Isabelita or Isabelín was a girl sure of herself, one of those girls who in restaurants order dishes with confidence, with the worldly wisdom of the rich girls who have been out to restaurants many times. She was an only child –one of the only children of those days–, spoiled, pampered. The one who wore the best clothes, the one who had carpeting in her room (it seemed so luxurious...), the one who wouldn't invite you over to her house if you didn't pass some shameful tests.

I write sitting on a pallet, between open barrels, some already full. I see her, all energy, a burst of vitality, climbed up the ladder, helping with her hands—her arms red with must—to make the grapes slide down. I see him, thoughtful, eating a grape of picapoll and smiling without realizing it, because it is delicious. We bring in “my” grapes, the ones we harvested, the toy ones, and immediately from those purple, compact, very healthy Mandó grapes, a juice springs forth that is a miracle. Up on the tractor, the very white teeth of the lanky young man, who is laughing, enjoying the pleasure of driving a machine, stand out in the darkness of the cellar. “He’s a machine!”, I hear someone say.

There has been a crime in Manresa, which leaves two children without a father and a whole town devastated. Carles Vilajosana, the victim, was a much-loved neighbour in Castellnou de Bages and throughout the region, as he had worked at the Mas de Sant Iscle winery, and everyone knew him. In these circumstances, the Minister of the Interior, Núria Parlon, wanted to emphasize that "the two minors detained for the crime were born in Catalonia", after politicians and youtubers had insinuated or stated that the arrested were immigrant minors.

Pedro Sánchez announced in the morning that the king would go to Ceuta (but did not say when) and in the afternoon he met with Felipe VI. And the next day, the Spanish government also announced that its relations with the royal house are "good".

We read in ARA that “Catalonia was warned seven times to correct the error in the PISA tests”. Apparently, the National Institute for Educational Evaluation (INEE) informed “Catalonia” that it “had made errors in the sample of students in the tests”. As everyone knows, “23% of the students in the sample were discarded, when the OECD marks that the maximum number of exempted students cannot exceed 5%”. The minister Esther Niubó finds “deficiencies in the communication of criteria to the centers, and has announced the replacement of the Secretary General of Education”.

You had a primary school teacher who, to encourage you and your classmates, told you that anything you had done was wonderful, and congratulated you for working so hard. You and your classmates scribbled and doodled, and he applauded and displayed them.

I'm reading a news item on ARA that interests me so much, about the most expensive house in Catalonia: a villa in Roses "with 1,202 square meters built and 970 square meters of usable space, distributed in eight bedrooms and seven bathrooms, in perfect condition of preservation". It is the "most expensive house for sale in Catalonia on the Idealista portal": it costs 22 million. It has a guest house, the old servants' quarters, a garage for cars and a garage for a boat. From the photos, I would say that any bathroom is the size of your dining room, and the dining room is the size of your entire apartment.

We read in ARA that footballer Esther González, former Madrid striker and world champion with Spain, has “deleted the photos she had with her wife and son from her public profiles, just as her signing” for Al-Qadisiyya, a Saudi Arabian club, has been made official. You know, readers, that the country of Lawrence condemns relationships between people of the same gender (death penalty, specifically).

The elderly woman, all dressed up, the way elderly women get dressed up to go do an errand (I've heard them on the train, going to see a grandfather in a nursing home), calls to her husband, a grumpy man with a mustache that seems to indicate he's very much in charge. They are on the station platform, and further down is their daughter, who resembles them greatly. “Dami, it’s ready now,” says the woman, showing him the phone she’s holding. She means she’s finished talking and the device must be his. Dami, who doesn't look like he's called Dami at all, looks at her angrily. “Don’t you know how to hang up? Don’t you know how to hang up?” The daughter turns and puts her finger to her lips. What's curious about this gesture, so common, is that she doesn't direct it at him, but at both of them, as if the woman were also partly responsible. The woman purses her lips and shrinks with shame, just like a scolded dog. She extends her hand further. He then snatches the phone from her with a flourish and, addressing us all and no one, exclaims, in a tone of someone who wants to be heard: “The aunt doesn’t know how to hang up a phone!”

We read in L'ARA that the writer and poet Juana Dolores “is about to abandon Catalan as a literary creation language, due to the systematic pressure and lynching she suffers on social networks”. She reasons it like this: “90% of my work is written in Catalan. If they want me to continue writing in Catalan, I hope the situation changes, because the truth is that I am about to stop doing so and I realize that it is becoming more and more of a hassle for me”.

