Even better, have them type in the menu to whatever they use to create their PDF (presumably they do actually print menus to give to diners :-) but then turn that input into HTML and put it on the web.

In any case, WTF do restaurants insist on publishing their menus as poxy goddessawful PDFs anyway? This is just pandering to the designer's pitiful little ego. If you want me to come dine, give me something I can READ, damn you.

It started off similarly in Ireland: local-call dialup in cities, nothing anywhere else (although universities had leased lines). The then-recently-denationalised-former-state-monopoly telco was completely pig-ignorant about data, but eventually offered dialup and then DSL. Finally they started to see the light, and the cable TV companies found they could carry an Internet service, and it started to take off — in the cities (no such thing as rural dialup). Now I have 200Mb from my cableco, but if I lived out in the deep countryside, I would have dialup only, probably long-distance to the nearest city, as the landlines can't carry much else of a signal (and many of them are still party lines), and there's mostly no data cellphone service, so no dongles. The government keeps spouting motherhood statements about rural and island connectivity, but it's patchy and poor.

Wasn't that either. It comes as a shock to many N Americans to realise that SkyMall catalogs, like the Hammacher-Schlemmer catalog and others, are only available in N America. I, like many visitors, would gaze in amusement on domestic flights at the variety of unbelievable tat (and the occasional jewel) that was only available to N Americans.

There are plenty of suck^H^H^H^Hpotential customers in other countries too, but neither SkyMall nor any of its suppliers are aware of this, so (a) those markets go untapped, and (b) SkyMall dies.

So long, assholes.

The one on my desk you may have only when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers.

Everyone's talking about DR saying that a server has mysteriously gone offline or some disk has gotten corrupted and we need to restore to the last known backup point.

No-one seems to be thinking of a real disaster: 50' tidal surge, earthquake, or a fire destroying the entire IT setup.

Backups? Onto what, pray?
Use the cloud? There is no connectivity here.
Rig some borrowed PCs? Powered by what, exactly?

Unless you have a duplicate datacenter a long way away from your personal Ground Zero, no amount of drill on earth is going to prepare you for a real disaster. You'll be too busy shooting the guys who have come to take your food and fuel.

Yep, sounds like Republicans to me. And Democrats. "Government" in the US means "government by the rich for the rich".

One of the problems is that there are two right-wing parties and no left wing at all. When Republicans froth at the mouth about socialism or communism they haven't a clue about what really is; they just think it's the same thing as government control, forgetting that their governments have been just as controlling as the other incompetents'.

Where the GOP went wrong was in getting into bed with the pro-lifer, fundamentalist, flat-earth, =3, bible-thumping loonies, who are further to the right than Hitler. They need to ditch those associations — a better choice would even have been the libertarians, who despite their own looney ideas on state control are far closer to the original Republican ideal or liberty than Oral Roberts or the Waco flakoes.

Bollocks.

The goblet connector on my blender sheared. I could have gone out and bought a replacement blender for €150. Instead I ordered a part online for €9.50 which arrived two days later and took ten minutes to fit. If the motor had failed, I would probably have bought a new blender (of a different make).

The skill is in knowing when it is worth fixing and when it is better to replace. That's the skill which is being lost. Actually doing the fix is usually relatively straightforward.