I don't know if anyone else finds this irritating, but I constantly wonder at the mindset of people who name themselves the most idiotic things in MSN, to the point where I don't know who they are any more! I mean, what kind of person sets their display name to this: Dmitry- ()|\|(3 '/()(_)\/3 /=r4|"|>£(| +() 4 -|-/'4|-' +|-|3/'£$ /\/() 9()!/v(_+ |3?(|{?

One of the most important values you can teach a growing child is that of accountability, ie learning to take responsibility for their actions and accepting ownership for the outcomes, rewards and/or consequences of the results. I spend a lot of time in various IRC channels and have found that as a nation, swedish people take a lot of beating. In my opinion, in an ideal world channels would consist solely of swedes. They've got IRC etiquette sussed by the time they're about 15 and show nearly everyone else up when it comes to channel behaviour. In contrast, UK channel members behave a whole lot more childishly, but even they aren't as bad as people from the US! Now obviously this sort of blanket statement doesn't include everyone, and most servers have ways of ensuring some kind of standard is kept to, but the places to really beware of are small, independently run servers. I can see why America has a problem with a large proportion of their young people - I'm staggered at the kind of behaviour that is considered normal for a 16 year old. Most people can be accountable for their actions, because in all but a small number of cases anyone old enough to act in a certain way is old enough to take the consequences. Maybe it's to do with the huge problem the US has with being a litigation crazy country, but my experience has been that the youth of the states are encouraged to see their bad behaviour as their victims' fault.

Well, I'm overjoyed to have my internet connection restored and be back onine again. I've got so much to catch up on, that it must have been the worst possible time to lose access to the online world. You have to hand it to AOL - nobody else can get close to them in sheer determination to be different to the rest of the ISPs, using protocols and systems understood only by themselves. For completely illogical and unbelievable behaviour, they have it all. I lost the router connection briefly about a week ago and the guy there was able to reset my password to match the username I've had since I bought the router from AOL (which they'd modified of course, so that master screen name and pasword were the sign on detail). When the same thing happened a few days later, I thought I'd maybe got a fault on the line - at any rate, with authentication failure as the error message, I needed their intervention. We tried EVERYTHING. BT ran three line tests, which involved me connectoing my router to the main phone socket and moving half the furniture round to allow me to move a PC near enough to plug the RJ45 cable from the telephone socket into the PC (then wondering why I hadn't simply used the laptop!). If an ISP don't get the customer to to this, they'll be charged by BT for an unnecessary intervention by one of their engineers. We did have a small line fault but even after BT fixed that, I was still in the same boat. It was left that for the meantime they would give me free dial up which I could keep in case it was useful in future, and they would send a brand new Speedtouch wireless router worth 75 pounds. They were confident that the problem would be fixed if necessary after they contacted Speedtouch for help, but while second line support rang me back whenever they could, one particular day I spent 45 pounds on calls to their technical support!

When I spoke to Billing about this and pointed out that I wasn't too impressed with their treatment of someone who had been a customer since 1998, had always been on their premium package, and had always been spot on with payments they immediately took off the following month's payment, added the next the next three, and then said I would only pay 9.99 for 12 months after that, before going back onto 14.99 for ever. So I'm not going to be leaving them - I don't reckon on a better deal anywhere right now! Oh - and any calls I might need to make to them in the future would be free!

This hasn't been a very good year for me. Back from a superb holiday in New Zealand, I finally got back to work hoping to really get stuck in again. I had a small setback being sick a couple of days after we returned, but disaster struck with a vengeance on Saturday 1st March when I went to a fellow colleague's 21st birthday party. I was at work the next day at 7am so I was sensible and just had one alcoholic drink. Then leaving I managed to trip over a bollard in the car park and went flying, landing on the concrete hard on my ribs. I was momentarily winded by it and stunned. Somehow I got home and couldn't move for the next few days. I'm still off work.

I'll write an article on New Zealand shortly and put some of the beter pictures online. My camera never did turn up, but the new camera was a godsend, as I've come back with some lovely photos. Our cruise down Doutful Sound was the scenic highlight of the holiday! In the meantime I must thank Benji for looking after this site in my absence, he took on the job of mending any broken links and inserting updates for me as I had forgotten how to manoeuvre around javascript.

Also to thank are Ninza and Simon, who looked after channel for the weeks I was away. In particular Ninza has implemented changes in our channel which unfortunately are way too advanced for most of our members. While we're all loosely called geeks from time to time for participating in irc, he is the genuine article.

