FRIDAY's FAVE FIVE

more participants at Susanne at Living to tell the Story.


I have still not fully recovered from my cold, what stayed is a terrible fatigue which makes me very angry as I am not used to that I think last time it happened to me must be at least 7 years ago.

So I drag myself from kitchen to computer, at least there I can sit and still see something of the world !
What a nice thing blogging is when you feel so weak.

On Monday evening I was invited for Ilona's 70th birthday. Of course I didn't want to miss this event, especially we are born in the same year and I will celebrate my 70th birthday this year too.



Her daughter had organized a big party secretly, Ilona didn't know anything ! She was so surprised when she saw her whole family and best friends. Ilona has 5 grandchildren who are all married or in a relationship and the baby you see is her great granddaughter ! I think she looks great for a great grandma !
It was a real nice party and we all had a lot of fun. At 10 I returned home, and was happy that I had made it !

Ilona had invited friends for coffee and cake in honor of  her birthday in her home, and we spent a nice afternoon all together, but at 5 pm I had to go home, I was feeling again so tired.



Our painting class had its last day before the Easter holidays, I pulled myself together and went there at least to say  hello, for painting I didn't have the energy. The entrance of the retirement home where we have our classes had decorated some vitrines for Easter, but less then last year. I think it's just because it's so cold and also because Easter is so early this year. I loved the little bunnies made from 2 wool balls. What a nice idea.

I had to drive my neighbor to the hospital for her monthly eye shot, I just managed to get there and back, which left me exhausted ! The next day I just did nothing except some blogging. I just didn't feel like doing anything. Fortunately the freezer is filled with lots of meals, which I just have to warm up in the micro wave.

 Hopefully it will get better next week ! My energy is hidden like an Easter egg and I just can't find it !

WHEN SPRING ARRIVES

more participants at Jenny Matlock's Alphabet Thursday

On March 20 spring began officially and lasts until end of May, at least here in the Northern Hemisphere.

But what happens so special in spring ? We all wake up or should at least and realize that the days are longer it becomes warmer and nature gets crazy !

Some humans are feeling depressed and retire in their deep black hole and call it spring (seasonal) depression others are coming out of their black holes because the autumn/winter depression is finished Some others are suffering from strong spring fatigue and feel weak, tired and without any energy.

Flooding, hails and thunderstorms happen in spring, and even snow storms like this year !

But then trees get leaves and the flowers come out, nature begins to take color.

Boys begin to look even more as usual at girls and men discover that there are other women to look at in streets and parks than their own one at home.

Girls do the same but more discreet. That's called sexual equality.



Cats are laying in the sunshine and sing operas during nights looking at the moonshine or fight with a lot of noise with another male for a cute female cat.

Dogs try to climb over the fences to find a partner especially when she smells so good. Dog owners are doing skateboard on the street pulled by their dogs running behind a nice looking (and smelling) dog girl.

Horses forget that they have a human on their back and ran after a horse lady, while the human tries with all his forces to stay in the saddle.

Cows are laying in the grass and leak each other tenderly until a bull hops over the fence

Windows are cleaned and you suddenly realize that a new neighbor has moved in. Curtains are washed and the room looks much brighter. Some housewives get crazy and clean from morning till evening the home from top to bottom.

Men suddenly discover that their car has to be cleaned from the winter dirt and salt.

Shops and boutiques are full of the new spring collections and women look for new feathers
.
Birds are arriving from far and settle down to built their nests. The once which stayed here do the same.

Early mornings you wake up and spring (or fall) out of your bed because of the bird's singing.

Hairs are cut and shaved off the whole body.

Babies are created. Couples get married (not necessarily in this order)

Spring feelings are in the air !

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

ABC Wednesday is here


more participants here

THE MARCINELLE COAL MINE TRAGEDY

Marcinelle is a Walloon town near the Charleroi (Belgium). It's a rather sad place because one of the most important coal mine catastrophes took place here in 1956.

In the years 50 and 60, Belgium needed badly miners, and 200 000  immigrants arrived in Belgium from Italy. Belgium had an agreement with Italy to exchange labor against coal. In 1956, a total of 44,000 Italians worked in the mines of Belgium. They were promised a lot, houses good salaries etc but the truth was different.

