Still living the 56k dial up modem lifestyle. Be quicker to connect to the interweb by carrier pigeon. It's like waiting for a ZX Spectrum game to load. I had Broadband from BT for years and never had a problem so I can't knock the service from that point of view but try and relocate that service without being forced to scream abuse at call centre drones... 2 weeks now and we are still 7 days away from getting the damn thing set up. Anyway... The big news is that I don't work at Foyles anymore. I still had a couple of weeks notice to serve out but things came to a head earlier than I thought they would, which was a shame. I'll pop back in early next week and tidy up a few loose ends and say hello and stuff. Any mail I get about the store I'll still answer or redirect as I see fit. This move has freed up a lot of time obviously - it means I can fast forward the house stuff and get this place in order. I can also hang out with people more. Seeing Dais tomorrow and then off out of London to hang with her and UK Dave on Tuesday. I just found out that Aidan from TRIBE is going to be here this week too. It also means I have more freedom with the NaNoWriMo novel. I am about 3000 words in so far (half on the PC and half in notebooks) but nothing I'm happy with. I'm hoping to have a coherent beginning ready to put online by Wednesday... The travel plans have taken another leap forward too. Now that our new friend Nicolette has confirmed her travel plans we are free to get our tickets. We will spend tomorrow organising the details and book the flights on Monday. Nic gets here on December 9th to flat sit and look after Merry. We will hang for a few days and get her settled before we set off for NYC around the 14th. We'll get back in the UK around the first week in March 2004. We have a rough idea of the trip outline but I'll post it up once we have it confirmed. Still waiting for the new laptop too. It is being custom built as we speak and should arrive around the time we have broadband again... Until then the posts here will be a little infrequent. Drop me an email if you want to hook up before we leave for the New World.