After reading the below comments I was going to stretch this out a bit, it’s just too much fun, but given that Simon got it I’d be being unfair…

“Confused divot lacks Kiki?”

Kiki Dee is a singer (most famous for her work with Elton John). As Simon surmised, ‘confused divot’ indicates an anagram, and ‘divot’ lacking ‘dee’ is ‘ivot’. Which rearranges as…

A TiVo! A refurbished model from Tivoland, since new models can’t be had for love nor money (and I’ve tried both). I ordered it last week but didn’t say anything as it was a surprise for Mum and Dad, who had previously agreed to go halves with me. I have, as you may have guessed, spent much of today playing, hence the toy comment.

I don’t know what ‘refurbished’ means, exactly, but it’s in excellent condition. All the manuals and cables were supplied, and the unit itself still has the pull-off sheet on the shiny front panel. As our lounge is currently in the midst of being redecorated, I’ve been forced to set it up using the tv in my room, where it will remain for the next couple of weeks. Damn The TiVo needs to dial in to an 0800 number every night to receive updated programme data, and also needs a connection when setting itself up. The supplied phone cable, astonishingly, reaches from the far corner of my bedroom all the way down the stairs and into the plug socket next to the front door. I estimate there to be about 1.5 angstroms in it, mind, and anybody walking through the hall currently has to duck under the taut cable or risk losing a limb.

Setting up the unit was fun, as the Telewest cable box is a bit of a pain. It uses high frequency infra-red codes (or something) so the TiVo needs a special adapter. This has an emitter which you have to tape to the top of the cable box so that it points at the IR receiver, preferably within a centimetre or two. This took a while as I couldn’t figure out where the receiver was I got it working finally, though. After plugging in everything else I ran the ‘guided setup’, which figures out your channels etc. Once this was done I phoned customer services to get it ‘activated’. It won’t download any programme data or allow you to record anything unless activated, which is either £10 / month or £200 for a ‘lifetime subscription’. It takes a good few hours to go through their system, however, so I haven’t had a chance to play with all the fun features yet.