diff --git a/boot.php b/boot.php
index 6d1ea165cb..a17f078bf0 100644
--- a/boot.php
+++ b/boot.php
@@ -416,6 +416,8 @@ function fetch_url($url,$binary = false, &$redirects = 0) {
 	if($binary)
 		curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_BINARYTRANSFER,1);
 
+	$a->set_curl_code(0);
+
 	$s = curl_exec($ch);
 
 	$http_code = intval(curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE));
@@ -474,6 +476,8 @@ function post_url($url,$params, $headers = null, &$redirects = 0) {
 			curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_PROXYUSERPWD, $prxusr);
 	}
 
+	$a->set_curl_code(0);
+
 	$s = curl_exec($ch);
 
 	$http_code = intval(curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE));
diff --git a/include/items.php b/include/items.php
index c5857f7fd3..27cb01f250 100644
--- a/include/items.php
+++ b/include/items.php
@@ -536,7 +536,6 @@ function item_store($arr) {
 	$arr['title']         = ((x($arr,'title'))         ? notags(trim($arr['title']))         : '');
 	$arr['location']      = ((x($arr,'location'))      ? notags(trim($arr['location']))      : '');
 	$arr['coord']         = ((x($arr,'coord'))         ? notags(trim($arr['coord']))         : '');
-	$arr['body']          = ((x($arr,'body'))          ? escape_tags(trim($arr['body']))     : '');
 	$arr['last-child']    = ((x($arr,'last-child'))    ? intval($arr['last-child'])          : 0 );
 	$arr['visible']       = ((x($arr,'visible') !== false) ? intval($arr['visible'])         : 1 );
 	$arr['deleted']       = 0;
@@ -550,6 +549,13 @@ function item_store($arr) {
 	$arr['allow_gid']     = ((x($arr,'allow_gid'))     ? trim($arr['allow_gid'])             : '');
 	$arr['deny_cid']      = ((x($arr,'deny_cid'))      ? trim($arr['deny_cid'])              : '');
 	$arr['deny_gid']      = ((x($arr,'deny_gid'))      ? trim($arr['deny_gid'])              : '');
+	$arr['body']          = ((x($arr,'body'))          ? escape_tags(trim($arr['body']))     : '');
+
+	// The content body has been through a lot of filtering and transport escaping by now. 
+	// We don't want to skip any filters, however a side effect of all this filtering 
+	// is that ampersands will have been double encoded. 
+
+	$arr['body']          = str_replace('&','&',$arr['body']);
 
 
 
@@ -640,6 +646,7 @@ function get_item_contact($item,$contacts) {
 
 function dfrn_deliver($owner,$contact,$atom) {
 
+	$a = get_app();
 
 	if((! strlen($contact['dfrn-id'])) && (! $contact['duplex']) && (! ($owner['page-flags'] == PAGE_COMMUNITY)))
 		return 3;
@@ -657,6 +664,10 @@ function dfrn_deliver($owner,$contact,$atom) {
 
 	$xml = fetch_url($url);
 
+	$curl_stat = $a->get_curl_code();
+	if(! $curl_stat)
+		return(-1); // timed out
+
 	logger('dfrn_deliver: ' . $xml);
 
 	if(! $xml)
@@ -711,8 +722,9 @@ function dfrn_deliver($owner,$contact,$atom) {
 
 	logger('dfrn_deliver: ' . "SENDING: " . print_r($postvars,true) . "\n" . "RECEIVING: " . $xml, LOGGER_DATA);
 
-	if(! strlen($xml))
-		return(-1);
+	$curl_stat = $a->get_curl_code();
+	if((! $curl_stat) || (! strlen($xml)))
+		return(-1); // timed out
 
 	$res = simplexml_load_string($xml);
 
diff --git a/mod/dfrn_notify.php b/mod/dfrn_notify.php
index f0c4f0c643..d7166f6aec 100644
--- a/mod/dfrn_notify.php
+++ b/mod/dfrn_notify.php
@@ -149,6 +149,8 @@ function dfrn_notify_post(&$a) {
 		xml_status(0);
 		// NOTREACHED
 	}	
+	
+	logger('dfrn_notify: feed item count = ' . $feed->get_item_quantity());
 
 	foreach($feed->get_items() as $item) {
 
@@ -223,6 +225,7 @@ function dfrn_notify_post(&$a) {
 
 		if($is_reply) {
 			if($feed->get_item_quantity() == 1) {
+				logger('dfrn_notify: received remote comment');
 				// remote reply to our post. Import and then notify everybody else.
 				$datarray = get_atom_elements($feed,$item);
 				$datarray['type'] = 'remote-comment';
@@ -254,29 +257,27 @@ function dfrn_notify_post(&$a) {
 							intval($posted_id)
 					);
 
-					if($datarray['type'] == 'remote-comment') {
-						$php_path = ((strlen($a->config['php_path'])) ? $a->config['php_path'] : 'php');
+					$php_path = ((strlen($a->config['php_path'])) ? $a->config['php_path'] : 'php');
 
-						proc_close(proc_open("\"$php_path\" \"include/notifier.php\" \"comment-import\" \"$posted_id\" &", 
-							array(),$foo));
+					proc_close(proc_open("\"$php_path\" \"include/notifier.php\" \"comment-import\" \"$posted_id\" &", 
+						array(),$foo));
 
-						if(($importer['notify-flags'] & NOTIFY_COMMENT) && (! $importer['self'])) {
-							require_once('bbcode.php');
-							$from = stripslashes($datarray['author-name']);
-							$tpl = load_view_file('view/cmnt_received_eml.tpl');			
-							$email_tpl = replace_macros($tpl, array(
-								'$sitename' => $a->config['sitename'],
-								'$siteurl' =>  $a->get_baseurl(),
-								'$username' => $importer['username'],
-								'$email' => $importer['email'],
-								'$display' => $a->get_baseurl() . '/display/' . $posted_id, 
-								'$from' => $from,
+					if(($importer['notify-flags'] & NOTIFY_COMMENT) && (! $importer['self'])) {
+						require_once('bbcode.php');
+						$from = stripslashes($datarray['author-name']);
+						$tpl = load_view_file('view/cmnt_received_eml.tpl');			
+						$email_tpl = replace_macros($tpl, array(
+							'$sitename' => $a->config['sitename'],
+							'$siteurl' =>  $a->get_baseurl(),
+							'$username' => $importer['username'],
+							'$email' => $importer['email'],
+							'$display' => $a->get_baseurl() . '/display/' . $posted_id, 
+							'$from' => $from,
 							'$body' => strip_tags(bbcode(stripslashes($datarray['body'])))
-							));
+						));
 	
-							$res = mail($importer['email'], $from . t(" commented on your item at ") . $a->config['sitename'],
-								$email_tpl,t("From: Administrator@") . $a->get_hostname() );
-						}
+						$res = mail($importer['email'], $from . t(" commented on your item at ") . $a->config['sitename'],
+							$email_tpl,t("From: Administrator@") . $a->get_hostname() );
 					}
 				}
 				xml_status(0);