One Flu (And Flew) Over The Cu-Cu's Nest

Flu. Would you credit it? No sooner does the weather finally get its arse in gear than flu descends. And before any jibes, this is no man flu, this is flu, or has been as it now seems to be lifting. Not that I've done myself any favours. Customer service continued even if it meant going back and forth, back and forth on Monday with boxes of guides for some and handfuls for others. The problem of not being able to park close enough to the centre of Alcúdia old town. Sweat upon sweat and then shiver.

Of course, there's a lot of it around. There always is a lot of it around, or so it seems. Someone says "I've had the flu" and with true predictability someone else replies, "There's a lot of it around". I don't know that it's any worse here than most places, but all the kissing, hugging and handshaking that goes on probably doesn't help. Sometimes it can be like a wild fire. Two or three years ago, around this time of year, there was a virulent dose of gastric flu. I got it, and when I mentioned it, it turned out everyone else had.

So I have taken two or three days out from doing the normal rounds, I've taken to the terrace, but I'm not at the stage of being wheeled out in a bath-chair with a shawl and a mug of hot lemon. Maybe it's the flu though that heightens one's senses or perhaps one's intolerance of certain noises. So I'm sitting on the terrace, and there is this noise coming closer, and then the noise goes right past and disappears up the road. But then it comes again, and again. I've long thought that these various things that the tourists pedal around on were accidents in the making, but I hadn't appreciated the extent to which they create noise pollution. Specifically, it's those kart-like trike things. Not the four-seater things with horses heads, the ones lower to the ground, just like, well, karts, except with no engine. But that noise. As it came and went and then came again, I was trying to think well what does it remind me of? Then it came to me. A knitting-machine. And perhaps reflecting my temporarily infirm status, I thought asthmatic knitting-machine. And that's just what these things do sound like. I wonder if the guys who operate them have ever thought about applying a bit of WD40.


An update on the Air Berlin-Balearic Government Catalan-usage spat. It seems that Valencia and Murcia airports have taken due note and, with due opportunism, have extended the hand of welcome to the airline to switch its hub from Palma. Can't think for one minute that it will happen, but it should serve as a reminder to the Balearic Government not to go around biting off a hand that feeds by making preposterous "invitations" to use one language over another.


And finally, back to Cuatro and its Euro 2008 coverage; well, the ads anyway. There is one for the Balearic symbol of quality tourism. If you don't know what this is, then if you happen to go to somewhere like La Parra in Puerto Pollensa you'll see a "Q" by the entrance. Hotels are also involved. But this ad. It uses the children's utterance of "cu-cu" (cuckoo). Why? Well because the "cu" pronounced with a short "u" here is basically how you say "Q". All fine it would seem, and the letter for "Q" for quality makes sense, doesn't it, unlike the Ç thing. Except it doesn't make sense, if you happen not to speak Catalan, English or German, i.e. you speak Castilian. The Catalan for quality is "qualitat"; the Castilian is "calidad". Moreover, the advert is not in Catalan, it is in Castilian and refers, of course, to calidad. Cu-cu!


QUIZ
Chain - REM's "Man On The Moon" referred to Andy Kaufman who, among other things, was an Elvis impersonator. And how do you get from that song to the American one-hit wonders Deep Blue Something? Yesterday's title - Barack Obama (see this here if you must: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjXyqcx-mYY). Today's title - in its proper form, who starred in the film? Easy stuff.

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

The Surrey With The Fringe On Top

Twat bikes. Not one of my expressions. It comes from one bar, and I'm naming no names as there may well be customers pedalling about on twat bikes. What's a twat bike? A trike. That four-wheeled surrey with or without a fringe on top, with or without a horse's head at the front, with or without some holiday brains in control or more often out of control. That trike that is taken to the open carretera and wielded like a dodgem, while all the time the "driver" is seemingly blissfully unaware that there are some industrial twats behind the wheels of cars who could quite easily take him and his trike out.

You know, you don't want to spoil people's fun and it has to be understood that everyday life here co-exists with that of the holidaymaker, but there are some things that just make little sense. Like trikes. Like trikes on the main roads. Like trikes being driven down the centre of the main roads. Like trikes with small children hanging on to the horse's head as they are pedalled frantically down main roads. There is a dividing line between holiday brains and crass irresponsibility. My guess would be that in health and safety and child-protection-obsessed Britain, an infant atop a horse's head on a trike on an A road would have social services round in a flash. But it's ok here as it's holiday time. Of course it is.

Many a time I have written about the roads here and many a time more will I doubtless write again. There has been a further growth in no left turns from and into the carretera between Alcúdia and Can Picafort. You wouldn't know it. From one such now prohibited turn this morning emerged a tourist coach. Perhaps like cyclists, coach-drivers can do as they please. It seems like it at times. The other development, that of further speed restrictions, is destined to tax the patience of what is an intrinsically impatient beast - the local driver. I've started to take a certain perverse pleasure in sticking to the 50kph speed that is at it should be between the Magic and Pointed Thing Roundabouts and between the Eden Center roundabout in Playa de Muro right through Can Picafort. It is a perverse pleasure; to see in the mirror the mouthing and gesticulation of the driver behind. Stupid of me, but there you go. Of course, it is possible to overtake, and the roundabouts themselves are used for this purpose. You can more or less guess what will happen. The guy behind has been up your backside, the road goes to two lanes coming to the roundabout, he goes one lane, you go the other and he looks to hurtle past on the in or outside (because no one knows which lane to be in by the way). Way to go, and he does.

And the season starts to home into view and the weather will start to warm up, and the roads will fill with more trikes and more people sticking to the speeds and more impatience, and the annual nightmare will start all over again. The joy of motoring - Mallorca-style.


QUIZ: Yesterday - Queen. Today's title - where does this come from?

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