diff --git a/make_mirror.sh b/make_mirror.sh
index 470054c..3799cd0 100755
--- a/make_mirror.sh
+++ b/make_mirror.sh
@@ -532,7 +532,7 @@ if [ "$HAVE_QEMU" = "yes" ]; then
 		--aptopt='Acquire::http::Dl-Limit "1000"' \
 		--aptopt='Acquire::https::Dl-Limit "1000"' \
 		--aptopt='Acquire::Retries "5"' \
-		$DEFAULT_DIST - "$mirror" > "$tmpdir/debian-chroot.tar"
+		"$DEFAULT_DIST" - "$mirror" > "$tmpdir/debian-chroot.tar"
 
 	cat << END > "$tmpdir/mmdebstrap.service"
 [Unit]
diff --git a/run_qemu.sh b/run_qemu.sh
index 7ee9279..b95e0dd 100755
--- a/run_qemu.sh
+++ b/run_qemu.sh
@@ -47,7 +47,7 @@ esac
 
 # the path to debian-$DEFAULT_DIST.qcow must be absolute or otherwise qemu will
 # look for the path relative to debian-$DEFAULT_DIST-overlay.qcow
-qemu-img create -f qcow2 -b "$(realpath $cachedir)/debian-$DEFAULT_DIST.qcow" -F qcow2 "$tmpdir/debian-$DEFAULT_DIST-overlay.qcow"
+qemu-img create -f qcow2 -b "$(realpath "$cachedir")/debian-$DEFAULT_DIST.qcow" -F qcow2 "$tmpdir/debian-$DEFAULT_DIST-overlay.qcow"
 # to connect to serial use:
 #   minicom -D 'unix#/tmp/ttyS0'
 #