Moving day

We spent last night - our first - in our rebuilt house. It was Ok, though the place is not yet finished as we are still waiting for the doors and some plumbing. Still, with a sheet pinned up over where the bedroom door should be, we made it through the night. About three a.m., one of the dogs, Una I think, got in and roamed about looking for us muttering to herself, but the sheet fooled her, and she went back to bed. At seven though, in daylight, the whole dog gang burst in licking and wagging and I had to get up, which I was going to do anyway.
Our luck is holding good. Spring is really here, and although we may get more rain, it will stay warm from now on.
The dog tally now stands at three. The latest is another stray, a bitch about six months old, half Alsatian and half something else, possibly terrier. She is clever and self-confident and is currently trying to assert herself as boss over Una. Tim watches the power struggle warily from a distance. We will, I think, let Mimi - for that is her name - go, if we can find a suitable taker, but that will not be easy. I am fond of her and would keep her, but it is a bit much for Reb.

Maybe the new lifestyle, without morning and evening journeys to Sahagun, will allow me to blog more. Be warned.

So, on an entirely different topic, a piece in a recent New Yorker, made a point that Orwell would have savoured. There is a brand new weasel word: Misspeak.
Hillary Clinton trotted it out some days ago when she was revealed to have lied about being under fire in Bosnia or Kosovo, or somewhere, a few years back. It means just that, ´I lied, but since, as a politician, I am supposed to be truthful, I will call it something else.´ Orwellian doubletalk.
Of course, they all lie as much as can get away with - Obama and McCain as well as her. I suppose the idea of ´misspeaking´may indicate at least some vestige of decency - some notion of admitting, albeit obliquely, a trace of guilt. ´My brain wanted to be honest, but my mouth, unaccountably and regrettably, spewed out these untruths and let me down,´ is what we are asked to accept.
So we are not likely to hear Bush and Co bothering to admit to ´misspeaking.´ When revealed as liars, about twice a day on average, they simply don´t answer, or else, if cornered, tell another lie about the first lie. If all that fails, they accuse the questioner of being unpatriotic for bring the subject up.
Whoever gets elected, all we can hope for is a change of degree in lying. But it will, at least, be a little less awful than now.

Sports news

Is Big Brown a super horse? Will he go on to win the triple crown and restore the fortunes of The Sport Of Kings (Sheiks, at least) ? I say he will. So he probably won´t.
Is Real Madrid a great team now. I say no. But they are better than any of the others (which only means Barca) right now.