substance. As for that sign, a few days ago there was a sort of blue bin-liner affair attached to it with an arrow pointing towards the bypass. I presume that it wasn't official, and that some wag had put it there as a way of making a point to the town hall (or whoever is responsible for road signs). Even if the frontline remains open, why not send traffic along the bypass? You can get to the centre just as easily; more easily in fact. Anyway, this temporary bin-liner sign is no longer there, and just to emphasise how much the town hall recognises that everyone is still of course using the coast road, there is another sign, a damn great big one across the road that announces this weekend's fisherman's fair in Puerto Pollensa (see the WHAT'S ON BLOG - http://www.wotzupnorth.blogspot.com - for information).
They seem to have a bit of a problem with road signs here. The classic road sign that isn't a road sign by the Hiper supermarket in Puerto Pollensa is one of the finest examples. What it is, is a warning road sign, intended to tell you to get into lane for the real road sign at the lights some 100 metres further along - around a slight bend, so conveniently you can't actually see that there are other signs and a junction. What happens therefore is that the uninitiated slow down or stop, get confused, cause the driver behind to get mad, and then maybe proceed or go left or right, which is not what you should do.
Then there is another bypass. The one that goes at the back of Bellevue in Puerto Alcúdia. This road is similarly lightly used. It may take you out of your way, but in summer it is much quicker to use it than crawl along the carretera in order to get into the centre of the port or to go to Alcanada or the old town. The only problem is that the sign at the roundabout directs traffic to Palma and Sa Pobla, which is fair enough, but it neglects the bypass possibility. Moreover, at the next roundabout the sign for Palma directs you along the road to Sa Pobla, the old one by Albufera; the old one with that bridge where it is one-way traffic. What it does not do is direct you along the bypass to Palma, which is by far the simpler route. As one enters Alcúdia from the motorway, the bypass is similarly poorly signed. It says Can Picafort and Arta. Again, this is fair enough, but it fails to therefore inform the driver that this is the road for, for example, Hidropark and Bellevue, to say nothing of Playa de Muro. For the tourist especially, these signs are, shall we say, less than useful.
WHAT WAS YESTERDAY?
The day England became World Cup favourites? Bloody hot, the consequence of all that air being sucked in from Africa? Well, one of these. It was also the "day of the tourist". If you are a tourist, congratulations, you have a day named after you. It was Puerto Alcúdia's day of the tourist. Did anyone know? Anyway, there were sports, arroz brut (bet that went down well with the Bellevue crowd), and musical "spectaculars", among which was a performance by the omnipotent Beatles tribute - Beatlejuice. And they are omnipotent. Everywhere you go, these non-lookalikes are to be found. With the greatest respect to some friends with whom I spent an evening being serenaded over a meal by said Beatlejuice, I found them singularly underwhelming. They liked them. There again, I'm none too taken with most, if any, tributes. What do I know. There again, I'm not a tourist. Wasn't my day.
AND WHAT IS TODAY?
The day for a hangover after England's glorious victory? The anniversary of you know what? Both. It also marks a 600.
Mention of those signs by Hiper brings me to the fact that this entry is the 600th on the blog. One of the earliest entries spoke about these very signs. You won't find that entry any longer as I've started a process of deleting old archives. The blog's just got too big. Accordingly, the stuff for 2006 now starts in July of that year. Some of the old stuff may well be worth revisiting at some point and re-doing. Anyway, as this is number 600, I'd just like to say thanks to all of you who come here. I had never anticipated that making entries daily back in October last year would have had so much impact. I have had those who tell me they are "too addicted" to the blog or who look at the blog as the first thing once the computer has been powered up. It is quite nice to know that. It's also nice to get comments that the blog is "refreshing", "very good incisive stuff" and an "antidote to some other sites where the sun always shines on the sangria". So to all of you, once again, thanks a lot. I very much appreciate your time in both reading the blog and contacting me. Do keep sending your emails, comments, observations, disagreements, and answering the odd quiz question. Which brings me to ...
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Racing Cars (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7xEfNrXOLg). The vocals on the video are not very clear. Today's title - Swedish.
Oh, and today is also someone's birthday - HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KAREN!
