This morning it was a case of getting to the supermarket before the maddening crowd could appear. Jan glanced out the porthole during the restocking of the pantry and noticed a very familiar boat had quietly moored on the opposite bank. A boat very familiar to Elly & Mick.
Parisien Star
After lunch I took a second walk to Aldi for a final few items (cereals, chocolate, margarine and stolen). I thought stolen was something you did when you walked off with something that didn’t belong to you. Apparently it’s also a sweet German pastry. I’ve been fooled by this before. When courting Jan I visited her parents one Christmas and her mother offered me a mince pie. Kiwis and Aussies love mince pies. Imagine my surprise when on my first bite I discovered it was full of raisins and other “stuff”. Apparently my face was a treat. FMIL hasn’t been able to fool me since!
I’ve been fooling around doing some serious modification on the old Samsung Galaxy smart phone. Time has moved on and Samsung ceased upgrading the phone software. They claim the phone was no longer able to cope with the newer software versions. There is probably some truth in this statement. But only because Samsung had filled the phone with ‘bloatware’. All those programs you never use! Moreover, why would they want to continue to provide free upgrades for an old phone when they would much prefer you purchased a new one that can run the newer software.
Today I removed the entire Samsung software off the phone and replaced it with the latest stripped down operating system. The one that Samsung said wouldn’t work. I was able to do this because all of the Samsung bloatware was excluded. The phone works (see following photo)
Actually it appears to be on steroids. The old phone has never worked better. The new operating system (Android kitkat 4.4.4) is blistering fast. The process wasn’t plain sailing and I did go down a few blind alleys. At one point I though I’d ‘bricked’ it (bricking is where you’ve destroyed the phone operating system and it can’t be recovered. All it’s good for is a brick!) The old phone now has a second life!
We’re having a special Christmas Dinner tomorrow (my lips are sealed).
7 comments :
Merry Christmas Tom and Jan and happy sailing im 2015. Love reading about your adventures on your blog. Best wishes Helen Foster
A very Merry Christmas to you both and an even Happier New Year. We are so envious of you out cruising, we are not back on board Serena until end January, spending Christmas with our two new granddaughters here in Pembrokeshire. Hope our paths cross again next year.
Luv
Judith and John
Merry Christmas Helen. Where in the world are you celebrating Christmas this year?
Merry Christmas Judith & John. Enjoy the grandchildren in the sure knowledge you can return them to their parents if they start to become annoying or smell :-)
Hi Tom & Jan Happy Christmas, it's been a great year for blog readers like myself, Enjoyed following your travels and catching up with the blog from the start. I read a lot of Sue & Vic's before yours theirs lead me to your blog which was the 2nd I read start to finish. In the mix somewhere came Harsner Brian & Diana,Sanity Bruce & Sheila, WB Avalon was probably the 1st thinking about it. Stronghold Oakie and NB Epiphany were also read complete along with Narrowboat Firefly NZ after you met up with them in the summer. Kelly Louise after your prompt to theres a while back. I'm dipping in and out of Muleless & Wandering Bark and a few others. The most recent start to finish was Parisian Star and hence the link to your post tentatively! which was a great adventure to read through, I just missed reading it when Elly & Mick were actually here. I'm currently doing a big one Seyella Geoff & Mags 2006 to date I'm currently at June 2008.
So keep up the daily posting Tom so I get my fix (and no doubt many others). All you boating bloggers are great and let us land based folk enjoy some virtual cruising.
Happy 2015.
Ade
Hi Ade, and merry christmas. Thanks for finding the time to read these ramblings. Sometimes they get rather boring! I know what you mean about finding more blogs to read and can remember sitting at my desk during lunch reading boaters posts saying to myself. "I'm going to do that one day!"
Tom & Jan, Ive been catching up on some blog reading and just found this. Goodness, we miss the boat! Thanks so much for taking photos when you see her. It makes our day.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you both.
Elly
Post a Comment