Shiralee: Winter 2012/13 # 9

Saturday 5th January


As I reported in the previous blog, I was unable to upload a copy of my painting of Shiralee. Now, having checked on the blogger forum and found somebody else with a similar problem, it seems the fault lies with IE9. I have a problem with this excuse, as I am still using IE8 and have had no problems up until now. The engineers are working on the problem, or so it seems but, meanwhile, in the top right hand corner of the forum page we are invited to try Google Chrome, as if we don’t have enough browsers to contend with already.

So, what to do about this? Well, if, by the time I come to post this blog I am still having problems, I will have to make a decision. Do I change to a different blog supplier, or do I start hosting pictures on a free hosting site, such as Photo Bucket?

Do I need this at my time of life?

O.K., back to normal living.

We are the proud owners of the Hairy Bikers book in which they both go on a serious diet and lose umpteen pounds each. Last night we tried their Lasagne, in which they use the skins of a leek in place of the pasta. This is to cut down on the fat in the recipe, and quite delicious it was too. The fact that my evening was thoroughly spoiled afterwards with a dodgy tummy, does not detract from its deliciousness. And besides, this could have been brought on by the mini pork pies I had for lunch, or even the glass or three of red wine that we had with the meal.

This morning, just for a change, and if she actually deigns to get up at all, Wifey is doing breakfast. This will be another of the HB’s recipes and involves a couple of crumpets laced with berries and Greek yoghourt. Hopefully my tummy will behave itself afterwards.

Sunday 6th January

Well, I’m pleased to say, no tummy trouble with that excellent meal. So far we have tried four of these recipes and found them all pretty darned good and tasty. Hopefully, following their advice and only eating at proper meal times, with no silly snacks in between, we will keep to a calorie controlled diet and lose weight.

As far as Wifey’s BMI reading goes, she’s at a healthy weight and, although she is a wee bit podgy – or mumsy - now, she says she feels uncomfortable. For myself, I know I need to shed at least 20lb and will endeavour to do so before we set sail in March.

At the start of this diet I weighed in at 14st. 8lb. (204lb), and that’s on our old scales. I’m at least half a stone heavier on nurse’s scales at the surgery. My comfortable weight is about 13 stone (182lb), but my ideal weight, and a target I would not expect to reach at my age, is about 12½ stone (175lb). It would be nice to think I could do so, but I’m only human, and a man at that, so I don’t expect miracles.

Rusty took a bit of a tumble yesterday and seemed to twist a leg underneath her, so we’ve had to lift her out of the boat to take her walkies. It’s now almost 7 am and, after 9 hours on her bed, she still seems reluctant to move, although she is wide awake. I don’t know how they do it! During the day she pesters us to go out at two hour intervals.

Monday 7th January

Well, the Sony arrived on Saturday and, true to his word, the seller had installed MS Office 2010. Whoopee, I thought, but then realised there was no Installation disc with it. Obviously, should the laptop crash sometime in the future, I won’t be able to re-install Office and, even if I were to install 2003, I won’t be able to open documents made in 2010. Great! I have emailed the seller and asked about this, but I’m afraid, if the disc is not forthcoming, I’ll have grin and bear it. After all, should the worst happen I do still have 2007 Home and Student, along with 2007 Outlook.

Any computer seller worth his salt would have a licence from Microsoft whereby he can install programmes and provide the necessary discs. If they don’t have that licence, they have no right to install the programmes. Simple!

Tuesday 8th January

Well, here we go again. I just knew I would have problems setting up Outlook 2010 and, as usual, I was right. At first, after following all the settings I had written down from 2003, all seemed to go well and I downloaded my messages. Then, for some odd reason the programme refused to run. It would not send a Test Message either.

Now, I have always had a problem with Outlook. I have no idea why but, whichever computer I have had, setting this up, be it 2003, 2007 or the latest 2010, nothing goes right. Until I set this up to run properly, how the heck can I expect my new WiFi unit to work? After all, this too will rely upon the correct settings. All I want to do is download my messages from my server Absolute eMail, to Outlook. Nothing could be simpler, could it? Sickening, absolutely sickening, and I have spent over an hour on this so far this morning.

I also have Typeitin to set up. This is a web and email storage programme that allows one click writing of web addresses and emails into their relevant boxes. This is another programme I always have problems setting up. It entails going online and downloading the programme and then registering it, which is where the problem always comes.

Another programme which requires a similar registration process is eBook Starter, which I used when compiling my recipe book. Thankfully, since I have nothing on the back burner, I’m in no hurry to set this one up.

Ah well, such are trials and tribulations of owning a computer. I’ll be glad when I’m too old to bother.

On a lighter note, we’re off to Derby by bus where, I hope, I’ll be able to buy a transfer lead, so that I can copy stuff from the Toshiba to the Sony.

Wednesday 9th January

Whoopee! It’s Wednesday and it’s Wifey’s turn to do breakfast. Why? Well, we always have crumpets on Wednesdays, normally with lashings of butter, yummee! But, as we’re on a diet and cutting down on fats of all kinds, we are now enjoying our crumpets with fruit and plain yoghurt. And that’s where Wifey comes into the operation. In truth I don’t think she trusts me to do it right. It’s a shame she doesn’t adopt the same attitude when it comes to washing up!

I am still having problems setting up Outlook 2010 and have gone through the procedure several times, always with the same result. I just cannot send and receive messages. I have no idea why this should be, but I had exactly the same problem when setting up the 2007 version on the Toshiba. Why it should be a problem with the Sony and 2010 I simply can’t figure out.

As for the disc for 2010, well, I have been assured by a friend of mine, that the installation of Office 2010 should not have been carried out and is probably hookey, so I’m in a bit of a quandary. Do I keep it? Do I delete it and install 2007 Home and Student; which would probably leave me with the same Outlook problem? Or do I delete it and install Office 2003, which I know is OK?

Alternatively I could install Ubuntu’s Open Office Suite, alongside Windows and run their equivalent programme. But I also have a problem with the Ubuntu disc, it’s making an awful noise when it’s running. This problem crops up sometimes with old or dirty discs, neither of which description fits this Ubuntu disc.

Oh boy, how do I come up against these silly problems?

Now, having typed all that in and despite the noisy disc, I’m going to try installing Open Office later today. I might give it a try out on the Toshiba first though.

Thursday 10th January

The good news is that, after several painstaking hours on the Sony, I finally managed to get Outlook to send a Test message. The bad news is that, when I clicked on Send/Receive Outlook did send my message to Sandra but, despite telling me my emails had been downloaded, they had not. At least I couldn’t see anything in the Inbox.

I suspect that I may have a problem with Windows Firewall settings because, it was only after ‘playing around’ with those settings that the Test message went out. I am now sitting at the Toshiba and have checked the Firewall settings on that. My next stop, later this morning, will be to compare settings.

Now, when I bumped into my friend Chris yesterday, he’s the all-knowing one with computers, he suggested I install Open Office. As it happens and as I have already mentioned, I do have the Ubuntu disc, but that’s faulty and, to make matters worse, Ubuntu is not the only Open Office suite available. There is another one called Apache, but that is considerably smaller. Suck it and See is a phrase that springs to mind, or find Chris and see what he thinks.

Meanwhile, back to those Firewall settings, I suppose. I have nothing else to do today, so it looks like more work on the Sony. I’ll crack it eventually. However, if anybody out there can offer advice, please do so by email.

And now we will post this blog. Well, it will give you all something to read, if you have the time.

Still unable to upload picture from laptop!!

Have a great weekend.

Dave, Sheila and Rusty.