OK. I give up. I'm just stupid.

I'm upset - I could cry. I'm not very good with IT, as you'll have realised if you've been reading regularly. Today my visitor counter that I had endless hassle installing has disappeared from my sidebar. The code's in the template, but the counter I was so happy with has gone! I dunno.

So there I was, having given up on hard stuff for today, searching for blogs to do with organic farming, keeping chickens, sutainable development - all that stuff for the happy-ever-after plan, and I found a 'live journal' that I liked, and wanted to link to, so I thought I'd say hi on Meredic's comments page.

Oh no. I don't think so. This outfit have got their members locked in and battened down so hard that I can't get in to leave a comment unless, it appears, I join up and start a journal with them.

This is where I was up to when I thought that I could use the "Anonymous" option, having sprained an ankle on their other hurdles:

'My God - scary OpenID - I just wanted let you know that I LIKE your blog and am going to link to you, but the fun's rather gone out of it now...... don't want a journal and can't work out where to start on OpenID. Don't like anonymous comments but can't work out alternative. If designed as unnatural selection process to intimidate bear of very little brain, IT WORKED!!!!!! Hoooooooowwwwwwwlll!!!!!! '

When, a little later, I tried to post, their bloody spam robot detectors wheeled into action, asking me to confirm that I was human below (uh...yeah..) then rejecting my 'anonymous' comment four times before informing me that "Your IP address (number given) is detected as an open proxy (a common source of spam) so comment access is denied. If you do not believe you're accessing the net through an open proxy, please contact your ISP or this site's tech support to help resolve the problem."

I've already looked at their Help page and there are so many FAQs and so forth that seem entirely for journal holders that - as a poor outsider who just wanted to be friendly - I am completely baffled and demoralised. The well-meaning architects of these cyber-forts should realise that the rogues and sad-hats who hack and spam will always get through anything they throw up; it's only harmless saps like me who can't get through.

Who needs this?