busy october: travels around switzerland

October has been busy for us. We visited Martin's parents for a week, in the sunny state of Wallis. Sonja liked that - plenty of goats and sheep around, plus some cats.

But she really really liked visiting Martin's sister, her husband, and their 4 kids this past weekend, near Luzern - those folks live out on a farm, with some 10 cows, a big friendly dog, two rabbits, and most importantly, a tiny kitten (2-3 months old) - Sonja had a balst. Poor kitten. She wanted to feed it and pet it and do everything for it. She really enjoyed the kids too, but the kitten was definitely the huge favorite thing she has played with this past weekend.

Darn macs... and some swiss house rules

Well, the my problems accessing anythinggoogle related (gmail, blogspot, etc) continue...I will have to google more next time the kids cooperate to see if I manage to find a solution. Using firefox, I can't log in at all. Using safari, it only takes 30+ minutes to load one page of gmail - so so far I managed to read 1 mesage there this afternoon.

The rules of the house we live in:
OK to do laundry from 6am to 10pm.
OK to beat rugs from 7am to 8pm.
OK to play musical instrument from 8am to 9pm.

Testing posting pictures / safari, firefox, camino

Hmmm, no luck with pictures, I get the following error with Safari:
Safari can’t open the page “http://www.blogger.com/upload-image.do”. The error was: “lost network connection” (NSURLErrorDomain:-1005)

No luck with firefox or camino yet, either. At least now I have the power adaptor for this computer. Still, right now I am heading to bed.

First days in Zurich

Somehow longer posts fail to load... I wonder why. I just wrote a short 4-paragraph post, and got a safari error back instead of the post. Anyways,... our Zurich apartment is wonderful, with great views of the city. The views do come with a price: it is five flights of stairs up from the ground floor. Without an elevator. I am getting better at having a newborn in a sling, a toddler in one arm, an umbrella stroller across the shoulder, and possibly a shopping bag from the same shoulder.

Testing

Had some problems posting...so this is a test. We're in Zurich.

RIP Mica

Dear Mica,
we sure will miss you. You went from being a puppy dog who couldn't even walk over the floor in our house, so afraid you were of the smooth surface; to a calm dog who willingly (and sometimes not so willingly) followed Sonja as she held the leash. When we first got you, next to Choly, you were the wild puppy while he was the grumpy old guy. Then neither you nor him returned for three weeks in Dec 2004, though the pound caught you, emancipated, with your neck cut. We couldn't have been happier to again have you in the house, tappity-tapping across the floor. Then we got you Saphira as company, and suddenly you were the grumpy old woman, next to the puppyish Saphira.

Saphira loved to bug you. You liked to follow her on explorations, though. Is that what you were doing today when the two of you disappeared while we were walking along the ditch? All I know is that Saphira came back after an hour, and you did not. Then, in the evening, we got a call telling us where your body lies, next to the road branching off our road. Who knows what happened to you - did you find some antifreeze? Did you get hit by a car, soft enough that there was no sign on your body? Did you die of some other cause? We know you threw up.

May you rest in peace in a doggie heaven full of bones, and with just enough puppies around for a good play but not too annoying, and with enough toddlers around for a good company, but again not too annoying. We will miss you. Rest in peace.

Girls