Aladdin's Cave!

The weather has settled again, cold mornings and nights, sunny during the day.

Today I was on a mission to get the braid to finish the table cover.  We went to my favourite shop.   Mary Carmen's Merceria (Haberdashery).   It is packed with every imaginable thing you could want for sewing, knitting, etc plus magazines, hair accessories, hats, etc.   

Product selected, Mary Carmen proceeded to check the reference on the card - which cabinet;  which drawer;  which box.   It took all of two minutes to get it out!   

I asked how long she had been in the shop and she explained that it had belonged to her father, however, on asking, her children are not interested, so it will be sad when she has to give it up.   We always come out with a huge grin on our faces as she has a bit of banter with us - counting in English, and she always says bye bye Almerimar laughing! She is a character.    Strangely, when I asked to take the pictures she wanted to make sure it was not for competition, or that I would be setting up somewhere else!

On our way there, we saw a huge group of small children all dressed up in Santa costumes on their way to the Theatre.   I managed to get a reasonable shot (see extra) from the car.

Today is 'El Gordo' The Big One - when the draw takes place.(see extra)   An estimated 2 billion euros in prizes.   The tickets cost 20€ for one of 10 in a strip with the same number.   As you can see, school children make the draw and sing the number and the amount of winnings, put them on spikes and draw the next.   Most of them are for 1,000€ but whilst we were there they had just drawn out 1,250,000€ and the number had been sold in Balanegra, a village just a little down the Coast from us.   There will be some celebrations tonight.

Sorry for a long Journal entry but it was an interesting morning.