19:47 Oct 24, 2010 

Once again - I am working backwards through Kudoz - I think you have already reached a good solution. If we are being more politically correct in England nowadays there is a tendency to omit the old to avoid accusations of ageism, and "the good lady" would also work quite well here since it delays the comment on age until the "punchline" has been delivered

19:02 Oct 24, 2010 

That our good old lady reached the respected age of 104 years - being erroneously called to kindergarten is a small price to pay for living at that age!

18:19 Oct 24, 2010 

The good old lady sounds good. "Unsere" -"our" implies affection. As opposed to " Die gute Frau", "Die" - "The" implies detachment, describing a thing without emotion. I think this term is difficult for those two reasons. "unsere gute frau" also has a hint of irony/sarcasm to it. The good old lady although covering the affection part, does not cover the hint or irony. Or...I am reading into this way to much and analyzing to the nth degree.

16:37 Oct 24, 2010 

It's kind of semi-affection - just respect (as one would refer to Ms. Marple for example)

16:26 Oct 24, 2010 

The part of the text I am referring to is as follows :
" In Deutschland erhielt eine Frau mit Jahrgang 91 zum Geburtstag 1995 ueberraschende Post. es sei hoechste Zeit, dass Ihre Eltern Sie fuer den Kindergarten anmelden. Dieser Serienbrief wird vom Computer verschickt. Und wie soll der wissen, dass unsere gute Frau 1891 ur Welt gekommen ist?"
" And how could it know, that the lady in question was born in 1891 ?"
How does that sound?

15:45 Oct 24, 2010 

Yes, the text has a humorous note that reflects the incongruous situation of someone her age reporting to kindergarten, but not really affection (the writer would not necessarily have to know the woman). I do think that you can use lady in this case if you want, as it's the tone we're trying to convey.

15:29 Oct 24, 2010 

Ok. But does'nt " unsere gute Frau" imply affection? Also, " lady " is Dame", not " Frau". So " the woman in question" would seem the most appropriate. There is nothing warm or affectionate or humorous about that though.

15:16 Oct 24, 2010 

Yes I am sure. It is a humourous article. A very old woman, gets a letter in teh post saying it is high time she went to kindergarten. The letter is a serial letter sent by a computer who thinks that "91" means 1991 not 1891. The point of the article is to demonstarte that computers cannot distinguish between 1901 and 2001 etc. I did not know about the IBM PC, you leanr something new every day. Thank you. Any ideas about the " unsere gute Frau" thing?

15:12 Oct 24, 2010 

Are you sure it's 1891 ? if it is about a computer, is a little premature (anachronistic).