So which broadband provider should I / we go with? My uneasy feeling that I ought to know this kind of thing is somewhat masked by the fact that my brain has turned to porridge over the last month or so, for various reasons.

Meanwhile, I've been procrastinating by reading through the extremely random collection of tomes on the bookshelf in the room where I am sleeping (not yet 'my' room, though I'm working on that). So far, O.Henry's 'The Four Million' (1906) is superb, G.K.Chesterton's 'Wisdom of Father Brown' (no idea of year, thirties maybe) has some horrendously passages of unspeakably dated racism of a sort to make your hair spontaneously combust, in between the otherwise fine detective tales, and the 'My Funniest Story' collection from 1935 turns out, sadly, to be somewhat patchy in terms of the 'funny' quotient. Iris Vorel's 'Be Your Own Astrologer', however, (1941) is refreshingly free of 1960's New Agey claptrap, although the fact that she lists playing jazz an example of poorly aspected creativity has been amusing me no end. Oh, and Uri Geller's 1986 book 'The Geller Effect' was oddly inspiring in places and just plain odd in other places. I failed to bend any spoons after reading it, though. Probably no bad thing.

As for my grandmother herself, she is doing as well as can be expected for a woman who has just lost her husband after 57 years of happy marriage and now finds herself living with her nogoodnik 33-year old grandson who smokes like a chimney and keeps unusual hours. In fact, despite her diminutive size, she is a veritable tower of strength as far as I or anyone can tell; she has been a lifelong believer in the power of positive thinking, and the slightly bizarre truth of the matter is that if anyone has been caught moping round the house being miserable lately it's me, not her. I taught her to play 'Go' the other day, which she seemed to take to alarmingly quickly.

So. Anyway. Broadband providers, UK. I haven't a clue. Please to advise.