Contracting Worlds

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Being alone is shrinking my world. Basically for four days of the week my life is ruled by work - well that and the laundry. Then I have a splendid long weekend but with nobody really to share it with I'm staying close to home. Even this weekend, a bank holiday weekend with Constitution Day on Friday and Immaculate Coception on Monday I haven't done anything special. Sofa time as my students call it. Telly time.

Christmas has just about arrived in Spain. Most towns have their lights on now and the shopping centre car parks are more dangerous than ever - car park design is not a Spanish skill, add a touch of driver indiscipline and you have a sure recipe for bumps and scrapes.

On the telly Christmas means seasonal ads. Perfume mainly. But there are at least two institutional adverts. One is the Freixenet sparkling wine advert which I've only seen so far by looking for it on YouTube and the other is the commercial for the big Christmas lottery draw.

This year the lottery spot has been a big talking point. It features five well known and generally well worn singers - if you're not Spanish the only one you're likely to know is the soprano Montserrat Caballé who did the duet Barcelona with Freddy Mercury - drawn from a range of singing styles. The music is the old Elvis and Pet Shop boys hit Always on my mind with new lyrics full of slushy sentiment. The setting is the village square of the real but made twee Spanish village of Pedraza in Segovia full of a crowd of extras gushing bonhomie with a background of candle like lights and a Christmas tree formed of copies of the drums from which the lottery is drawn.



The song has been mercilessly parodied on the Internet with the main talking point being the general choice of the singers and particularly Montserrat's fixed stare. Personally I quite like it. Unfortunately the news that lottery sales are currently down 8% on last year doesn't mean my solitary ticket has more chance of winning because of the method used for the draw.

You have more chance of being struck by a meteorite than winning the lottery as someone close to me used to mistakenly quote.

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