Spain 2026: Drawn by drums, an Easter trip to La Fresneda and more

I love to witness drumming and our village in Spain is a great place for it. This time we flew over, then took a bus from Reus airport to the Catalan city of Tarragona – famous for its human towers and more. We had a hotel very near to the Mediterranean coast, the sun was shining, and just around the corner lay the superlative Roman amphitheatre. What’s not to like? Graffiti, that’s what. Every spare vertical surface was covered in the stuff.

We were also near the old quarter which has at its centre a marvellous cathedral with that rare, but to my mind excellent, combination of both gothic and classical architecture, plus a sun filled  cloister with orange trees and the ripe fruit hanging from them.

On our second night we were making our way to the old quarter to drink and eat when Margaret stopped me and said, “Something’s going on”. And it was. The streets were free of traffic and people were lining up along the pavements. Then I heard it: drumming. This was an unexpected surprise and I was soon overwhelmed by the repetitive drum rolls and the sight of the everlasting parade of men, women and children dressed as soldiers, plus others seemingly dressed like members of the Ku Klux clan in black or white robes and hoods. There were also many troops of drummers, plus the wonderfully large religious displays carried by many men, some labouring beneath their heavy loads: you could just about see their feet! All wonderful and a complete surprise.

We travelled to our own village on a series of buses and over seriously impressive mountains, finally slogging up the steep hill to our house in La Fresneda. It was cold, so cold. But I found some firewood stored in the garage and soon got a blizzy going in our open fireplace Then, once again we heard drums. The local troop were practising for what we call Good Friday outside the church above us.

The following day the whole village including returning locals and visitors crowded into our imposing plaza (square) at a little before noon. Then the drummers entered and formed a large circle. There were about 70 of them all dressed in shiny black smocks and toting a whole mixture of drum sizes from huge ones that took a strong man to bear, to tiny ones carried by little children. The leader stood as if frozen in the centre with his sticks raised and, at exactly noon, he gave a signal and the sticks and cudgels crashed down onto the drums. The “hour was broken”. Thrilling is not a strong enough word for the emotion that I felt as they continue their drum rolls and the tears coursed down my face. They then began to parade this way and that under the command of the leader's raised sticks The whole performance lasted about an hour.

But this was not the end of the drumming, they were at it again in the evening parading down Santa Aguada, the street in which we live. We could look down on them from our lounge window and watch the vicar singing some hymns accompanied by his little choir of village women: he garbed in red, they in white.

There was more, much more. During the weekend the streets were filled with stalls selling antiques and such and here there was a smaller, more exotic, drum troop touring through the village creating a wholly different set of rolls and trills. They were wonderful too.

Then it was Monday and our village became our own again, the masses had departed and the drums were tucked away until the next Semana Santa. I walked down to our huerto and began attacking the brambles and energetic fig trees that believe the place is theirs. We managed to plant another tree, a Kaki, to add to our beleaguered orchard and I got my irrigation system working to help the trees through the hot arid summer.

A great trip, but soon over. We do love our village and do feel part of it in some distant way. By the way this little account is just a precis of the notes that I write whilst I am over there. Scribble, scribble, scribble.

 

My most successful book ever.

 Though I enjoy writing books, I can in no way claim to be a financially successful author. If I and my family had been dependent on my income from the twenty or so books I have written so far then impoverishment would have been inevitable. In my writing I have dabbled in fiction and non, technology and travel, children’s and adult, fact and fantasy, autobiography and more. However, only two of my books have been truly financially successful, and that mostly indirectly. What is more, it is from those two books that AI, or rather the abuse of AI, is now promising me even more money!

I wrote the very first book to be published on Computer Telephone Integration (CTI) back in 1993 and followed that up with the grippingly entitled Computer Telephony Integration a few years later. Note the ‘Telephony’ in the second title, it was important at the time. Those books had respectable price tags so I did make a bit of money from their publication and yet more from the enhanced profile they gave me as a consultant, conference speaker, etc in the CTI world.

