Visits and viruses...

...and how both can be good.

Yesterday fellow miniaturist Debby came all the way from Australia to visit me and look at my canal house. Well, obviously she didn't come all that way just to see the dolls house, but as she was holidaying not to far from where I live, I invited her over.

I very much enjoyed meeting Debby and seeing her work on the photos she brought with her. She had photos of a quilt shop, a nautical shop, a Venetian glass and jewellery shop and a few photos of her dolls house. All of them packed with detail, made with precision and great creative solutions.

Debby made me something as well! On the photos below you can see something typically Dutch, a box of chocolate flakes, which I eat on my bread almost every day. Debby made me a miniature box and a plate with two slices of bread with flakes. Such a thoughtful gift (Debby read my website very well!) I love it!







Visits, yes, definitely a good thing. Now how about good things and viruses? Last week we had unknowingly downloaded a virus by clicking the X on a popup window. The virus stopped us getting to our regular virus scanner and was pretending to scan the computer for us, telling us we had to download this and that to prevent all kinds of bad things happening to our computer.

Our local computer store sorted it all out for us, but the computer had to have a clean reinstall. We lost a lot of info, emails etc. Very annoying and time consuming. How can that be good then, I hear you ask. Well the good thing about it all is that I got my followers back!! Just as many of you, I lost my followers list back in April, and I couldn't get it back whatever I tried.

So unless this is the way you want to get your followers back as well, here is some free advice from me (courtesy of our local computer experts): don't close an unwanted popup by clicking anywhere in the window, instead, find the popup tab on your taskbar, right click it and close it that way.

Update 26/6: Please read how Karin Corbin dealt with this very same problem in the comment section below!

Comments

  1. What a thoughtful gift.

    It is fascinating to hear about what sorts of things people eat daily in different counties. I had never even heard of chocolate flakes. While anything chocolate always sounds good to me... I can't imagine eating it on toast. I am sure there are many more things I eat that you would find curious too. :-)

    The more viruses, Trojan horses and malware I get... The more I am considering buying a Mac for my next computer. Thank you fo the tip.

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  2. Enhorabuena por el regalo, compensa quiza el mal trago del virus....son cada vez mas habiles a la hora de colarse, ya no van por los cauces normales, gracias por la informacion, un beso.
    <susi

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  3. Catherine, along with cheese, it is the staple food of the Dutch, lol. It is really good! You may know the French 'pain au chocolat' which also has chocolate in it (also delicious!).
    Yes, the Mac, we were discussing that yesterday as well. Although I'm sure they'll also have their share of problems.

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  4. Susi, a gift like that is always a joy. I hope the computer tip will help you to keep some viruses at bay!

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  5. I have a French Bakery across the street from my house. They sell pain au chocolat there. But... no French macaroons. I have never tasted one of those. :-(

    As for the Mac having issues... I went to the Apple store last week and played with the IPad 2. They told me it doesn't get viruses.
    I was so blown away by the technology.

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  6. Josje,

    We've only had Macs (6 of them) for over 15 years and have never had a virus on any of them. I can tell you that it just isn't an issue on Macs. You might want to seriously consider one.

    xo
    Claudia

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  7. What a fabulous gift and so thoughtful.

    What is it with the Dutch and their chocolate flakes. When our friends come from Rotterdam they always bring their own.
    Just like the English with their tea I suppose, I always have a couple of tea bags at hand when I go away.
    Some things just can't be done without!

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  8. I got that same very malware the exacxt same way last weekebd. It also wiped out my antivirus.

    I started my computer in safemode and installed a free program "malwarebytes". That took care of the bad critter at zero cost with no need to wipe the drive. I am going to keep a copy of it loaded onto a usb thumb drive for this kind of emergency. Many anitvirus programs will not load and run in safe mode but malwarebytes does. Read up on how to start your computer in safe mode, on my OS it is started by continuously tapping the F8 key as soon as you press the power on button.

    One thing I learned in this experience is never to browse the internet with a user account that has system administrator rights active. If I had not been logged in with that ability loaded the malware would not have been able to install itself.

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  9. Claudia and Catherine, our main computer is about 6.5 years old now and although used intensive on a daily basis, is still running very well. As technology is marching on I'm sure we'll need to get a newer version in the near future. The Mac will be on my shopping list!

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  10. Janice, Your friends have a Dutch addiction, lol! Even though I also eat the stuff on a daily basis, I have never taken it with me on holiday. Just like you I do bring a few tea bags with me as the one or two tea bags in a hotel room are never enough for me.

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  11. Karin, thank you for the tips! I will google the malwarebytes program.

    The problem I usually have when trying to deal with these kinds of things, is that the solutions are always in English with (obviously) lots of computer jargon thrown in. My English skills are quite good, but not when it comes to computer lingo. It makes understanding and solving problems concerning my computer an arduous task.

    However, if this happens again I will try it myself. Thank you!

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  12. What a great gift! A really fun mini.
    Mona

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  13. All your pictures have disappeared on my screen except in the last two posts.There are now little thumbnails saying.

    Upgrade to pro today!

    Bandwidth Exceeded

    PhotoBucket

    This must be the problem with photobucket you talked about in an earlier post.

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  14. I've had the exact same virus!I did click on the virus it's fake scanning program to run and it made my computer crash really bad! Lucky enough I have a brother inlaw who works with computers and he was able to salvage my documents and fix my pc.. I wonder what kind of people spend their time making such nasty virusses...

    I love the bread and chocolate flakes Debby made for you! They look fantastic and very real! Such a nice and fitting gift for you!

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  15. Catherine, yes I know, that is what I was talking about in my last post. I must wait until the
    2nd of July to get my photo's back or upgrade. I don't want to upgrade as it is another unnecessary expense. I will see what next month brings and then decide what I'll do. So for now, my apologies for not being able to provide you with my pictures!

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  16. Anneke, Yes, I'm sure their motivation is money. I hope whenever they catch people like these they get severely punished and have to pay enormous penalties. You were lucky to know someone to fix it for you, I had to pay to have it done (even though their prices are very reasonable!). On top of that it takes a lot of time to reinstall everything which was on it before, and you run into all sorts of problems because of lost information. Punish them hard I say ;)

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  17. Thankfully no viruses here...but being a total ignoramus about technology I live in the fear of them.
    I also ignored chocolate flakes :oP yummy ! we are addicted to Nutella and yesterday I bought a Pistacchi of Bronte spread which is to die for. Lots of calories but OMG, I might have it on my spaghetti too.
    The gifts is truly lovely and very thoughtfull too.
    Have a nice day, Rosanna

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  18. Bedankt voor de tip over die virussen.Leuk hoor die boterham met vlokken.
    Zelf eet ik altijd hagelslag puur.
    Groetjes
    Maria

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  19. Rosanna, Nutella is also on our table! Yum! The Pistacchi of Bronte spread sounds very good as well, I have never seen that here.

    Graag gedaan Maria. Hier in huis worden melk, puur en mokka hagelslag gegeten, en vlokken natuurlijk :) Puur is natuurlijk iets gezonder voor je.

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  20. This reminded me of my friend from Holland, when we both lived in Nigeria when we were 12 years old, she would have this for breakfast when we would sleep over. :)

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  21. Yes, the chocolate sprinkles and flakes have been around since the 1950's, when it became a huge success in Dutch households. A staple food for many Dutch people, so no surprise to hear your friend had it for breakfast even in Nigeria! :)

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