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Monday, July 14, 2008
Just The Two Of Us
Do you know that there are two official languages in Mallorca? If you do, well done, and count yourself in with the other 6.2% of Brits (assuming you are British; and if you are not, my apologies) who also know. A survey of tourists staying in Playa de Palma (as reported in the "Diario" on 11 July) discovered that there was a general lack of knowledge about the languages as well as a high level of indifference. And it's not as if coming back on holiday makes much of an impact. Only 7.3% of repeating Brits have become aware that Castilian and Catalan share official-language status.
This comes as no surprise in the sense that most visitors are unaware that there is another language, other than Spanish. Many will probably be unaware of Catalan's existence, let alone the fact that it (or Mallorquín) is spoken here. Let's face it: never over-estimate the knowledge of your average tourist.
The survey crops up in the context of the Mallorca Council's promotion of Catalan in restaurants (9 July: I Say High, You Say Low). Quite what the survey's findings have to do with this mystifies me. The fact that British, and German, tourists seem to care not a jot what language is used is no pretext with which to suggest that Catalan, or indeed any other language, should be used. I still don't understand quite what this is all about. Restaurant menus, in tourist places at any rate, are usually in several languages, Castilian and Catalan included. Your regular tourist goes to the page with his own language or the one he understands best. He does not go to the Castilian or Catalan page except if he is from mainland Spain.
Another of the survey's findings is that hardly any tourists are ever attended to by someone speaking Catalan. Of course they're not. More often than not, they will be greeted in English. Fatuous is a word that springs to mind in respect of some of this survey. Though this is not an apt description when one learns that only one in four Brits has done anything of a cultural nature while on holiday. I actually would question this. It would be good to know what they were asked precisely and, as importantly, how the tourist defines cultural. A trip to Marineland is probably cultural to some tourists. Apparently, nearly 40% of Brits would be interested in cultural activities, but I hope the Mallorcan tourist top brass don't get carried away. People will say anything as part of a survey.
To other matters ... And another blog to be linked. This is Married With Children Mallorca (http://mwcmallorca.blogspot.com). The work of Vicki McLeod, it is a look at things in the south of the island and well worth delving into. Vicki also appears on Luna Radio, which I confess I have never listened to. But maybe I will now do so and to Vicki's show on weekday afternoons.
And, as a sort of follow-up to yesterday, another election for another fiesta top-billing. A Maria, always a Maria, can forever say that she was a Beata, as in Beata Santa Catalina, she who was tempted but gave short shrift to the devil and whose memory lives on in what is reckoned to be the most traditional of Mallorcan fiestas - that of the Beata in Santa Margalida in September.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Ting Tings of course (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UX0p7uAW2s). Today's title - two languages, just the two, or maybe it's three, but anyway who did this?. By the way, I used Time Won't Give Me Time the other day. I really, really must keep a note of these titles as I found I had used it back in April as well. Oops.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
This comes as no surprise in the sense that most visitors are unaware that there is another language, other than Spanish. Many will probably be unaware of Catalan's existence, let alone the fact that it (or Mallorquín) is spoken here. Let's face it: never over-estimate the knowledge of your average tourist.
The survey crops up in the context of the Mallorca Council's promotion of Catalan in restaurants (9 July: I Say High, You Say Low). Quite what the survey's findings have to do with this mystifies me. The fact that British, and German, tourists seem to care not a jot what language is used is no pretext with which to suggest that Catalan, or indeed any other language, should be used. I still don't understand quite what this is all about. Restaurant menus, in tourist places at any rate, are usually in several languages, Castilian and Catalan included. Your regular tourist goes to the page with his own language or the one he understands best. He does not go to the Castilian or Catalan page except if he is from mainland Spain.
Another of the survey's findings is that hardly any tourists are ever attended to by someone speaking Catalan. Of course they're not. More often than not, they will be greeted in English. Fatuous is a word that springs to mind in respect of some of this survey. Though this is not an apt description when one learns that only one in four Brits has done anything of a cultural nature while on holiday. I actually would question this. It would be good to know what they were asked precisely and, as importantly, how the tourist defines cultural. A trip to Marineland is probably cultural to some tourists. Apparently, nearly 40% of Brits would be interested in cultural activities, but I hope the Mallorcan tourist top brass don't get carried away. People will say anything as part of a survey.
