Happy New Year to you all. I've had an, um, interesting Festive Period. Some of it is fairly standard seasonal stuff, such as most of the railway notwork being switched off for the duration of the holiday season, entailing a couple of hundred passengers all having to disembark at Leamington Spa and then proceed through a single set of double doors to watch buses hang around outside the station for a few minutes with doors resolutely closed before then departing, empty, into the sunset. The rest, however, is less so and I hope you excuse my indulgence of reporting it here, especially when we've been reminded of the true meaning of the word 'disaster' the last few days.

The plan was to have a quiet couple of days with the immediate family at my brother's house, taking a short trip down the road to have lunch with my Grandparents, Uncle and Aunt. To begin with, I was unsure as to whether I'd be able to go down south as my doctor had muttered something about the possibility of needing some mildly urgent surgery if the drugs she gave me didn't do what they were supposed to do. Luckily, the drugs did and I very nearly managed to avoid hospitals for the duration.

Unfortunately, Grandma was admitted a few days before Christmas, needing (I believe) a minor repair to her leg. So we went and chatted to her, and she seemed ok, if a little pissed off and bored. (This exacerbated by the fact that the women's magazines in the hospital shop were deemed by her 'pornographic'. She has a point.) I presented her with a gift of stationery that she had asked for, presumably so she could continue to compose her wacky free-form-jazz letters from time to time, which I said I enjoyed receiving (which much is true).

We then ambled across to her house where Grandad and the Aunt and Uncle were in situ for the second (of three) Christmas meals. This was all very jolly: Grandad's not entirely compos-mentis these days, but still tells a funny story or two. Unfortunately we had to break up the party atmosphere by taking him to a care home (he's not compos-mentis enough to be able to look after himself when Grandma's away). I can't say I felt entirely at ease with all the incumbents of the institution, but I suppose that's the way these places are. And I'm sure Grandad knows how to fend off the advances of dotty old ladies. Anyway, apart from some hoo-hah about medication and managing to kill a kamikaze deer that ran into the car on the way, this all passed off smoothly. We all, apart from my father (who was driving) slept in the car on the way home.

Understandably, Dad needs an early night. And what does he do, but trip on the stair leading into the bathroom and need taking to Casualty? He returns two hours later with his foot in plaster and hobbling about on crutches. To add excitement to the proceedings, my brother lives in a Victorian house where the loo is downstairs and the sleeping quarters up...

I learnt today that sadly, I shall not be receiving any more of Grandma's trademark letters on account of her passing away this morning. I'm told it happened as quickly and as peacefully as one can hope for once they realised the treatment she was on wasn't working and there was nothing more that could be done.

[rab] I'm sorry to hear about your grandmother.

[rab] likewise, my condolences on losing your grandma. my thoughts are with you at what I know is a really difficult time.

[rab] aww - hope she had a wonderful life. I really loved all three of my grandmothers [don't ask!] and they've all gone now and although they appear in my dreams on a regular basis, I miss them dreadfully.

[rab] Sorry to hear about that. I, too, have lost both my grandmothers but I only ever knew one of them. Still, one can't wind back the clock without being literal about it.

[rab] All sympathies extended. I lost a grandparent for the first time at the end of last summer, and it knocks you flat to think that someone who has had such an effect on your life and who you are has gone.

[rab] I hope Grandpa is going to be OK. Best wishes to you and your family after what sounds like a glum Christmas.

Coo, new ISP is impressive. Migration is booked for the 13th, and they've already given me my IP addresses. This means that I can, in theory, set it all up to fail over fairly gracefully.

Crap, perhaps I should read the recent moves before posting. My condolences as well, Rab.

[rab] Might I add my commiseration to those already expressed? Regrettably most of us have to experience such events at some stage of our lives.
On a brighter note, your father must have received wonderful service at the hospital. If you had that problem here (at least in New South Wales) I'd lay odds on a minimum five hour turnaround and more likely eight. Some ten years or so ago I had a "bit of a turn" and was carted off to my local hospital by ambulance; the ambos weren't sure whether it was a heart thing or not. I lay in the A&E on a stretcher bed for five hours before a doctor saw me. This was a weekday afternoon, not the weekend. As best I can gather from the press the situation is much worse these days. So, congratulations to your health department and your local doctors.
I hope your grandfather is found decent long term care and that your father has a short recuperation.

Thanks, all. [Nik] Which ISP is that. I'm looking at getting adsl, but am a bit befuddled by the myriad of resellings of the same package.

I'm moving to Zen as they've long held a reputation similar to Nildram, but are currently a lot cheaper (only £1 less on the basic unmetered 512kbps package, but with free static IP blocks, where Nildram charge £3.50 for a single IP then £5.88 for a block of 8). The price difference wasn't enough to move, but Nildram's stability has been shocking for the last few months. It might be worth you checking out ADSLGuide - look at the 'fastest ISPs' chart, then poke around the forums for some of those ISPs.