Carrying on from Christchurch, I can only say that the south island with its Southern Alps was stupendous! There are a few of the photos which can be downloaded as a zip file here. Hopefully soon I will write a separate page on the entire holiday. For now I am snookered. I don't know who is annoying me more, the pain clinic doctor who is so highly qualified I wonder at someone with about 15 letters after their name who can't grasp that I cannot pick up a script from a pharmacy which closes at 5pm because - surprise surprise - I work! Then I have the GP who already did his best to sabotage my insurance claim by in his words "ticking the wrong boxes by mistake." Now when I ask for a sick note for work, after he came to see me for my damaged ribs, told me he never carried sick notes on home visits and I would have to wait until I was fit enough to trash down to the surgery to collect a *sick* note!

Now I have AOL being similarly frustrating, but working in a call centre myself, I can understand why they are acting the way they are. I just don't understand why nobody can get my router showing three solid green lights to get me online. I have had good service from second line support, 3 different people, but I have to go through the same rigmarole to set transferred to them. I can appreciate this, second line support are not paid the money they get to help someone send an email. So thanks to their insistence on my recongiguring Sky, dsl filters, the phones etc, I've ended up cutting myself off and have has to go through this procedure about 5 times. Again, they have to do it or else risk being charged by BT for the line test. I've worked for similar companies and I know what it's like and to be fair, they have rung me back and promised to refund all the phone charges, plus cancel next month's subscription. Kudos to AOL - but I'm just as offline.

Lastly, one funny thing. The gave me a username ratki91194@dialbb.com, but I thought they said dialBABY.com (it sounded like it). So I put this in and the given password, and it actually connected to the router interface - while their bb.com didn't! I've come to the conclusion there is nothing more illogical than a computer!

I'm writing this en route to Melbourne, where we get a short stop for an hour or so. It's hard to believe this moment has finally arrived and that I'm sitting in my first class suite, at 33,000ft, on my way to New Zealand via Dubai and Melbourne. We spent last night in Dubai, which is somewhere I've always wanted to see and indeed it does look an impressive place. Realising that the oil wouldn't last for ever, they've had the sensible foresight to do something now and have built a glamorous, luxury tourist resort, a city out of sand, Las Vegas style. Once all the building work has been finished, it's going to look really nice and if it attracts the tourist type it is clearly aiming for, then there will quickly be more money to spend on the place.

Taking a walk to the far end of the plane earlier, so as to comply with the "mobilising" instructions given by my GP to avoid DVT as I'm still slightly more susceptible to this following my operation, I was heartily glad I wasn't going economy! Squashed in like cattle, there was no room for people or hand luggage or anything and the ones asleep looked terribly uncomfortable. Business class was an improvement, but I was glad to get back to our first class section and my pod-like suite, which did so much it took a good while to learn exactly what was on offer and how to put your seat into the various positions. I'm sure the Emirates Captain would have had more difficulty operating one of these "suites" than flying the aircraft!

Well, that was now over a week ago and this is the first chance I've had of connecting my laptop to the internet to upload anything. Since then we've had a wonderful week in Auckland with Uncle Austin, who wore us out with his energy and enthusiasm, particularly as the heat was something else! Unacclimatised coming straight from a very cold spell in UK winter, we went straight into what even residents of Auckland admitted was the hottest summer in memory. Our last night there for instance, was 22 degrees overnight and during Ithe day I was literally dripping with sweat the whole time as the humidity was horrendous too. Still, I'll take back some wonderful memories of seeing cousins I haven't met for 41 years as they emigrated when I was nine.

I'm now writing this from Christchurch in our motel. We flew here this morning, which was very skin-of-the-teeth as the taxi firm had forgotten our booking and we were thankful that the flight was somewhat delayed. Check-in was pandemonium as we belatedly realised that we weren't going to be able to take the same amount of hand luggage on board as we did flying first class in a large airliner. All our cases were overweight and our hand luggage simply had to lose a few kilos we were told. However, the check-in girl seemed happy when I just removed my laptop to carry, but poor Barbara had a frantic time tossing items here and there in an attempt to get the weight down. The basic trouble was that we couldn't have fitted even a sheet of paper in our hold bags! I didn't tell her that I'd heard the girl say "she can't take a bag that size on the aircraft in any case". In the end the problem was solved by weighing the case on different scales, which magically gave a reading of under 7 kilos. So we picked up our hire car and arrived at last.