To other matters ... And another blog to be linked. This is Married With Children Mallorca (http://mwcmallorca.blogspot.com). The work of Vicki McLeod, it is a look at things in the south of the island and well worth delving into. Vicki also appears on Luna Radio, which I confess I have never listened to. But maybe I will now do so and to Vicki's show on weekday afternoons.
And, as a sort of follow-up to yesterday, another election for another fiesta top-billing. A Maria, always a Maria, can forever say that she was a Beata, as in Beata Santa Catalina, she who was tempted but gave short shrift to the devil and whose memory lives on in what is reckoned to be the most traditional of Mallorcan fiestas - that of the Beata in Santa Margalida in September.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Ting Tings of course (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UX0p7uAW2s). Today's title - two languages, just the two, or maybe it's three, but anyway who did this?. By the way, I used Time Won't Give Me Time the other day. I really, really must keep a note of these titles as I found I had used it back in April as well. Oops.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Posh 'n' Becks
There are some people who seem to drop out of one's orbit. Maybe they've moved on and away, like so many do. But then, by chance, you find they haven't. And so, by chance, I happened to be loitering with some intent yesterday evening in the area of The Posh Paddy. Hey, who's that?, thought he'd gone, hadn't seen him for, oh, a couple of years. Matt. Former Comics and Jacks, Matt. But of course he's at The Posh Paddy, one of the few watering holes in Playa de Muro that is deserving of an honourable mention.
By itself, this might not have inspired a small item on the blog. But there was more to it, in that Matt is The Alcúdia Barfly or, more accurately, the blogger that is to be found at http://thealcudiabarfly.blogspot.com, which is a pretty cool blog, albeit that time is short and the updating is, er, a bit sporadic.
Time though is also short for myself just at present, so this is a short entry today, but no less important for its brevity.
But while on bars ... When new bar staff arrive in Alcúdia, what finer an experience can there be than to enjoy a Mallorcan night, almost as nature intended? The chill of an April night, the buzz of a malevolent mosquito, the grating zip of a crap moto, the wail of a drunk, the throb of the power station. From one in the morning till eight in the morning - all of this, all of this in the raw. A Mallorcan night.
Charlie, the new chef at Foxes, and his girlfriend, Becky, enjoyed this Mallorcan night. Locked themselves out. Locked themselves out of their Siesta apartment. Locked themselves out and on to their Siesta apartment balcony. Could have been worse. Could have been a Mississippi apartment.
QUIZ
A character in the Jane Fonda film "Barbarella", and Joni Mitchell was the title. So, Jane Fonda's brother, Peter, was in "Easy Rider", and one of the tracks in that film was "Born To Be Wild" - by which group?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Blowin' In The Wind
Is it normally this bad? I don't remember it being so. Pollen. All over the damn place. The terrace looks like the tide's been in and deposited a load of sand. It gets inside. Open the car window and the black leather trim is blasted to take on the appearance of an abstract painting, all streaks and bits of yellow and green. Whoever thought that those holes in the leather would look cool didn't take into account the insinuative nature of Mallorcan pollen. Don't they have trees and bushes and stuff in Japan?
Perhaps it's the summer in winter we've been having. At times it has been pretty damn hot, so thanks God there's a storm brewing and some rain will come. Only problem then is that the pollen will turn to glue. Oh and one other thing. Washing. Put the washing out, and you know that white t-shirt. Looks like the whole of the Norwich City kit - shirt and shorts.
But to other matters, and something of a celebration as the blog now starts to spread its wings. Can a blog have wings? Maybe not. Whatever. It's like Cheers spawning Frasier or some such. Blog - the spin-off. My good friends at Majorcan Villas have given their site a make-over and there now is BlogMV, as I've dubbed it. So long as I don't get too bogged down with doing specialist in meat ads, it could be there will now be two regular different blogs, or similar blogs, and maybe exactly the same if I am struggling for time. But then it wouldn't be like a spin-off. So I'll try my best to keep them different. The link to Majorcan Villas, and therefore Blog MV, is in the links menu.
And just one final thing. Today's "Bulletin". Back page. Headline. "Wacky Races". Reference to the Classic Car Rally that I spoke about on 1 March and in which I used the wacky races line. I don't know, am I becoming like "The Bulletin"?
