11 Apr 2014

FRIDAY's FAVE FIVE - RANDOM 5 FRIDAY

1. The week started rather bad ! I was in war with my new Window XP installation in French, the original was in English and the one who had translated these technical terms must have had some whiskies too much !



You really need a lot of phantasy to understand the translations ! Fortunately I know where the places are otherwise with a dictionary I would never have found out. "Settings" for example was translated by "parameter" ! On top of that Picasa went mad and exported my pictures to an unknown place called "Images of the administrator " (in French) instead to "My Pictures" and I had to call Mr. G. for help as he knows all these technical terms in French, which ended up in arguing again, because men and women have a different logic !

2. Our water softener had its yearly check up and the guy should come Tuesday afternoon, which meant that I was stuck home, because I didn't know when he would come ! And if you are not home you have to take another appointment which can be at a time in the blue moon ! Tuesday is also the only day in the week where Mr. G. doesn't stay home with his cats, but goes out to play "Whist" (a card game ) with a group of retirees. So I continued with my French Window XP and found other things which didn't work, I just could pull out all my hair, but the fact that my head is not made to be bald it's not round enough, I refrained. Finally the guy arrived at 4 pm, cleaned and worked on it for an hour, assisted by cat Arthur who loves mechanics. He sneaked around, put his nose in the utensil bag to check what was in there. Fortunately the guy loved cats and we had a long chat about cats !


Arthur sitting on my car and supervising the work !

3.Our son announced his visit with Toby, my grandson, for this weekend, and had suggested that I buy some Easter stuff, as we won't see them on Easter. As Easter is only at the end of the month I hadn't thought about that at all. I went shopping. I was in 3 shops and none had not even a Easter bunny or little baskets, there was nothing left anymore or not yet there ! I hope I still have some things in the basement as most of the Easter stuff I had brought to Amsterdam 2 years ago when we had celebrated Easter together. I found some little things to hide and I think that is the most important thing for a 3 year old kid. The poor thing is very allergic to nuts and all little chocolate eggs I found contained nuts or "may contain nuts"  ! My eyes burnt from reading all the labels ! Next time I take a magnifier glass with me.

4. I was invited by a friend whom I hadn't seen since at least 7 years, somehow we had lost contact. She had remembered me because she needed some support for her oldest cat who is now 19 years old.



Mother and son, the little one is the mother, the son is 18 !

When I arrived I saw a little cat very skinny and she weighs only 2 kgs ! She also has troubles to walk. I think it's only a question of days or maybe two weeks, with cats you never know, and it will be the end. She won't let her suffer and ask the vet to put her asleep when it is time. Then we had to catch up on what happened during all these years and how it was possible that we lost contact. We decided that this would never happen again and will see each other from now on regularly. She is Belgian and her husband is German and was delighted to speak German for once !

5.



Rain was announced for the whole day, and as usual when it should rain, the sun was shining as if payed for ! It had been quite cool and we arrived at Nicole's with thick pullovers ! But on her terrace it was so warm that we had to striptease off one layer after the other and Nicole had to give us sunhats ! We enjoyed a cool drink and had this beautiful view. Her neighbor beneath is a 82 year old lady who mows her rather big lawn alone she was just busy ! I was already tired when I only saw her !



more participants at Susanne at Living to tell the Story.

and

More participants here at A rural Journal.

17 comments:

  1. Look at all that blossom - and what pretty kitties :)
    Easter is actually next week, so I'm not surprised the shelves were bare! Hope you can find some goodies to celebrate with...
    Happy Friday xx

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  2. I chuckled when I read about your experience with Windows XP. I totally sympathise with you on the instructions issue. We have the same problem here in Spain. Most of the appliances are made elsewhere, and they always seem to have someone with a basic command of Spanish to put the how-to guide together. Amazing cats living to be so old. Your friend must have taken really good care of them. All the best for the weekend, Bonny

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  3. I chuckled when I read about your experience with Windows XP. I totally sympathise with you on the instructions issue. We have the same problem here in Spain. Most of the appliances are made elsewhere, and they always seem to have someone with a basic command of Spanish to put the how-to guide together. Amazing cats living to be so old. Your friend must have taken really good care of them. All the best for the weekend, Bonny

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  4. Why are you still using Windows XP?

    Love the gorgeous blooms, wish I could smell them.

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  5. Your friend's cat is the same age as my Charlotte but Charlotte is still not looking like an old cat.
    You must have the same hard water as the U.K, here the water is much softer.

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  6. That is amazing 19 and 18 year old cats in the same family. So glad you got to see them.

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  7. Given support has just been withdrawn for Windows XP by Microsoft, maybe it time for Windows 7. Don't get 8, or wait for 9, which will be more like you are used to.

    I know what hard and soft water is, but what is a water softener? A machine to soften water?

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  8. Arthur looks like a great supervisor. So sad when our fur babes get to the end of their journeys ... so nice your friend has you for support. I'm an Apple girl so I don't have those PC problems! Happy Friday!

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  9. Big fan of Siamese cats and those two seem to have some of those genese. :)

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  10. Beautiful sunshine and Spring skies and flowers; such a happy time.

    It's good your old friend got back in touch and remembered that you would understand about her kitties. She needed you!

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  11. Computer Issues are never fun.
    Happy you found an old friend again. I feel sad about the old kitty. It is never easy to say good bye to them.
    Very pretty flowers.

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  12. That is a beautiful view. Goodness, you waited all day for the service man to get there! Hope things are coming along well with your computer.

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  13. Isn't that cherry blossom just gorgeous. Nothing better than catching up with an old friend whilst sitting in the sunshine and enjoying a cool drink.

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  14. I hope all is ok now with your window xp! I understand it is really a problem when you have to blog and it doesn't work! Luckely Mr Gattino can help you like Pierre when I have a such problem! The garden of Nicole neighboor is so beautiful! I really admire this woman! She's fantastic! I post something on my blog: http://www.commediasland.blogspot.fr

    Incredible! I blog again!!

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  15. I hate getting a new computer and trying to figure out the instructions in my own language. I'd be hopeless with a foreign language, even if I could speak on fluently (I know some Italian but certainly not enough for that!).

    It's good to see Arthur is still on the job of supervising all that goes on. Someone has to do it!

    Lovely to see your Friday Five is still keeping you busy! Have a good week.

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  16. 18 and 19 year old cats? I am quite jealous.

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