That's outrageous! At whom am I now going to vent my spleen (speaking metaphorically).

To be serious, thanks for the apology but it would be more acceptable had it not been ordered by your father but instead, had been born of true contrition on your part.

Hi Colm,

Can I suggest the Chinese gear sellers posting on here in the past couple of days? They are well worthy of all the spleen you can vent.

In my view, the guy apologised,  I was learning at 15 - I'm still trying to now.

Yes AL, you are right, sometimes even pensioners like myself need "guidance" with regard to the temperance of the language we use in our discussions with others and the need is even greater with those of tender years and inexperience.

I did, like you, accept the apology but pointed out that it would have been better had it been unprompted which is a fair enough point to make to someone of less mature years... guidance for the future do you see? As for the venting of my spleen remark, it was obviously (I thought) humorous.

Have a go at spammers? Are you joking? That really would be an exercise in futility, I'd rather do what I have done in that case, report them then put them on ignore.

I did, like you, accept the apology but pointed out that it would have been better had it been unprompted which is a fair enough point to make to someone of less mature years... guidance for the future do you see? As for the venting of my spleen remark, it was obviously (I thought) humorous.

Fair points Colm, and well made.

I should have put a smiley by my suggestion that you vent spleen at the spammers - I did realise your question was humurous.

Isn't the ingnore button a wonderful idea (although in some cases it has lead to me trying to piece together even more than usually incoherent threads!)