I don't have any flashy requirements (like fixed IP, or the need for decent upstream speeds or even email/webspace) so what I can't decide is whether a basic package whose only limitation that might affect me would be a bandwidth cap of something like 1 or 2 Gb a month, or if it's worth the extra few quid a month for an uncapped service. I don't do any internet gaming, download movies or whatever. The only big downloads I do are new software packages (I'm not doing anymore OS updates since the last one killed my laptop for a bit). I guess the question I ask is, how much bandwidth does a fairly normal amount of web browsing and the odd bit of ssh and scping actually consume?

Oh, and the other issue, of course, is that my only computer is a Mac, so a Mac-aware (if not outright friendly) ISP would be a bonus. In any case, I'll want to purchase an ethernet modem that's compatible with my wireless box.

General surfing doesn't use much - I tend not to transfer more than 1-2GB *total*, running the web and email servers on top, and I use BitTorrent every now and again. As for atypical system support, I've no idea who does what well, although I would expect companies like Zen and Nildram to be better than volume providers like AOL and Wannado.

So, let's get this straight, even running a web server you use less than 2Gb a month?

From the Nildram access stats, "Total time on-line was 40 days 3:12:56s, during which time 2.206 GB were transferred." - this was the connection that went squiffy over christmas. It hasn't noticed me being dis/connected since then. I believe the 'transferred' figure includes uploads as well as downloads, but can't be sure. Most providers cap based on downloads and ignore uploads anyway. And let's face it, it's not a very busy web server (mostly text, which is all compressed for transfer).

On the other hand, er: 'You made 2 connections during October. Total time on-line was 17 days 23:28:28s, during which time 9.990 GB were transferred.' and 'You made 1 connections during September. Total time on-line was 38 days 4:43s, during which time 4.784 GB were transferred.' I was a very heavy BitTorrent user around that time, though.

[Nik] Tried Adsl Guide just the site I needed back in September ;^)

Please don't take offence because you know I love you all dearly and all that boll*cks - but The Limerick Game - gah!
Proper names should have Capital Letters
The first line should begin with a Capital letter
There's too much inconsequential nattering which breaks the flow
Finally - do we have to go to the far end of a fart every time something remotely 'welsh' is mentioned?
:-) :-) :-)

< mode=sarcastic > and yes, there really is a Chat Game on this server - you're reading it now < /s>

Methinks I got out of bed the wrong side this morning.

[Chalky] Well, at least it only took you two minutes to notice...! :-)

[Incle Korks] I've had three cups of tea, so feel a bit better now. :-)

I agree, but I couldn't resist the limerick line.

also agreed, and I know I'm quite an offender. I promise to try and limerick things that make sense and scan, and use capital letters.

Grrr... slightly annoyed with my ex-funding body, who've quite reasonably asked for a report on what their money was spent on. Unfortunately, the covering letter of their request directed me to a webpage containing the wrong set of guidance notes. Although these were sufficiently similar to make sense in the context of the rest of the documentation, the differences are enough to require a further heavy editing session. I so wanted this finished, like, last year. Fucktards.

[rab] if it's any consolation, I'm currently putting together my section of a presentation on corruption under the Brezhnev regime in the soviet union. I had a text message while I was at work earlier from one of the group. "Hi (nights), hope you're getting on OK. I've been talking to (someone else), and apparently our presentation has to be quite analytical, so could you try and do that? thanks! see you tomorrow!".
So instead of being in bed at the moment, I'm sat in front of word trying to pull analysis from a rather dark place. gaaaah. (dies.)

A turbulent day with Prince Harry still front page (good for the celebdaq shares), Busted are splitting unfortunately - McFly are sticking it out, Jackie Stallone must be shown the door of the BB House (John to stay). MC⁵ returns.

yes, hooray MC5 is back in my life. I was thinking that it was telewest being their usually competent selves.

It took until Sunday evening for MC5 to reappear on my interwebnet thingy ... but nice to see it again :o)

yay - it's taken 'til around now for it to appear on my screen aswell. Which gives me the opportunity to 'pologise to Rosie in particular for the 'far end of a fart .... anything remotely welsh' remark which looked much more vehement on screen than was intended.

(Chalky) Vehemence not detected. But you might have used a capital "W". :-)

Just a suggestion (and I know it won't appeal to everyone) for a short game... The gauntlet has been thrown down in the latest Doctor Who Magazine, inviting readers to contribute to a sort of 'Welsh Film Club' (only using existing Doctor Who story titles as source material), to celebrate the filming of the new series in the valleys. Now, this is the sort of thing that I know we can do well. Anyone interested? The two examples provided were The Swansea Devils and Powys of the Daleks.

Is it just me, or is MC5 (and angrycake.com in general) responding more quickly with this new ISP? The time to move had apparently arrived a long time ago - everything about this new ISP is an improvement. And look, the old one has just charged me for the coming month! Gah!

Yes, it does seem faster. The Furcation Game seems to appear almost immediately, whereas I'm sure it was always a bit sluggish before.

(Uncle K) I think it's been done on ISIHAC. But anyway, there's Bridge over the River Wye.

I forgot. It stars Gwynedd Paltrow.