I seem to have lost a few things along the way, the latest of which was my camera which disappeared in between taking a photo of Austin's house and getting to Auckland airport. The major impact was the loss of irreplaceable photos of the first week of my holiday - however, I've copied those of Barbara's that I liked, which in part makes up for it. For the record, I've also lost my reading glasses (on the plane) and my silver watch (in Austin's car when I took it off to put sunblock on). I've taken on the cricket players' fashion of white stripes it seems, as I've managed to buy total sunblock which is very effective, but very difficult to put on so I don't look sheet white and about 120!

This is the biggest change yet to the website, and a huge improvement on what passed for an index page previously. For this I must say a huge thank you to Ben Stoner who created the whole design, redid all the code and basically produced the finished pages as they are now. I've been very lucky to have found someone with both the necessary skills needed to code a website and the artistic talent to make it look something special. He was hampered here by my rather basic needs I'm afraid and he is not to blame for the content! But I'm delighted at the result and would recommend him to anyone. He was a delight to have working for me on this project and currently a graphic design student, I know that once he finishes his studies he will never be out of work. His contact details are on this site, or you can email me if you would like to speak to him about further work.

And another big thanks to AntiOnline forums, in particular Joe, who works for Jupiter Media. Having been asked to redo the banner so it fitted on the site rather better, I then managed to lose his effort by presumably accidentally deleting the email sent containing the gif. But never mind, they found the time to either dig it out from somewhere again, or redo it and anyway, it got onto the site! This is an example of the attitude found in their forum and why I like it so much - nothing is too much trouble to help someone.

Quite a long time since I updated this site, but I was unexpectedly in hospital for a week just before christmas, without warning. Some severe reaction to drugs taken was what the doctors concluded was the cause, at any rate it caused a lot of worry and concern both in real life and online. On the computer I just seemed to disappear without trace from channels and MSN, AIM and forums, while at home my symptoms of being in a coma, then not being able to speak properly, not knowing what date or day it was and general disorientation, being unable to walk straight and having a totally different idea of what had taken place over the month were quite scarey. I'm still finding things that I'm convinced took place, which in fact didn't. I have such clear memories, it's just impossible for me to take in the fact that it's all just imagination. For instance, I can still see the MSN conversation with Michael after Philip had killed two people in a fight - joyriders who had run over his godson. Michael was saying "I've just been watching the fight - bet you didn't know Philip had it in him!" and I thought what a shame, he'll never be allowed to join the police force now. Then there was the text message going round which both Michael and I were doing, a sort of chain message where each recipient added a short verse and sent it on. And one of the most weird things of all, I was convinced someone had given their cats LSD ..... one cat had died and another needed emergency vet's treatment. I can still see this trip report, about how he was taking some LSD himself and decided the cats would be his trip companions! I remember the comments, slating him for giving a cat the dose that a much larger human would take, as well as the idea of giving them a substance like that in the first place. I was quite cold towards him when I got back online, as I found such behaviour disgusting, indeed he had had to take down his trip report as the comments got more and more vicious. Well, apparently this and all the other stories were just in my own head, they didn't happen in reality at all! In fact the guy with the cats was most indignant that I could think he'd ever do anything like that! It just proves how powerful the brain is, and just what it is capable of, plus what powerful drugs in combination with each other can do.

Anyway, I'm now out of plaster and was doing well walking and had been twice to the gym. However now I've got a sore foot, ie the foot on the leg that had the operation is so sore on the rear half of the sole, that walking is unpleasant and trips to the gym are certainly out of the question. I missed an appointment with my rheumatology consultant while I was in hospital, and have to wait to go back on 16th Jan, when hopefully I can have something better than methotrexate and get his opinion on whether this foot pain is connected with arthritis rather than the recent operation.

Very soon now, this site should look very different as Benji has just about finished the design - it should be a huge improvement. Oh and the insurance company eventually paid up - but guess what? The cheque still hasn't cleared in the bank, and even the bank are saying it looks like it's gone missing somewhere. I have to give it till tomorrow, then put they will put a stop on it and I'll have to get another from Wessex. I can just imagine what a nightmare that's going to be and how long it'll take! Not one single thing has been straight forward about this insurance payment.

Some progress, I'm now in a plaster I can hobble around on a bit. The system doesn't exactly make life easy though. Rather than allow me to make an appointment at the Urgent Clinic at the Freeman Hospital, I was told I had to get a GP referral. When I finally got to my GP, after arranging for a friend to take me in her car, and hobbled in to see the doctor, I found out this was only because the Freeman get paid for each GP referral! Never mind how hard it is for me to get to the doctor's at the moment, I have to struggle there because making my own appointment would deny them this referral fee!

