azazil.net

My apologies for anyone who has been having problems connecting to the site for the last week or so. The ancient copper wire that connects the server to the rest of the world had degraded to the point of uselessness, so that by Thursday my ADSL modem was redialing every couple of hours, and running at only a few percent of capacity even while the connection was up.

On Saturday I logged a line fault with British Telecom. Normally I really hate those annoying IVR menus, that reassure that even though “you are in a queue but your call is important, an operative will take your call shortly. Please hold the line.” Well, BT have it sussed… their message says: “Due to high call volumes, all the lines are busy at the moment. If you would like us to call you back within 45 minutes please enter a contact number on the telephone keypad.” I entered my mobile number, hung up, went about my business, and sure enough about half an hour later they called me back! That’s how it should be done :-)

Yesterday an engineer came and checked the wire as far as the telegraph pole outside, and called to ask if he could have access to the house since the connection was akay up to the pole. Within a couple of minutes we had arranged for him to arrive this morning. He is outside replacing the wire between the pole and the house right now. Hopefully, I will be reconnected within the next half an hour…

Well done BT. Your customer service is fantastic. :-D

70I’ve just got back from a weekend at the Kerrang Download Festival 2004, at Donington Park. It was quite an adventure! I had wanted to take my digital camera, but didn’t want to leave it in my tent, or try to ensure its safety in the mosh-pit. I did manage to take some of those awful low-res phone-cam pics everyone hates so much though…

The bands were playing on Saturday and Sunday, but Steve, some of his mates and I had paid for the £105 tickets for use of the camping facilities for the weekend, and set off on Friday afternoon. We stocked up on beer and easy to prepare food, had a hearty fry up and hit the road at about 2pm. We arrived in the queue for the car park well before 4pm, which was slowed by the organisers charging everyone another £5 for parking! The cheek of it! We trickled along a dirt track for a couple of miles until we reached a field and were directed to park. I was a bit surprised at how far the parking was from the main gate on the other side of the race track, and pretty disgruntled that we had to carry our tents, backpacks, beer and food all the way back to the gate on foot. We joined the back of the queue a little after 4pm.

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