This is strictly a matter of curiosity, as the problem has gone away without any
action on my part.  For two and a half days, I had extremely limited internet
connectivity... with odd symptoms unlike any problem I've experienced before.
If there's any kind soul out there in POV-Rayland thinking "Aha! I recognize
that", I'd very much appreciate any sharing of insight.

Here's what happened...

I come home from work on Friday to discover that my internet connection, which
is provided via cable modem through a company contracted by my local
municipality, is connecting very slowly to a few sites and timing out with all
the rest.  On the POV-Ray site, for example, I could get the home page, but
"Support" would always time out.  I did the usual restarts and checks, my system
(XP Pro) continuously insisted my network connection was just fine.  "Ping" and
"tracert" tests repeatedly returned normal results.  I spent nearly thirty
minutes on the phone with a support tech who seemed reasonably competent. No
other customers in my area were reporting similar issues.  We tried powering
everything down and up (again), releasing and renewing the IP address as well as
assigning a static IP address.  Nothing changed the connection status. We gave
up and made an appointment for a physical service call.

The situation continued throughout Saturday and Sunday. On Monday morning I
discovered that the connection was gone entirely.  I did yet another standard
power down and up of the cable modem and, lo and behold, POOF! the problem is
gone like nothing was ever wrong.

Does this sound familiar to anyone?  If it happens again, is there something
better to do about it than just wait patiently?  Thanks in advance for all
replies.

Best Regards,
Mike C.

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