A HARD WAY THROUGH ADMINISTRATION

Concerning crimes such as murders or attacks, Waterloo is rather spoiled, besides stealing your handbag while you are walking on the sideway, pickpockets and some drug dealers, Waterloo is a rather peaceful little town under the watchful eyes of usually friendly policemen.


The only big problem the city has are burgleries. As there are a lot of wealthy to very wealthy to rich people living here, there is a lot to steal too. Therefore people decorated their houses with alarms not always connected to the police and with the only purpose to wake up the whole neighbourhood, only because the cat had jumped on a table or the dog had scratched himself behind an ear. The result was nobody cared about alarms anymore and nobody either wanted to safe the neighbour's computers or TVs and been knocked out by a burgler.

Therefore the city decided from the 1st of September on, that all alarm owners have to declare their alarms to the police. By internet ! The city is so proud that their employees finally learned to use a computer. It had discovered internet only in the last couple of years, and of course now they want to let the whole population know that the city tax is also used to modernize the administration. Where 2 or 3 years ago still electric typewriters were used, now brand new computers are standing and the proud employee can write all documents by typing with two fingers.

Last thursday a 85 year old lady showed up in the city's computer room, where Mr. G helps the Waterloo population twice a week to explain the use of a computer and internet and helps to solve other computer concerning problems. That's a free service that the city offers to make their citizens more modern and intelligent.

As a correct inhabitant, the old lady wanted to declare her alarm to the police and went there. The friendly policeman told her that she has to declare her alarm on internet on their special website where she can find a formular she only has to fill in.

Old Lady didn't understand a word, she had only seen computers in shops or now here at the police and of course had never touched one either. The policeman send her to the city hall. There the employee listened with an in appearance open ear, that she should help the old lady to fill in the formular on the police website that her house was protected by an alarm. The employee made big eyes, didn't know anything about that and wanted to send her back to the police.

The old lady informed her that she just came from the police who had send her to the city hall. The employee asked her collegues and finally somebody remembered that there were 9 computers available to the population with a person who could explain. And so it happened that old lady ended up in Mr. G's computer room. He and his collegue had never heard about a police website either and unfortunately couldn't help her because she didn't know the link to this misterious site.

I don't know what happened to this poor old lady, but yesterday we all were already informed by the local newspaper that an alarm declaration can only be done via internet and that the city hall has a special service for the ignorant people who don't even know how to handle a computer and that they also could go to Mr. G who would help them out.

The only problem was that the services concerned didn't know anything about it. That's called collaboration in administrations.

Meanwhile a couple in a well alarm protected house slept peacefully in their bedroom on the first floor, while downstairs burglers took away everything they could, Madam's purse and Monsieur's wallet, computers, TV video, mobiles, in short everything they could carry.

SHOW & TELL

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Lately I wasn't happy with my HP laptop anymore. Not because of it's technical skills but because the screen was not big enough for what I am doing now, i.e. more photography and it's better to see photos on a bigger screen. I had noticed that they look completely different on Mr. G's computer then on my laptop. So I became pregnant of a new computer. It had to have a big screen but a little tower as the space in my room is reduced. Not easy to find.

But then I saw this and that was the ideal computer for my purposes. Big screen, no tower !! and rather cheap ! (400 €) I couldn't believe it and called Mr. G as he is the responsible for the technical details, I don't know how many Giga I need and all the rest. Computers are his big love (besides the cats) so he hurried over to join me in the shop. The verdict was : yes for you, it's OK. It is an Acer so called emachine ! (never heard of it)



Rosie had to help with unwrapping



and here it is in all its beauty. Enough USB plugs behind and on the side and also space for DVDs. It came along with a keyboard and a mouse.



and here is a picture of my blogging space now



a little closer look. It really doesn't take a lot of space and I so much appreciate the big screen !

THURSDAY THIRTEEN

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13 funny News headlines

1. One armed man applauds the kindness of strangers

2. Puerto Rican teen named mistress of the universe

3. Local child wins gun from fundraiser

4. Federal agents raid guns shop, find weapons

5. Poison control center reminds everyone not to take poison

6. Caskets found as workers demolish mausoleum

7. Meeting on open meeting is closed

8. Drunk Gets Nine Months in Violin Case

9. Safety Experts Say School Bus Passengers Should Be Belted

11. Survivor of Siamese Twins Joins Parents

12. Iraqi Head Seeks Arms

13. Eye Drops off Shelf

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

Father and son came back early morning with the train they had celebrated too much and didn't make it home, they collapsed on the banks in the Waterloo station and the employee there let them sleep !



and we are all very proud of Kim Clijsters who returned home to Belgium today ! I never watch sports, but this time it was tennis and I made an exception ! A Belgian girl playing and winning after almost 2 years of absence ! Aren't they cute, mom and baby daughter ?

MY WORLD - Farmer's feast

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Each year in September a farmer's feast is organized in the city park of Waterloo. As the weather was nice I made a little walk through the stands.



There were quite a lot of people and a band played all kind of music



There was garden furniture and decorations to see



and lots of other stands selling different products, like here the wool stand with some clothes.



Publicity for a "green" life and propositions how to become more and more "green"



After having seen these cute pigs, I had no appetite for a sausage anymore !



there were some other animals too even a llama which is quite exotic for Belgium



The police showed what their dogs are able to do (see post below)


and a little video of the show






For children there were lot of things to play with



Solar pannels proposed for heating and people walked through this beautiful parc



some strange decorations for your garden



and a man who showed us how he makes clogs. They are mostly worn in the Netherlands, but also in parts of Belgium.

FUN MONDAY

ChrisB asks : 'what type of shopping bag do you favour'-plastic or material? How many do you use. You could even show us what's in your bag!

We haven't been asked if we didn't want plastic bags anymore, we had been forced to use shopping bags. We went back not to the future but to the past.

My female ancestors have always used fabric or even leather shopping bags or baskets, so did my mother. Then she got free plastic bags as much as she wanted and put her shopping bags away, they had become useless. This went on for 40 years at least for me. I "recycled" the plastic bags and used them for my garbadge. Nobody owned shopping bags anymore and the once born in 1970 didn't even know how they looked like.

From one year to the other plastic bags were banned and if you got one you had to pay for and use it until it broke into pieces. People remembered Grandma's shopping bags and bought some to carry their groceries into the car or home, because it was much cheaper then buying new plastic bags all the time.

We are back to the beginning of grocery shopping ! Just like with the food, today food without chemicals are called "bio" to grandma's times everything was bio.




These are the shopping bags I use for frozen stuff (upper left) for cat food in plastified carton and a plastic bag for the rest. The logo depends where you shop, but usually these bags are all out of the same material, strong plastic.




When I don't have a lot to buy I have these once in my car which I bought at Ikea. They are in plastified carton



and when I am just out for a very few little things I use this cotton bag with cats on, but I also have others and the jute bag which I like because of the lined up lady bugs.

Result of all this, now I have to buy plastic bags for the garbage, but I can show shopping bags on Internet which is a big difference with my grandma who only could show it around to her neighbors and the people in the shop !



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