Greetings and apologies

NEW YEAR GREETINGS TO EVERYBODY!

We start off the New Year in traditional style, with a cold, on My Good Lady's part, and with me being frustrated by the ever more complicated business of Information Technology. MGL's colds, of course, are as seasonally traditional as turkey, so nothing new there. But it means that I'm in charge of dinner today, and for my first culinary effort I do us a Hampton Pie - a thing using leftover gammon and topped with mashed spuds. I serve it simply, with some Heinz baked beans. Very tasty it is, too, and quite filling, and on the whole, in these credit crunch days, fairly cheap.

I must also offer readers my apology for not have posted any blogs - or anything else for that matter - for nearly two weeks, but this was due to circumstances beyond my control. We initiated the process of changing Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in the run up to Christmas, and of course the change-over took place bang on the Eve of the festivities. Unfortunately, the old router was dedicated to the old ISP and simply would have no truck with the new one, so there we were, left high and dry, cut off from the cyber world. A dismal experience it proved to be, too, without a voice, without a window, without radio even...

Yesterday I finally managed to locate the young genius who tends to our computing needs. He came along with a whole new bag of tricks for us to play with, some of which I'm only just beginning to explore. Anyhow, both our machines are up and running - it seems they can communicate with one another wirelessly, chatter boxes that they are. Needless to say, though, I feel as if I'm back in the dunce's class at school, trying to figure out how this bit of kit fits in with that bit. It's always the same, as soon as I begin to half-understand it all, they go and change it and I'm back to square one. C'est la guerre!