h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Won't you please come home Bran!? You, Wazungu and Walter are missed and I'm going to have to send the internet police out to hunt you down if you don't come back soon.

Sal

Hi Sal!!
I have just reactivated and shall be back in touch as soon as I work out what has happened to the rest of my page.

That was a long pause in the conversation wasn't it?!

Great to hear from you
Cheerio
Bran

Hey Bran! So glad you're back. It certainly was a long pause. It's just like old times here. This is my third attempt to leave a message for you. H2g2 is as slow and prone to falling over as ever. Quite nostalgic really.

Are you well? Any news? I'm ok. We have a foot and mouth epidemic here that's out of control. Our government is telling us it's not an epidemic and it's all under control. No doubt I'll bore everyone to death with it soon enough. I'll let you off for the moment because I want to post this before the site crashes again.

Speak to you soon.
Sal x (if that's not too forward from one who's missed her friends)

Dear Sal

Well ... I have been well, albeit very busy, with teaching in a summer course and then working like a maniac on The Tome, which is progressing quite well. It just keeps getting bigger and bigger so that what I thought might be a 70,000 word project is now looking more like it will be 100,000 by the time I am done! Still, I am enjoying it greatly and am getting somewhere, so that is good (currently at 65,000).

I did a four day bush-walk to a place called Frenchman's Cap, which is a quartzite mountain that is just magnificent. It was hard-going but well worth it. If I was not fit at the beginning, I was at the end! This was basically my summer holiday, as I did not have any time for anything else.

My article has come out on the e-journal (did I mention this?). If you would like to have a look at it (it is pretty specific and a bit inane), this is the link:

[URL removed by moderator]

Just follow the link to the article in the name of my alias Martin Grimmer.

Glad to hear from you, and no it is not forward! I seem to have lost all my forum links. Where are we, and Waz and Walter (who I can't raise on normal email), going to continue our chats? Any suggestions for a posting place?

All the best
Bran XX
(See, not forward at all!)

Hi Bran

You just caught me on my way out. I was going to have a break from h2g2 until they've sorted themselves out. As you will see, I can't go and read your article because the moderators have removed the url you posted. This is happening all over the place. It's worse than that though. I've had a couple of completely inoffensive messages removed from 2 different conversations and those conversations stopped dead when that happened. I had thought the moderators had gone insane but vegiman, left a message over at yahoo (I'd put the url in so you could come and check it out, but there's no point as the moderators will remove it straight away) to say anyone can click the turquoise buttons dotted about at the end of threads, and the message will be removed. This is too much. I don't know whether the moderators will tell you which particular infantile brat clicked the button so you can confront them but my messages have been missing a couple of days now and no word of explanation or reply to my questions has been forthcoming.

I don't know if they'll bleep this out, but my email address is [email protected] if you want to keep in touch or send me that url so I can read your article. You can also find the address on my home page. It won't be difficult to find because I've removed the rest of my introduction.

Anyway, I hope it'll all be back to normal in a few weeks and in the meantime perhaps I'll get some work done.

Speak to you later.
Sal x

Hi Sal

I too am appalled at what seems to be happening to the site. This is not why I got into it. I think I'll take your advice and give it a rest for a few weeks and see if some sense re-emerges. Thanks for the email address. I'll contact you there.

Best wishes
Bran

Bran, I bring you an update. Vegiman was mistaken about the those buttons. They just alert a moderator who decides whether to hide a message or not. My stolen messages have reappeared. I've been told why the first one was plucked out: I mentioned what Nick Brown, our Agriculture Minister said about the foot and mouth outbreak. I was told I quoted someone in the other message too, but I didn't. So I still don't know why that message was pulled.

Anyway, I'm back but only posting short messages until I know what the moderators are up to. I hope it'll start to make some sort of logical sense before too very much longer.

Still no sign of Wazungu or Walter. Have you still heard nothing from Walter?

Sal

Hi Sal

I have just sent you an email, so you should have that by the time you read this post ... no news to add in the last 20 minutes. No sign of Walter - I think he is either away, lost his job, changed email address, or is ignoring me! (I suspect the first of these option). I have lost all my old fora links, so don't have one for Waz ... I'll try to find her, but she just may not have checked back in yet.

Take care
Bran