DamnSaxon

For comparison, a fairly typical ("2Mbps") result from about 500 miles south ... http://www.speedtest.net/result/207216023.png (through my mate's wi-fi what I share). Other sites give similar results.

A well-travelled pal of mine's take on Islam is that whenever you talk with a Muslim you're talking with the Q'uran. You know what he means when you hear this sort of sh*t. I've just re-named "the Great White God", know what I mean?

^^ Ah, but what are the reviewers used to? Hollywood! My only reservation is that they're a bit over-free with the word "f*ck", but that isn't much of a reservation these days. Or, read the original & make up the pictures yourself ...

Roachmill - the one you want to watch is Beowulf and Grendel, directed by Sturla Gunnarson in 2005, with Gerard Butler and Ingvar E Sigurdsson in the title roles. Just check those names against where the legend comes from ... Visually gorgeous, no Hollywood glitz at all, a bloody lovely film. It's an Icelandic - British - Canadian offering, which IMHO gives it a running start over anything Hollywood is likely to come up with. (US patrons are free to disagree of course )

^^ Ah, très bien. Merci! - You need cannabis, not paracetamol (see other thread)

Well, anyone with: MS glaucoma insomnia headaches gastrointestinal disorders pain muscle spasms a variety of rare muscular and skeletal disorders atherosclerosis ... Can't be bothered to calculate the total. Make no difference if I did. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_marijuana for an outline.

One of the best comedy films of all time.

Unfortunately, it is almost solely the UK which has for almost 30 years been forcing measures through the EU to enforce the barking mad free-market twattery which declares any kind of "state support" illegitimate. And now the <°)))>< are coming home to roost. As the WTO is screwing third world countries, so ill-conceived EU regulations are screwing Europeans. And because the UK is mainly responsible for this madness, there's not much hope that the UK will find a way round the undesirable consequences. Scuttle the boats. Burn down the factories. Invest the insurance money and become parasites like the cretins who come up with these stupid rules. Who needs food supplies anyway?

And then we hear that the NAO didn't even want the most sensitive information, but that it would have been "too expensive to remove". WHAT? 1 - Select column 2 - Delete column Truly, these people live in a vile and bizarre world of their own. Tragically, they seem to be succeeding in forcing the rest of us into it willy nilly. And still people twitter on that "if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear". Whom the Gods would destroy ...

^^^ Eh?

^^ The most frightening potential being that this will, apparently, NOT make the idiots think again about their ID card scheme. Presumably the plan is that by the time they're forced on us, HMG will already have blown all the information they have on all of us into the public domain?

^^ Only sales of the big breweries, apparently: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,2214384,00.html Support local industry

^^ Yes, there was a fellow on the telly news last night (a Daily Mail hack, I believe) who reckoned that ACPO were pretty good at sussing out which way the wind was blowing, then issuing a statement in favour of it. Possibly one of the most accurate statements to come out of that organ in years Such as the enormous number of deaths attributable to cannabis compared with nice legal drugs like alcohol and tobacco, presumably?

^^ Agreed. A solid feller in blue is a DamnSight more reassuring than having snooping cameras watching (and recording) your every move. And you can't ask a camera the time ...

^^ A sensible (and apparently fairly successful) approach. If you can't take the drugs out of the equation, take the criminal element out instead. And today we hear that ACPO want cannabis put back up to class B, just as the number of kids using it is decreasing for the first time in years. Makes you wonder.

^^

It's the most spectacular piece of incompetence yet in governmental IT. And as half the posters on the BBC website point out, there'd undoubtedly be great interest in the paedophile market in a list of all the UK's children. Absolutely appalling. (edited "there's" to "there'd")

I think this system is in fact a very stripped down Linux. Thinking about it the main thing you'd need for the browser would be the codecs for the various multimedia types you'd want to play on it - the html should be pretty straightforward by comparison. As for "anyone know..." - McDilly-Willy probably knows of one Alas, yes ... we're (almost) history now But think positive. The computer is now roughly where "wireless" was in about 1930 - with lightbulb valves on the top of a hand-made wooden box. Give it another 25 years and they may even make computers that do what you want, rather than what Bill Gates wants As for "stripped down" OS's, I recently came across an interesting site. Last time I installed Windows 98 it installed to a tad over 200MB. However, if you remove everything which isn't operating system ... http://www.embeddingwindows.com/graphics/8mb_windows98.gif Now, that's impressive. Rather confirms what we've all suspected about a *certain* OS supplier all along. Want this, too (if only to have a play with it)

Actually, much the same goes for me on those points ... I had polio in the 1956 epidemic, and was saved for posterity by the still quite new NHS. It has a lot to answer for As for global warming ... I don't deny that the globe is warming. I don't deny that carbon dioxide (etc) levels are higher now than at any time in our history. But - I've never yet seen one peer-reviewed paper which proves to my satisfaction that the current warming is due to our noxious emissions. Has anyone?

Darn tootin' right. (Pun intended.) I've no problem with people having a bit of fun among themselves, but where this lot differ from our generation is that we used to try to avoid f*cking it up for other people. But I still think that governmental "promotion" raises its status & appeal.

Better late than never ... Nice one, PB, and good luck with the Development biz. Now, about those plans I had for the Shetland International Opera House ...

The title alone seems to confirm all my worst suspicions about "financial engineering" For me at present, "Wild Swans" by Jung Chang. A fascinating personal history of how events have affected three generations in China, written by the youngest of them. (who was on Desert Island Discs last week)

^^^ Seems odd to suggest that Scouse drug suppliers should "target" Shetland. You'd have thought that there'd be a lot more profit to be made from some of their own housing estates. Surely more likely that there's one wide boy in Lerwick who'd set up a new supply from them. I'm sure Sherlock knows. An' I'll bet he's not saying ...

... and here was me thinking it was the ones with big fast cars you had to watch out for

How old is the PC? More important, how old is the monitor? If it's recent enough to be made with "lead-free" solder it may be a dodgy connection somewhere inside the monitor - lead free solder is proving "somewhat" less reliable than proper solder, despite its environmental friendliness. And if that's what it is, good luck to the hapless tech who goes in there looking for it - most lead free joints look "dry"!