And one final, final thing. I was doing these labels things that go with each entry, and put in Pollen and then Pollensa. How about that? Pollen-saaaahh. Atchoo!
QUIZ
Yesterday - Isaac Hayes. Today's title - oh come on, this is dead simple.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Perhaps it's the summer in winter we've been having. At times it has been pretty damn hot, so thanks God there's a storm brewing and some rain will come. Only problem then is that the pollen will turn to glue. Oh and one other thing. Washing. Put the washing out, and you know that white t-shirt. Looks like the whole of the Norwich City kit - shirt and shorts.
But to other matters, and something of a celebration as the blog now starts to spread its wings. Can a blog have wings? Maybe not. Whatever. It's like Cheers spawning Frasier or some such. Blog - the spin-off. My good friends at Majorcan Villas have given their site a make-over and there now is BlogMV, as I've dubbed it. So long as I don't get too bogged down with doing specialist in meat ads, it could be there will now be two regular different blogs, or similar blogs, and maybe exactly the same if I am struggling for time. But then it wouldn't be like a spin-off. So I'll try my best to keep them different. The link to Majorcan Villas, and therefore Blog MV, is in the links menu.
And just one final thing. Today's "Bulletin". Back page. Headline. "Wacky Races". Reference to the Classic Car Rally that I spoke about on 1 March and in which I used the wacky races line. I don't know, am I becoming like "The Bulletin"?
And one final, final thing. I was doing these labels things that go with each entry, and put in Pollen and then Pollensa. How about that? Pollen-saaaahh. Atchoo!
QUIZ
Yesterday - Isaac Hayes. Today's title - oh come on, this is dead simple.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Awards For 2007 / Happy New Year
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Awards 2007
The great and good gathered to hear last year’s winners announced by Russell Brand/Graham Norton/Jonathan Ross (choose according to which one you can stomach most – difficult).
First up, the sensible ones:
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Bar Of The Year: JK’s, Puerto Pollensa.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Restaurant Of The Year: Es Turó in Santa Margalida.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Business Of The Year: No Frills Excursions.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Person Of The Year: José, Café Bony, Puerto Pollensa.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com New Bar Of The Year: La Birreria in Pollensa, Vamps, Puerto Alcúdia.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com New Restaurant Of The Year: Sa Caseta, Alcúdia, Sal i Oli, Puerto Pollensa.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Most Popular Bars Of The Year (special award in association with www.thealcudiaguide.com): Festas and Foxes Arms, Puerto Alcúdia.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Heart In The Right Place Award goes to Little Britain supermarket for its charitable stuff and service above and beyond …
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Song Of The Year: Laura Veirs, “To The Country”.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Album Of The Year: Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, “Raising Sand”.
Now, the special sponsored awards:
The Civil Engineering Couldn’t Organise A Piss-Up In A Brewery Award: joint winners, the designers of the changes to the Carretera Arta in Puerto Alcúdia (too many references to list) and of the new Palma metro which had to be closed soon after it opened because of flooding, and remains closed (22 August for instance.)
The Daily Bulletin Historical Inaccuracy Award (Columbus class) this year goes to “Euro Weekly” for its botching up the sequence of Columbus’s voyages to the Americas (getting it wrong in other words). And a supplementary award for geographical inaccuracy also to “EW” for suggesting that the Dominican Republic was/is an island separate to Hispaniola. (11 October.)
The Dale Carnegie How To Win Friends And Influence People Award For Lousy PR is entrusted to the Juaneda group for its poor communications and mixed messages in respect of the closure of the Alcúdia hospital. (5 December for instance.)
The Glasgow Ice-Cream Wars Award goes to the rival sunbed-and-sun-lounger concessionaires on Playa de Muro beach. (15 July, 20 September.)
The Jeremy Clarkson Environmental Bore Of The Year Award is granted to GOB, the environmental pressure group, for banging on and on and on about the proposed golf course on the Son Bosc finca in Muro. Get those diggers out! (7 December for instance.)
The Jimmy Savile Award For Governmental Initiatives goes to the new Balearic administration which announced that its period in office would be “The Age of the Train” (among other things, an extension of the line as far as Alcúdia is planned.) (18 July.)
