Thanks for the replies...

it was the webhost blocking outgoing connections, I knew it! I'm so annoyed.
Looks like I was talking to a junior member of support who was guessing all sorts.
An expert took over and told me it was a server problem blocking outgoing connections (what a surprise)which is being resolved.

For info, the error message I got was

500 Can't connect to somedomain:80 (connect: No route to host)

so imagine how I felt when the junior told me I had my outgoing connection blocked due to terms and conditions abuse (incorrect)!!
Anyway, I'm talking to someone who knows what they're doing now...

In reply to Re^2: LWP::UserAgent Mystery by Anonymous Monk
in thread LWP::UserAgent Mystery by Anonymous Monk

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.