[Rosie] The drawback, though, is that you can't use general film / TV title as your source material - it's Doctor Who stories only.

[Nik/rab] For me, MC5 seems extremely slow. It's taking up to 30 seconds to respond each time.

[Nik/rab] Not really a noticeable difference here, but maybe 5,000 miles of perspective flattens the diffs out.

[Darren] Given that the server is now routed via a different ISP, the problems you had last year, and the lack of serious complaint from anyone else, I'd still (unhelpfully, I admit) lay the fault at the door of your ISP, or some route near to you. Do you have problems with other sites?

[Nik] No, no problems with other sites, although MC5 seems to be running alright now. It probably is my ISP.

(Uncle K) OK. So I'm sure you can translate the above.:-)

And that.

[Rosie, Darren] I've tried a number of online translation services... with little luck. Can't work out your first word, Rosie, and I'm completely stumped on Darren's!

[UK] When is Dr Who scheduled for screening? I am looking forward to the series, especially on the special effects. Children's tv drama has a very low budget compared other areas. But if it is being made by the Drama dept the budget will be there but not the expertise to make good children's tv, afterall that should be the target audience not us Big People.

[Rosie] Aha - cracked yours, now. Obvious, really, in retrospect...
[Darren] Yours seems to come out as... He is being breasts excellent good she?!
[Inkspot] No formal announcement has been made as yet, but the smart money's on Easter Saturday. This is, of course, typical. I wait sixteen years - I mean, sixteen years - for a new series of Doctor Who, and I'm going to be out of the country when the first episode airs!

I am, perhaps, the only person who ever actually reads the terms and conditions of low-cost air carriers when making a booking. Occasionally it's worth it. I note that one airline says:

We are not liable for the replacement cost of designer baggage which in itself is valuable and inappropriate to be carried by a low cost airline

Amusingly, designer baggage is defined as

baggage which bears a logo of a so-called designer manufacturer and is sold at inflated prices.

[rab]They sound kind of bitter, don't they?

(Darren) Your example doesn't look grammatical to me and I wonder who put it together. Da means good, but ardderchog means wonderful, excellent etc and you wouldn't use both together. I suspect it should read mae bronnau ardderchog genni hi, literally, "there is (are) breasts wonderful with her". There's no verb "to have" in Welsh. The word genni is a conjugated part of gan, "with", and its ending means you can omit the pronoun it refers to, hi, in this case, and most people would, certainly in conversation.

I wonder what would happen if you checked in luggage in black bin liners - which are presumably appropriate for travel on a low cost carrier....

(rab, pen) It's a bit like a notice on the door of a pub, saying "No suits, ties or dresses - this is a rough house". An amazing admission.

[Rosie] I've shown it to you before. It comes from an old Welsh-English phrase book, the translation for which it claims is "She has excellent breasts." Quite why they thought that would be a useful phrase I'm not sure.

Wow, all this time and nobody posted a response to that.

Thanks, Nik. You can now go and get some sleep.

As if!

jolly good work :-)
I think spoken Welsh is a truly beautiful sound

Well, just before I disappear to bed, about time I posted my first hello on MC5. My nanny corporate firewall/websense blocks this site out as it's a "game" site, apparently. Although in which sense of the word, I'm not sure. (And nary a mention of the fact it contains breasts.)

Breasts? Where? Whose?

er . . . that's "breasts like the hills of Snowdonia". Probably a quotation. (Darren) I remember your phrase-book quote from MCpants days. It would probably be OK conversationally. My father's first language was Welsh and I picked up a lot from him, and from many other people, but I could hardly be called an authority. Part of what I know has been deliberately learnt but quite a lot is instinctive. My English speech is quite London.

Nice to see the old place back. Thanks for your hard work, Nik.

[Botherer] On the "List of Things To Do (Urgent)" is a Stealth Mode where all mentions of the word "game" are obscured. This might be useful in a workplace environment.

Nice to see everyone here. Coffee, Nik?

One of the nuggets from ploughing through LoTR extended remix (and brilliant it was to) was the Elvish languages Sindarin is based on Welsh.
Good to see things back up again. Ace going Nik.

go nik, yaaaay, etc. nice job. mc5 is back in my life! *sighs contentedly*

I agree with whoever said that welsh is a lovely spoken language - my Dad doesn't. so for an april fools I tuned all of the stations on his car radio to BBCymru. they were still there a week later! and then he glued all of my post together. grr.

Nik] Thanks for all your work - it's great to see this back. Botherer] These things are utterly random. My work's firewall allows me onto MC5 and MCIOS, but not Orange - anyone have any thoughts on why this might be so? Oh and did you see that the guy who lost £9 million of his company's money gambling was betting online from work up to 30 times a day. He obviously didn't have to worry about NSFW.

[Botherer] I think it's classed as a game because of removed-yonks-ago metatags on (www.)angrycake.com. Most annoying.
[Irouleguy] The filter in place at my work used to block dunx.org, too. It stopped such foul practices some time ago now.
I need sleep bad.