The Leapy Lee Award For Self-Publicising One’s Own True Self goes to … Leapy Lee for bringing to the attention of the world Alexei Sayle’s hatchet-job on him, which would otherwise have gone unnoticed and forgotten. (17 July.)
The Ted Dexter Award For Getting Sportspeople’s Names Wrong is the prize for Riki Lash who referred to Tommy Dority (sic) and Joe Royal (sic) – in the same article. (Ted Dexter once called the fast bowler Devon Malcolm, Malcolm Devon; Dexter was chairman of the England cricket-team selectors at the time. The Lashmeister meant Tommy Docherty and Joe Royle; at least one assumes so.) (15 March.)
THE SENSIBLE AWARDS: A NOTE
These awards are to an extent, but not exclusively, personal. If I had never heard any good recommendations or comments regarding the award-winners, they would never have been chosen. In my work with the websites and with the local guides, I hear all sorts of remarks, and these I duly take on board. It is of course difficult to choose one place over another (especially when so many, but not all, are clients), but this blog works according to different criteria than the websites or guides; it is, ultimately, personal, but does not seek to favour one establishment over another. The awards are as much a point of entertainment and starting-point for information and debate as anything else.
This all said, I’d like to go into a bit of detail about the award-winners.
JKs: Best Bar. What gives JKs this accolade is partly the fact that it is open all year, but this is not all. Jane and Kevin have worked hard at creating a bar with a multiplicity of offers. It is family, it is drinkers, it is sports, it is food. It gets best bar as it does so much so well.
Es Turó: Best Restaurant. This was really the best find of last year. It was working on new business in Can Picafort that brought it onto my radar. Though living not that far from the restaurant, I was unaware of it … until going there and trying it. The food is good, not outstanding, but good. It is the atmosphere and the sheer magnificence of the setting that do it.
No Frills Excursions: Best Business. If there were one business out of all in the northern zone that would get this accolade (including bars, restaurants and others), it would be No Frills. I know of no other business that gets the level of commendation that Toni and Seamus do.
José, Bony: Person of the year. A jokey entry perhaps, but José is a heck of a character. Café Bony is not just José, but his personality defines the place, and that personality is one that attracts people back year after year.
La Birreria and Vamps: Best New Bars. Bars come and go. What defines both these bars is their innovation. This is increasingly important, and both have carved out strong reputations as a consequence. They are very different: La Birreria has focused on a pub atmosphere with a vast range of beers and live music, Vamps has focused on adult-style entertainment also with live music.
Sa Caseta and Sal i Oli: Best New Restaurants. Once again, new restaurants come and go. Why these two very different places? Sa Caseta is a converted old town house in Alcúdia with a terrific and economical range of pizzas and Italian food, Sal i Oli is an unremarkable looking place by contrast but, boy, is the food good. Caseta has some roots in the excellent Little Italy in Puerto Pollensa and Sal in the equally excellent L’Almirant also in Puerto Pollensa.
Festas and Foxes Arms: Most Popular Bars. These are special awards as they are based only on recommendations sent to www.thealcudiaguide.com. Both share one thing, they are not that big, but they also share great reputations in their differing ways (see all the comments for both under Bars Alcúdia on www.thealcudiaguide.com).
Little Britain: Heart in the Right Place. Another special award. Not only is this an excellent small British supermarket, but also Steve and Urbano offer charitable assistance and offer a personal service that is hard to beat, and it is over and above what one might expect, things I have commented on in the blog.
So there you are. These are some short explanations. In each category, there are many other worthies. Tell me about them.
QUIZ
Last time – it was of course Slade. No quiz today. Normal-ish service starts up again tomorrow, rather like Network Rail – possibly.
HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL!!!
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The great and good gathered to hear last year’s winners announced by Russell Brand/Graham Norton/Jonathan Ross (choose according to which one you can stomach most – difficult).
First up, the sensible ones:
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Bar Of The Year: JK’s, Puerto Pollensa.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Restaurant Of The Year: Es Turó in Santa Margalida.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Business Of The Year: No Frills Excursions.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Person Of The Year: José, Café Bony, Puerto Pollensa.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com New Bar Of The Year: La Birreria in Pollensa, Vamps, Puerto Alcúdia.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com New Restaurant Of The Year: Sa Caseta, Alcúdia, Sal i Oli, Puerto Pollensa.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Most Popular Bars Of The Year (special award in association with www.thealcudiaguide.com): Festas and Foxes Arms, Puerto Alcúdia.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Heart In The Right Place Award goes to Little Britain supermarket for its charitable stuff and service above and beyond …
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Song Of The Year: Laura Veirs, “To The Country”.
