It's a nice sunny day here. Barcelona has the med climate all year round (it would, wouldn't it being on the med). We only get to see that Irish stuff for three or four days in May and ditto in September.

All this serves to underline the value of PPP comparisons and the HDI. As Greenspan suugested in his classic speech on GDP, you don't need central heating in Arizona, so what exactly are we measuring?

>>Unable to cook, and living by candlelight..<<
In the words of Eliades Ochoa, Estoy Como Nunca. Remember the tasty Spanish omlette.

How odd, it's raining here in Wales too.

That's Wales for you, Eccles, always springing leeks.

Now go and stand in the corner and think about what you just said!

>> Big, heavy rain. Sheets of water driven by howling winds coming down from the sky! <<

You should have voted Republican.

We have a number of small parrots - conures and parrotlets. They seem to notice rain and at times make soft clicking sounds as though imitating the sounds of the drops. Our birds, we are quite sure, listen along to classical music. Their activity and the sounds they make change with the music. Also, the birds do coughs and sneezes and phones along with asking for cookies and bananas.

Also, our little parrots are crazy about water and take showers with us or sit under the sink faucet soaking and splashing and babbling. Ever shower with a happy parrotlet?

I had an unclipped parakeet once that used to stalk me when he was pretty sure I was heading for the shower. I'd adopt a nochalant expression and make a feint toward the kitchen or something and then spin off towards the bathroom. I can still, very many years later, hear the "thunk" sound he made when he hit the door closing behind me.

He was a good little guy, just a pain in the ass to have in the shower.

Let the water drip in the sink and keep the door to the living room open and usually there will suddenly be a parrot under the faucet. [We always keep the water cool.]

Fear not! Your nation is standing by. Should you run out of baby vegtables we will declare you a disaster area. The Americorp debutantes brigade will come out there with $6,000 shower curtains for your suffering 1%.

"Fear not! Your nation is standing by. Should you run out of baby vegtables we will declare you a disaster area..." LOL, great post.

To paraphrase Marie Antoinette, let them eat artichoke hearts.

"I had an unclipped parakeet once that used to stalk me when he was pretty sure I was heading for the shower. I'd adopt a nochalant expression and make a feint toward the kitchen or something and then spin off towards the bathroom. I can still, very many years later, hear the "thunk" sound he made when he hit the door closing behind me."

My girlfriends have very similar experiences with me.

"Big, heavy rain. Sheets of water driven by howling winds coming down from the sky!"

This is supposed to be Irish weather? Maybe an occasional bad day on the west coast, although only the winds part. Irish weather is steady, miserable drizzle, that sort of floats down, frequently sideways, making an umbrella useless.

Our German Shepard, in Berkeley, finds the sudden return of rain disturbing and distasteful. Disturbing, in that it keeps falling on her when she leaves the safety of the garage. Distasteful, in that she really doesn't like getting her feet wet. Taking her out to relieve internal pressures involves protracted negotiations for the first few days of rain.

H'mmm. You vote your Gray Davis and get hit by a destructive storm. Am I right in thinking that the parts of California that gave him the most support were also hardest hit? Perhaps you are being warned. (Chuckle)

That has some scary implications for the Midwest tornado outbreak, Jim.

H'mmm. You vote your Gray Davis and get hit by a destructive storm. Am I right in thinking that the parts of California that gave him the most support were also hardest hit? Perhaps you are being warned. (Chuckle)

Apparently not. The south-east got the true brunt of it. Coincidentally, the land of the Southern Baptists. Good job I'm a Papist.