That income died away, of course. But then, quite unexpectedly, I had a call from a New York  law firm (I was in a pub at the time and remember it well). The lawyers were acting for clients making use of CTI and they were being chased by companies claiming they had patents on the technology and demanding royalties for the use of it! My first book predated those patents and thus could be used to nullify the royalty claims. The lawyers paid me quite well for preparing reports on the early days of the technology and suggested that I might appear in court as an expert witness at the proceeding, something that I quite relished. However, I believe the dispute  didn’t ever go to court for whatever reasons. The lawyers paid me twice for my last report and, though I queried this apparent act of generosity, I didn’t hear from them again. I did not have my day in court, but I did appreciate the fees that they paid me.

Now, CTI has come back to kiss me again, and this time it’s all about AI. Artificial intelligence was not suddenly created, it, like us, had to learn. We learn from experience, from our parents, schooling, reading, and more. AI learns by stealing information from books  as well as other sources and, in the case of Anthropic, they did not pay for access to those books. This is wrong. A recent court case (Bartz v Anthropic) has confirmed that and has published a list of books that were utilised in the training of Anthropic’s AI: and my two CTI books are amongst them! Apparently, the settlement provides for $3,000 per work, less costs, so I am now awaiting my check, or, as we would say, my cheque.

Lucky me. I do wish that some of my other books had gained sufficient royalties for me to repeat that financial success, but it’s not all about the money you know. What we little known authors really want is to be read. Read, that is, by people not just AI information leeches.

 

 

Rolling Stones in Spain: Solo Loco

The title has no connection with the famous music group, but I did get a lot of ‘satisfaction’ from  transforming an old stone hut (called a caseta) into a liveable space near our Spanish village. Hence, I wanted to share what was a challenging and fascinating experience for Margaret and myself by creating a short video which compresses five years of hard graft into fifteen-minutes. That took some doing, but it’s now available on YouTube and friends who saw the rough cut really liked it. I truly hope that you will watch and enjoy  and pass it on.

The release coincides with the launch of the second edition of my book of the same name. Yes, Rolling Stones in Spain: Solo Loco is now available in these formats: Paperback, eBook and Audio

I’m really hoping that this video will stimulate interest in the book which, in addition to the building work, encompasses the human side of this crazy venture. Many in our village helped with advice and encouragement whilst  welcoming us into the social traditions of the community. And that’s not to forget the help freely given by a number of expats living thereabouts.

Have a look at the video, it might persuade you to buy the book , and if you enjoy it do a review. I need reviews!! Here's the video link again.

https://youtu.be/6QSEwMoDzs0

 

I’m finally a yesterday’s man

Many years ago at the tender age of sixteen I began work as an apprentice telephone engineer. I started on “poles and ‘oles”, which meant learning about the business of connecting the telephone in people’s houses to the telephone exchange. There calls were steered to their destination at the touch of a dial. It was all very physical in those days, but much has changed. I was part of that change as were thousands of workers throughout the UK and the world.

Just today, as I write this, the final nail (copper I hope) has been nailed into my career coffin.  I have gone over: I have a new router and have plugged our two old fashioned analogue telephones into a little thing moulded onto a conventional electricity plug. Henceforth my calls, the few that I do not make or take on my mobile, will be carried across the Internet in packets.

I have many tales about my early experiences during those long-forgotten bygone days, but they will be safely lodged in the growing list of word files that I have titled ‘Remember Me’ and I will someday bequeath to my offspring. They will know what to do with them.

So, very briefly, I have enjoyed the journey from clunky old electromechanical switches carrying analogue telephone calls, through to the miniature chip-based switches carrying digital calls. After that came the integration of telephony and computing and, believe it or not, I wrote the first book on that, yes, and the only song! I then ploughed my furrow through the introduction of the new mobile telephone system that could carry goodly quantities of data as well as voice and  finished up by writing a book about the beautiful film star Heddy Lamarr who is sometimes claimed as its inventor.

Tiring of treading down the upward escalator of technology I switched and became an Oxford tour guide and an author of books on many different things, anything but technology. Along the way a marketing-oriented friend once asked me why I didn’t write books that people wanted to read. Dumbfounded, I did not reply just then.

Whoops, sorry, got to finish here, my analogue telephone connected to the lump on an electrical plug is ringing. Maybe this is the call from the Internet that will provide me with the answer.