For whatever reasons, two sites I linked to about financial fraud (dodgy investments and crooked IFAs) have been removed recently from the Internet, no doubt by legal threats to the site-owners. The last one, 'The Costa Action Group', went this morning. How far courts can go to control what are, in essence, warnings of bent dealers and boiler-room operators that prey on the gullible remains to be seen. Oddly, the courts never try and stop truly dangerous sites... only the ones (like Wikileaks) that keep a watch out for the public's safety.
And yet, today I found a customer protection site called 'Complaints Board' which, to my surprise, features a rather shady outfit I have had trouble with in the past, so there's still hope.

Twenty ballerinas from the Lviv Theatre of Opera and Ballet will be performing this Saturday in the Centro de Usos Multiples in Mojácar (the Fuente) starting at 9.30pm. Entrance is 12 euros.
I looked up Lviv - it's in the Ukraine.

While never seeking popularity, I was reading the other day that the unattractive Minister of the Interior Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba is apparently viewed in a better light by the general public that any of his fellow ministers (which, as you will see, doesn't say much for them). Rubalcaba is known to European residents as being the man who, as Minister of the 'Presidencia', took away our nascent right to vote in local elections in 1995 - he probably thought we would vote conservative - and is also responsible for removing our residence and residents cards in favour of the passport and blue/green A4 letter-from-the-police combo which we currently enjoy. The Spanish are annoyed with him over his handling of the recent Melilla crisis and the current Spanish Sahara problem and are not too pleased with his call today to the Guardia Civil's traffic police to step up their quota of fines while reducing their wages. The traffic cops had been fining less as a protest known as the 'dropped ball-point' (see my remarks here and here).

There's a video (dated July 2010) on the Almería - Murcia high speed train here. They do a good job on the visuals. Includes information on the 7.5km tunnel near Sorbas and the Vera and Lorca stations.
Slightly marred at the 4.10m mark by a sign outside the brand new Almería station that reads in Spain's two principal languages, Spanish and Engrish: 'Venta de Billetes de Tren - Ticket Sales of Train'. How much are they spending on this beast?

Well here's a story you won't be seeing on Fox News. The leading sceptic against global warming, the Danish climatologist Bjørn Lomborg, now reckons we need '$100bn a year to fight climate change'. The change of heart from the right-wing's leading 'no'-man comes in his new book to be published in September and in an article in The Guardian. However, comments from readers of the rightist El Mundo seem, on first look, to smell some kind of a rat (despite the hottest summer on record, etc blah blah).

While none of Mojácar's mayors have done much for their pueblo (which was, I'd just like to point out, when Jacinto Alarcón quit back in around 1978, the best-known town of the province and leader in both tourism and foreign residents), it was good to bump into Miguel Barón today. Miguel was mayor of Bédar for 16 years and not only never took anything, or speculated or robbed his fellow-citizens, he also never even took a wage as mayor, prefering to continue as 'un agricultor'. He worked hard for his village and was often in Almería with the president of the diputacion sorting out Bédar's needs over a beer and a sardine. He now in his retirement takes 550 euros a month as a pension. Not quite as much as some of our boyos down here...

The sentence finally meted out to a Malaga con-artist was reduced last week from two years to just ten months by the Supreme Court considering that the crook has suffered unduly through the tardiness of the courts. You see, he was nicked in 1998 for bouncing two cheques and the whole clobber of the judicial system had taken twelve years to produce a ruling. In fact, due to many stories like this one, some Andalucian courts (including 31 in Almería) will begin working during the afternoons from September to try and ease the backlog.

The Mojácar fiestas are upon us (swishhh... BOOOM). Hooray, three cheers, and the dogs are barking their heads off. Musicians and athletes, politicians and The Families, pop groups and dancers, girls in flamenco dresses and young Englishmen in spots (swishhh... BOOOM), all in attendance in the village. Four days and nights with a final thunderous explosion to mark the end of the saturnalia and, as far as we residents are concerned, the end of the lunatic tourist summer and the beginning of our own time of warm and empty beaches and once-again pleased-to-see-us bar and restaurant staff.
But what of that final thunderous explosion mentioned above? Do I mean the firework display (swishhh... BOOOM BOOOM... BOOOM) or could it be something more sinister?
The Mirador by the Plaza Nueva is in a bad way. The engineers have put in metal support 'puntales' and, with the odd exception of the police station, everything else has been closed down and either transferred to a safer home or, in the case of the library and the school of hostelry, somewhere appropriate will no doubt be found in due course.
But what might happen with all that weight on the Mirador? Well, probably nothing, but according to the hostile Gaceta de Almeria and its piece 'Alarmante grado de irresponsabilidad por parte de la Alcaldesa de Mojácar al mantener abierto el mirador en las fiestas de San Agustín en contra de los criterios técnicos' it might be a good idea not to stand too close to the edge and admire the view...

Congratulations to the Ayuntamiento for the floral display around the new rotunda.
Although the roses have wilted somewhat, the abundance of 'Devil's Trumpet' (Jamestown Weed) is to be admired.
This hallucinogenic plant is encouraged no doubt for the benefit of those of our 'tourists' who can't stump up for the cocaine being dished out at the chiringuitos.
I suppose a bad trip is seen as better than no trip at all!

The Mojácar fiestas run Friday through Monday. Saturday is San Agustín. Apart from pop groups each night in the Plaza Nueva, the main attractions are the Saturday marathon (with about 100 runners) at 7.00pm and the Sunday mounted ribbon-race at the Fuente (from 6.00pm). The main fireworks assault will be Sunday night at 2.00am.