The choice of words is important, as is the non-choice. With levels of language, orality, false rhetoric, imposture, care, swear words, barbarisms, slang, we build a way of understanding the world. On the trip to Sicily that we took with readers of ARA and Il Viagetto, a Sicilian woman explained to us that she and her daughter understood each other with a language of signs and facial expressions that, on the other hand, her son, who lived in England, did not understand. The gesture of cutting the throat, furrowing the brows and bringing the fingers together – “Like a magnolia”, as Víctor Català would say – touching the heart, touching the nose... We imitate the everyday way of speaking of mothers, grandmothers, and politicians.

We read in ARA that the daughter of actress Andie MacDowell, whose name is Margaret Qualley and who is as beautiful as her mother, appeared on a red carpet "with footwear that left people speechless: soleless Chanel sandals". The photo shows the, let's say, shoes. They are shoes that only have a heel (tied to the feet with a strap). The heel bears the CC logo of Coco Chanel. Therefore, half of the foot has no sole, touches the ground and, in this way, the wearer is almost barefoot. They are shoes that Cinderella's stepsisters and even I could have fit into.

You leave your phone for an hour because you have to do something, like being at the dentist's office or an activity that doesn't let you keep it with you, as other activities do – or you make them do so – like being in a bar with friends, being in a meeting, walking, walking with someone, being on public transport, or participating in a paid TV discussion. When the dentist has finished their work and explains how you should take care of your teeth, you listen, of course, but you go to get your phone (you left it, charging, on the shelf with the dental instruments) and unlock it (how many times a day do you do this gesture?). Without realizing it, you become absorbed, completely absorbed, in one message or another. A message as important as what the dentist is telling you, but more addictive, because it's on the screen. Everything is more addictive on the screen. If you've arranged to meet a friend who is telling you about her marital breakup, you'll listen to her halfway, because on WhatsApp someone will tell you about a marital breakup. And the WhatsApp marital breakup will always excite more parts of your brain than the one in front of you. On your phone, it will be fun to play online billiards. The real thing, you won't think of playing.

Since we're getting straight to the point, and even more so in August with heat and flies, we don't know who the owner of the real estate company Evergrande Group is, who is Chinese. And by this I mean that if the company is large and Chinese at the same time, it is obligatory to call it "the Chinese giant". Well, this gentleman, whose identity we don't know, "internationally known as Hui Ka-yan", says ARA has been sentenced to life imprisonment for crimes related to real estate fraud. In China, they don't mess around. "He was under house arrest since 2023 and in April he pleaded guilty to the charges against him".

Delfín Amaya has died, a member of the duo Los Amaya, the two brothers who came from Oviedo to Barcelona and revolutionized Catalan rumba, creating a unique and claimable style. The authors of Vete.

I remember a song by Carlo Padial, or maybe it was by one of his friends, a thousand years ago, about a theft at Fnac. The lyrics, interpreted as tortured rap, said: “You told me Nice price, you told me Nice price and I'm still paying for it”. It came to mind today, thinking about the Moves plan. That 5,000 euro subsidy you were given (you are given, it seems) if you buy an electric or hybrid car. I took the bait.

We read in ARA that the Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, said that "Israeli forces should 'kill thirty or forty' Palestinians every night in Gaza, in addition to those who may pose a danger at this specific moment." He said this in a podcast he recorded with Rom Braslavski, who is a man who was kidnapped by Palestinian militias. By this I mean that in that tumultuous land, where there are several "chosen peoples" (each one of them the true one), there are few who are completely innocent.

With wild enthusiasm I read in ARA that the Government, the ministry, Renfe and Adif have announced "the deployment of a million-dollar works plan, distributed among various stations, which aims to transform these transit points into "dignified" infrastructures while the major works are pending". The major works will take years and perhaps, when they are done, we will already be stardust, to put it poetically. "The station is the gateway to the system, and its comfort speaks of what the user will find afterwards," said the Minister of Territory, Sílvia Paneque. For example, at the Molins de Rei station, they will carry out works with an investment of "more than nine million after two years of being stalled". At Llinars del Vallès and Santa Perpètua de Mogoda, more than two million. At Sants, 150 million.

Michael Jackson's daughter, who is now a model (are there still models? Do they earn as much as before?), says she met her "mother" when she was 15 years old. The "mother" had them, her and her brother, through artificial insemination. Michael Jackson and she met – of course – at the dermatologist's where she worked. The New York Post reported that the woman had waived custody "in exchange for a payment of about 2.8 million euros." The lawyer for Debbie Rowe, the mother, denied it. We read in ARA, however, that the woman — a nurse — "lived for years in a mansion in Palmdale, California." Presumably, of course, she must have been paid well. And then that was "a job".

The reasons of those who do not want to welcome migrants, minors or half-minors, are logical. The ones everyone says in private. "We have enough problems". And they are right.