The AlcudiaPollensa.Blogspot.com Album Of The Year: Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, “Raising Sand”.
Now, the special sponsored awards:
The Civil Engineering Couldn’t Organise A Piss-Up In A Brewery Award: joint winners, the designers of the changes to the Carretera Arta in Puerto Alcúdia (too many references to list) and of the new Palma metro which had to be closed soon after it opened because of flooding, and remains closed (22 August for instance.)
The Daily Bulletin Historical Inaccuracy Award (Columbus class) this year goes to “Euro Weekly” for its botching up the sequence of Columbus’s voyages to the Americas (getting it wrong in other words). And a supplementary award for geographical inaccuracy also to “EW” for suggesting that the Dominican Republic was/is an island separate to Hispaniola. (11 October.)
The Dale Carnegie How To Win Friends And Influence People Award For Lousy PR is entrusted to the Juaneda group for its poor communications and mixed messages in respect of the closure of the Alcúdia hospital. (5 December for instance.)
The Glasgow Ice-Cream Wars Award goes to the rival sunbed-and-sun-lounger concessionaires on Playa de Muro beach. (15 July, 20 September.)
The Jeremy Clarkson Environmental Bore Of The Year Award is granted to GOB, the environmental pressure group, for banging on and on and on about the proposed golf course on the Son Bosc finca in Muro. Get those diggers out! (7 December for instance.)
The Jimmy Savile Award For Governmental Initiatives goes to the new Balearic administration which announced that its period in office would be “The Age of the Train” (among other things, an extension of the line as far as Alcúdia is planned.) (18 July.)
The Leapy Lee Award For Self-Publicising One’s Own True Self goes to … Leapy Lee for bringing to the attention of the world Alexei Sayle’s hatchet-job on him, which would otherwise have gone unnoticed and forgotten. (17 July.)
The Ted Dexter Award For Getting Sportspeople’s Names Wrong is the prize for Riki Lash who referred to Tommy Dority (sic) and Joe Royal (sic) – in the same article. (Ted Dexter once called the fast bowler Devon Malcolm, Malcolm Devon; Dexter was chairman of the England cricket-team selectors at the time. The Lashmeister meant Tommy Docherty and Joe Royle; at least one assumes so.) (15 March.)
THE SENSIBLE AWARDS: A NOTE
These awards are to an extent, but not exclusively, personal. If I had never heard any good recommendations or comments regarding the award-winners, they would never have been chosen. In my work with the websites and with the local guides, I hear all sorts of remarks, and these I duly take on board. It is of course difficult to choose one place over another (especially when so many, but not all, are clients), but this blog works according to different criteria than the websites or guides; it is, ultimately, personal, but does not seek to favour one establishment over another. The awards are as much a point of entertainment and starting-point for information and debate as anything else.
This all said, I’d like to go into a bit of detail about the award-winners.
JKs: Best Bar. What gives JKs this accolade is partly the fact that it is open all year, but this is not all. Jane and Kevin have worked hard at creating a bar with a multiplicity of offers. It is family, it is drinkers, it is sports, it is food. It gets best bar as it does so much so well.
Es Turó: Best Restaurant. This was really the best find of last year. It was working on new business in Can Picafort that brought it onto my radar. Though living not that far from the restaurant, I was unaware of it … until going there and trying it. The food is good, not outstanding, but good. It is the atmosphere and the sheer magnificence of the setting that do it.
No Frills Excursions: Best Business. If there were one business out of all in the northern zone that would get this accolade (including bars, restaurants and others), it would be No Frills. I know of no other business that gets the level of commendation that Toni and Seamus do.
José, Bony: Person of the year. A jokey entry perhaps, but José is a heck of a character. Café Bony is not just José, but his personality defines the place, and that personality is one that attracts people back year after year.
