Greetings From Outer Pomgolia

– Patrick – 24/12/96

“Our roving reporter Patrick has been dispatched to the far reaches of the bottom North…”


I am here in blighty though it is more like blight…..Xmas with the kin. It is great to see my family but the UK is YUK. Everything is so expensive here, PC parts in NZ are about 50% of their price here. I came across an ISP that advertises lifetime access for $1000 no ongoing charges….

Motorway driving yesterday, driving on 2 lanes in each direction, pitch dark (at 4pm) pouring rain, doing 130 – 150kph with about 2 car lengths between each vehicle !!! one false move and the show’s over….but the Poms drive so well it is not as scary as doing the same thing in NZ. There is so much traffic here the mind boggles, people too – in every shop there is a queue.

The country is so run down on some levels; 2 million unemployed and all there is to do is shop or watch tv. We have seen the X-Files almost every night so far, it’s always on one channel or another. We watched 53 channels at my oldies place, I saw Terminator in german….Ren and Stimpy in German too.

They have a series of “hard hitting” drink driving ads on tv, it shows a woman with scars on her face talking about her chances of getting married !!!!! Apart from the fact no-one here has heard of NZ let alone having any idea of what happens there, we are well ahead of the pack…the latest series on TV is “3rd Rock From The Sun”… yawn.

Your man in the West…