Never had the mine claimed as many victims in exchange for the coal extracted from its bowels as on 8th August 1956 at the Bois du Cazier. As a result of human error, a fire rapidly spread to the whole mine. A total of 262 men, of 12 different nationalities (including 136 Italians and 95 Belgians) lost their lives, leaving hundreds of widows and orphans. This resulted in an end to Italian immigration into Belgium and stricter regulations on safety at work.




The promises



The day of the catastrophe



The entrance today



You still can see the huge wheels which held the lifts going into the mine





Some of the buildings are still standing on the site and can be visited



In the mine



The Italian immigrants lived in these metallic hangars, very cold in winter and very hot in summer.



In these narrow shafts the miners worked the whole day



Still to be seen is the control board and the only telephone which connected the outside world to the miners in the shafts. The clock stood still when the incident happened. The miners could only be identified with these numbered buttons, no name was on them. It made it very hard to find the corresponding names to these numbers.



At the beginning there was not even running water, showers came later



There is a memorial with the pictures of the dead miners which the Italian families had given for this little chapel.



The memorials





and some very touching sculptures

Currently, the mine is a museum dedicated to the disaster, as well as the history of the region through the Industrial Revolution and, of course, to coal in general.

WHAT DID YOU DO THIS WEEKEND ?

Helps you to remember what you have done on the weekend of March 23. If you participate please put the little logo on the top of your post and leave your link.

I slowly recovered from my cold last week and felt a lot better on Saturday.



As usual I got my weekly Skype call from Toby, but this time he wasn't in the mood at all to look at his  grandma's boring face, he preferred by far to play with a green jeep ! Yes he is now in the TT (terrible two) age, where he discovers that he has an own will !  I admired the jeep and continued talking with his Dad.



I also got a picture of him in his new bed ! He became too small for his baby bed and seems to be proud to sleep now in a normal bed. The baby is gone, welcome to the little boy !

It was a very boring day I couldn't go out because of the bad weather, fortunately in the evening I had a theatre play, which was hilarious. Just what I needed to cheer me up !



The play was called "My Mother in Law is crazy" (Ma belle mère est givrée) and she really was ! Sometimes the actors had to stop because the whole audience laughed so much.

When we got back to my car it started to snow !!



and on Sunday morning when I opened the shutters I had again a black and white view !! I wonder if this winter will ever end. It hasn't happened in Belgium since 1916 that we had snow end of March !

Mr. G recovers from his cold and did a long nap while I watched  a little TV and sorted out photos. No way to put a foot outside it's so windy and cold and the roads quiet slippery ! 

WHAT TO DO WITHOUT GOOGLE READER ?

When I started blogging in 2006 a blog was not so easy to handle like today ! Besides all kind of technical htlm problems, disappearing sidebars etc, we also didn't have Google. Blogger was Blogger and Google was just a search machine. Slowly Google took over and Blogger became Google/Blogger or as we said Bloogle Glocker and amongst other stuff we got the Google Reader ! The blogrolls we used before to follow our blogfriends slowly disappeared and we used Google Reader to follow who has published a new post. Now that everybody is used to that very easy feature, Google decided  that we don't need it anymore and is promoting the rather useless Google+ page, which in my opinion is a waste of time and a want to be Facebook.

My blogfriend since the very beginning   Hootin Anni had always helped Bloggers when they were stuck with something or if she had discovered something new.

This time she helped me out with a replacement for Google Reader. It is called "Feedly" and works with Mozilla Firefox. As I only work with Mozilla Firefox since Internet Explorer doesn't like Blogger and takes ages to load a page, this tip was just what I needed.

I downloaded "Feedly" which is very easy and it installs itself on the Mozilla Firefox startpage :



See the little green sign ? Just click on it. Feedly imports all your friends from Google Reader



and you arrive on a perfect follow up page for your blog. It is even more clear and detailed ! Here I clicked on "Today"



and here on "Latest" you see it looks quiet like Google Reader.

Thanks to Anni my problem was solved and I just can follow new posts as usual. Maybe you should inform your friends who will have the same problem when Google Reader disappears.