AP Photo

For the average deskbound Spaniard, October 12 can’t come soon enough. That’s the next opportunity for Madrid and Barcelona’s worker bees to down tools and relax. Spain’s national day — the Fiesta Nacional de España — marks the moment Christopher Columbus first hit dry land in the Americas and is celebrated with the closure of offices and shops. But against a backdrop of an escalating debt crisis and soaring unemployment, Mariano Rajoy, the Spanish premier who was blown to power last November by an electorate hoping he will alleviate the economic pain, is planning precisely the opposite of more time off.