Ned Sherrin, Garlic

It is wet tonight here in western Madrid; and eastern Madrid as well, I would imagine. We do get rain in Spain, and in Madrid, May is one of the two wettest months in the year (November is the other). Having a cold, and it being Tuesday, there was little temptation for me to join fellow teachers at the bar up the road for a couple of beers. (Like many English-teaching establishments in Spain, work is mainly in the afternoon and evening, and most of us finish at 9.30 each night, having started around 3.30.)

Ned

I listened to Ned Sherrin's charming quiz show Counterpoint, from Radio 4 yesterday, using the Internet and the Listen Again feature, as I ate my spaghetti bolognaise, watching the rain cascading down on the quiet streets through my window. He is urbane and accessible, and the programme I listened to tonight was from the Northern College of Music in Manchester, a building and a city I knew very well at one time. Life has improved immeasurably for many of us expats, as for years, apart from not being able to get Marmite and decent sausages, the main beef amongst us was not being able to get British broadcasting. Spanish radio and TV are awful, and always were; British ditto might not be all that good these days either, but there are things around, and Radios 4 and 7, with the Listen Again option for those of us with off-peak Internet connections, are a joy; really.

Garlic

Casting around the net for a possible home-made remedy to help the antibiotics along, I discovered that garlic is great for practically everything. So while cutting some up for the bolognaise sauce earlier, I crunched a whole clove in my mouth. It almost burned the back of my throat out, for a few moments, but then the sensation eased, and I haven't coughed that much since - fingers crossed, and there's a combination of garlic, honey and cider vinegar which is foolproof, apparently. So we'll see...