It finally rained heavily in the Lleida Pyrenees, up to 75 l/m2, and this ought to fill up the reservoirs just a little, enough to postpone water restrictions for a couple more weeks. The weatherman was promising rain today, but that's not going to happen.

Speaking of rain and lack thereof, Zap announced that he was going to meet with Sarkozy and get the Rhone River water flowing about five years from now. Montilla is absolutely furious that his demand for more water for Barcelona now is being overruled by Zap for political reasons, and that Zap's position on water for Barcelona is similar to that of CiU rather than that of the Catalan Socialists.

Madrid mayor Ruiz-Gallardon told Esperanza Aguirre to get off the pot and make it clear whether she is going to oppose Rajoy for PP president, warned her that she would not get enough support if it came to a showdown at the convention, and told everybody yet again that he was supporting Rajoy. Regional bosses Camps of Valencia, Valcarcel of Murcia, and Feijoo of Galicia also backed Rajoy. Rumors are flying, though, that Gallardon himself wants to be the PP candidate for prime minister in 2012. Also, Montserrat Nebreda is going to challenge Daniel Sirera for PP president in Catalonia. I hope she wins; I think Sirera did a mediocre job during the last campaign. By the way, she was voted "most attractive woman deputy" in the Catalan parliament this year. Agreed, there's not a whole lot of competition.

And the tragedy of the African boat people continues: a cayuco with 62 illegal immigrants aboard reached Tenerife this morning. 15 of them are minors. Naturally, the international media ignored it.

The European Parliament voted, 580-24, in favor of a resolution calling for a joint boycott of the opening ceremonies at the Peking Olympics by EU officials, and the heads of state and government of all the EU nations. I don't think politicians ought to go to sports events in an official capacity anyway, and that goes double for sports events in Red China. I do want to point out one thing: You can't go to the Games and boycott merely the opening ceremonies, since if you visit China voluntarily for whatever reason you should behave as a guest, and that means no protesting. You have to stay home and boycott the whole thing.

La Vanguardia's current "save our city from the tourist hordes" campaign is against the avalanche of pseudo-Irish pubs near the Rambla; there are fourteen of them, and their clients are 80% tourists. Quote: "While legendary nightspots in the Old City, like the Pastis, are planning to close, these pubs targeting the Anglo-Saxon visitors introduce another element, foreign to the local culture, in the cityscape."

What's funny about that is that the "legendary" Pastis, a smelly old overpriced dump where a bunch of decrepit nostalgics for Charles Trenet sip absinthe, is a French-themed bar, just as foreign to the local culture as any Anglo-Saxon pub where a bunch of beer-gutted tattooed chavs and slags swill stout.

Check out this enlightened and illustrated reader comment: "In Barcelona we don't need these animals, these guiris* are the worst thing you can find anywhere. I'm up to my balls with foreigners, miserable moros*, drunken English, stinking French, terrorist Pakistanis, gangs of Latin criminals, scum from countries in the East, send all of them home now!!!"
*"Moro" is the Spanish/Catalan ethnic slur for Muslims, especially Moroccans.
*"Guiri" is the Spanish/Catalan ethnic slur for Nordic foreigners, especially English-speakers.

So Barça won last night and will face Manchester United in the semifinals. Get your money down on Man U right now before the odds get even worse.