First Blog from the new (ish) laptop

Hi All,

This is my first blog for a while. I have been in a mild funk and wasn't really up for too much blogging but things are moving along so here we are back on track.

Firstly, I was trying to do some work on a laptop for a friend whose Windows XP had crapped itself. I tried everything and it simply would not reinstall. Everytime it got into the process, it would overheat and shut down. Bugger! Perversely though, it installed Linux perfectly and without a hassle - found all the hardware, hooked up to the wireless network here at chateau mac during the installation (XP has never done that!!!) and basically worked really well. The upshot of this was that I told my friend I couldn't get Windoze to install, would he like to learn a whole new operating system. He had a particular Windoze application that couldn't run properly in a Linux emulator so he said no - I could keep it. He has decided to buy a new laptop and I'll help him to set that up and get his special program running. Score!!!

Only problem is that now I am even more of a geek than before and also an advocate of open source software. Poor ms. mac - she has to put up with me sitting here learning how to use the command line and zzzzzzzzzzzz..............
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Tonight we went to the Gewerbe Ausstellung which was an exhibition of farm machinery (since we live in a semi-rural area) at the local school. An interesting affair. The lovely ms. mac has a post coming up about the tractors etc, so I won't steal her thunder but will show you some amazing trees (Bäume) that were for sale (Zu Verkaufen)



Check out the beautiful flower on the right. Then there was this one:



This one is even better developed than the previous.

The look on the lovely ms. mac's face is due to the prices. The first one came in at a fairly reasonable


Your eyes are not deceiving you, that is CHF 18'750.--

The second was the kicker, it comes at an astonishing


CHF 38'500.-- That is a lot of cash for a tree in any currency. I'm not saying that they are expensive cos it's in Switzerland, I'm saying it's dear cos it's a tree.
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Finally, we found James bike, which had been stolen from the Velo Keller a couple of weeks ago. It was nicked by the little shit down the road, who resprayed it and then he was riding it around the village!! At least in Hoppers when they nicked your bike, they had the decency and good sense to sell on the other side of Melbourne. Went down to see the kids parents and they are going to foot the bill for a new one. Result!