La Birreria and Vamps: Best New Bars. Bars come and go. What defines both these bars is their innovation. This is increasingly important, and both have carved out strong reputations as a consequence. They are very different: La Birreria has focused on a pub atmosphere with a vast range of beers and live music, Vamps has focused on adult-style entertainment also with live music.
Sa Caseta and Sal i Oli: Best New Restaurants. Once again, new restaurants come and go. Why these two very different places? Sa Caseta is a converted old town house in Alcúdia with a terrific and economical range of pizzas and Italian food, Sal i Oli is an unremarkable looking place by contrast but, boy, is the food good. Caseta has some roots in the excellent Little Italy in Puerto Pollensa and Sal in the equally excellent L’Almirant also in Puerto Pollensa.
Festas and Foxes Arms: Most Popular Bars. These are special awards as they are based only on recommendations sent to www.thealcudiaguide.com. Both share one thing, they are not that big, but they also share great reputations in their differing ways (see all the comments for both under Bars Alcúdia on www.thealcudiaguide.com).
Little Britain: Heart in the Right Place. Another special award. Not only is this an excellent small British supermarket, but also Steve and Urbano offer charitable assistance and offer a personal service that is hard to beat, and it is over and above what one might expect, things I have commented on in the blog.
So there you are. These are some short explanations. In each category, there are many other worthies. Tell me about them.
QUIZ
Last time – it was of course Slade. No quiz today. Normal-ish service starts up again tomorrow, rather like Network Rail – possibly.
HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ONE AND ALL!!!
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Sunday, June 24, 2007
What The Blogging Use Is A Blog?
This is a blog, in case you haven’t noticed. It is not necessarily a thing of beauty, but it serves a purpose. Moreover, it’s free. I’m all for free. One of the wonderful things about the internet is that there are very nice people who let you do things for free. Like blogger.com. Like myspace.com.
I was chatting to Trev at La Sala (see the previous entry) about all this malarkey. Trev is no computer-illiterate. He understands that websites cost money. But for a café such as his, why pay a shed-load for something that you can do for nowt. Ok, these sites are limited in what you can do, but - for many an establishment - they are sufficient. Also ok, you need to devote a bit of time. If you are as switched on as Steve at Little Britain (www.littlebritainmallorca.com), you can use the facility offered by Microsoft to do a very serviceable and good website of your own. Yes, this takes more, but the result is fine.
Moreover, if you get linked via a mother site that offers good optimisation - let’s say, for sake of argument, www.thealcudiaguide.com - and you’re quids in. Well, maybe.
Try it.
Quiz: Oh dear, I will wear a hair suit. What a mistake, but honest I thought “Burn You Up, Burn You Down” by Peter Gabriel was called “Twist And Shout”. That was meant to be the link, but it wasn’t. Never said I was infallible. But ... this track by Peter Gabriel was co-written with Karl Wallinger (Waterboys, World Party). There is another connection between him and Peter Gabriel. What is it? (Think education.)
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
P.S: The title of this piece comes courtesy of my friend Carol. It’s ok, she doesn’t understand these things. God, what have I said?
I was chatting to Trev at La Sala (see the previous entry) about all this malarkey. Trev is no computer-illiterate. He understands that websites cost money. But for a café such as his, why pay a shed-load for something that you can do for nowt. Ok, these sites are limited in what you can do, but - for many an establishment - they are sufficient. Also ok, you need to devote a bit of time. If you are as switched on as Steve at Little Britain (www.littlebritainmallorca.com), you can use the facility offered by Microsoft to do a very serviceable and good website of your own. Yes, this takes more, but the result is fine.
Moreover, if you get linked via a mother site that offers good optimisation - let’s say, for sake of argument, www.thealcudiaguide.com - and you’re quids in. Well, maybe.
Try it.
Quiz: Oh dear, I will wear a hair suit. What a mistake, but honest I thought “Burn You Up, Burn You Down” by Peter Gabriel was called “Twist And Shout”. That was meant to be the link, but it wasn’t. Never said I was infallible. But ... this track by Peter Gabriel was co-written with Karl Wallinger (Waterboys, World Party). There is another connection between him and Peter Gabriel. What is it? (Think education.)
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
P.S: The title of this piece comes courtesy of my friend Carol. It’s ok, she doesn’t understand these things. God, what have I said?
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