Some of you may have read (here, and linked to at Trevor's wildly observational post here), that I had my wallet stolen on the Barcelona Metro recently. Trevor's post, written with a depth of knowledge and understanding that, if I didn't know better, might otherwise make me suspicious, explains roughly the process that probably led to my being separated from my cartera.

After my brief violated sulk, I went through the process of filling in the online denuncio, going to the local police station and picking up my new cards at the bank. But these were the easy steps. Because my residency card was nicked, I now had to carry my passport around if I wanted to pay by card anywhere other than the small and excellently stocked  privately run supermarket I habitually buy wine, meat and vegetables from. I wasn't happy with this (a passport can be a real bugger to get replaced), so I essentially slipped into cash mode: something I've not done since the first time I got a card about 13 years ago.

And you know what? Apart from buying my snazzy new phone* the other day, I've certainly spent less this month than I would normally have.

Anyway, the point of this post was really to relay the news that I had a phone call yesterday from a nice lady at the Comisaría of the Mossos d'Esquadra in Les Corts to tell me: we have your wallet, with all your documentation. Would you believe it? I thought that the Mossos wouldn't have bothered investigating a common wallet theft but it seems that they had their very best, most sexy men and women on the case, sometimes working under cover.

So I have my expired Tarjeta de Residencia back and can now return to card-based [what's a word for 'of or pertaining to cards'?] profligacy. Or I can learn my lesson and stick to cash… which was, funnily enough, the only thing the thieves got when they nicked my wallet. A serious decision faces me.

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*My HTC Magic has a great text prediction module that makes sending text messages and emails very easy indeed. However, it does sometimes change correctly spelled words for what it thinks I meant to say. 'Mossos' became 'Mississippi', automatically.