It's a similar story with an insurance company supposedly making payments while Im on the sick. Quick to sign you up, they then drag their feet over paying out. They ask for minimal medical history before taking your money, but try putting in a claim! Currently they have my medical records and their Chief Medical Officer will give his opinion as to whether I have a valid case or not. Mind, that hasn't been helped by my dozy doctor, who clearly filled the form in without paying any attention to what he was doing, and had no idea that certain questions could be key to the whole claim. Apologising for "ticking the wrong box", and explaining that "RA contributed to your injury only because it added to it and made things harder for you" is a bit late now. Once they can delve into my medical past they'll come up with some reason not to pay what should have been a very straightforward claim. The papers are full of such cases nowadays, one just reported in the Financial Mail on Sunday this week.

This room has been transformed into a sort of computer graveyard. I've got a Dell which fell foul of the orange flashing power light syndrome, a very old laptop I keep meaning to dispose of, an old Mac, a fairly new laptop, my Athlon SFF and my dual core PC, as well as a broken printer, a Canon photoprinter, and a Dell colour laser printer. Two scanners, a pile of computer equipment, some new DDR2 memory, a motherboard and numerous DVDs/CDs help fill the rest of the room, which will become even more crowded tomorrow, once the rest of the components for my upgrade arrive. Just about every OS is catered for, from the old laptop running Kubuntu through to Vista Ultimate, with Tiger OSX on the mac.

Still hobbling around on a non weight bearing plaster, still off work, life has certainly changed. Rosie has moved out this week, into a one bedroomed flat she is buying through a grant scheme to help workers in key jobs to get a step on the property ladder. As is often the case, it can be worth applying even when not in a "key" job, as these organisations have money to use which can often be left over if not enough people apply.

I hate insurance companies so much! They all seem to be the same, stalling and going to ridiculous lengths, giving every excuse they can think of rather than pay out what to them would be a paltry sum. This site or the index page anyway) will be getting a makeover, which I've decided it badly needs. It's beginning to look very 1990's and writing simple HTML in notepad doesn't quite cut it these days when new applications are making it easy to use modern standards like XML, CSS and SOAP.

Halloween already! Fortunately we're going out tonight, so I won't have to listen to kids ringing the doorbell - there wouldn't be enough time to reach them before they would have inevitably given up (only the ambulance service wait around long enough!) I've come back from the Freeman wearing a special glow in the dark plaster.

Hadn't realised such a long time had passed without any updates here! Anyway, I'm hobbling around on crutches or else hopping one one leg or crawling .... it's no fun being in a non weight bearing plaster. Altogether it'll be 3 months before I'm walking again - which means time off work, but the downside to that is no money, other than SSP! On balance I think I'd rather not have had this done, but to have spent the rest of my life unable to stand on the tip of my toes, or run, or walk properly would be pretty unthinkable.

Once again, I have nothing but praise for the hospital, which is the same one I was in four years ago. It was a bit of a longer stay this time - a whole week, and I definitely won't be doing a challenge walk a few weeks later either! Overall though, I was very comfortable and well looked after.

So sad that England didn't win the World Cup :( I didn't think they'd even get past the group stages at the start of it though, so it's just amazing they got as far as the final. However, South Africa just proved to be the better team on the day.

This will be the last update before I go into hospital - I'll be offline for a while as I'm going to stay at my Dad's for a few days when I come out. It'll mean I've got someone there all the time with me, able to prepare proper meals while I get used to moving around in plaster. It'll also be company. I've changed my mind about not taking 3 months off work - it's turning out not to be worth going back while I can get a sick note. I'm getting nervous about the whole thing, yet I'm so geared up for it, that if the operation was cancelled for any reason, I know I'd feel a big sense of anti climax!

This will be the last update before I go into hospital - I'll be offline for a while as I'm going to stay at my Dad's for a few days when I come out. It'll mean I've got someone there all the time with me, able to prepare proper meals while I get used to moving around in plaster. It'll also be company. I've changed my mind about not taking 3 months off work - it's turning out not to be worth going back while I can get a sick note. I'm getting nervous about the whole thing, yet I'm so geared up for it, that if the operation was cancelled for any reason, I know I'd feel a big sense of anti climax!