HAVING US ON IN ARAGON

If there is one thing I can not get used to after all this time it has to be the noise. It seems once I have sorted one set of neighbours out via educational means or measures via 'la Comunidad' or 'los juzgados' another lot surface to unsettle my nerves. I am not alone and find many Spanish people are just as frayed through lack of sleep thanks to their anti-social, 'individualist' neighbours. I have been patient with the latest rabble but it seems lines must be drawn. I can live with noise, the distant perennial sound of mopeds, the clashing of cutlery on plates, the opening and closing of doors, garage included. Sounds which confirm I have neighbours with lives. There are some people however, who can fry fish and make it sound like it's coming out of a public address system. After a meaningless telephone conversation with a raving copper where I thought I might at least get someone round to 'measure' the bedlam next door, ha! I decided to watch something that would prevent me from packing my bags and hitching back to the native sod. I have in my video collection various programmes that well meaning friends have sent me over the past few years to keep me up to date or perhaps to stop any home sickness from kicking in. I find they do have some effect and prevent me from abandoning my new home for colder, northern climes. A random choice led me to first watch a trailer of a programme starring Michael Palin and was advertised with a 'Guess who these people are?' Where do you think I am?' teaser. There were people pushing what looked like a blazing cheese down a hill, morris dancing and camel fighting, although not all at once. My first thought was 'Britain?' but no, it was our 'new' European neighbours who we obviously have more in common with than we dare admit.Despite Palin the other programmes led me to question the state of British TV. When I came to Spain I was struck by how shite the tele was and likened it to something that wouldn't look out of place in say, Bulgaria. I have never watched Bulgarian TV but I imagined it was on a par with Spain's, meaning similar in its shiteness. I realise now that you can not take the piss out of either after watching the bunch of hoodlums that appear on British TV. I remember when people were outraged at the antics of The Sex Pistols and Bill Grundy on the Today show and yet now any old bod can nail his scrotum to a piece of wood in the name of attention seeking. Wonders will never cease. Nevertheless, I did get to see some documentaries where I learnt that there are some sharks who eat their siblings whilst in their mother's womb and the most beautiful, hallucinogenic spectacle that is slug sex. If you don't believe me ask David Attenborough.