Personal preference is PCTools Firewall, nothing gets past unless you tell it to    I am sure though there must be quite a few other free ones that others would recommend as well, but so far this one blocks EA effectively.

oooh great stuff! 

So far works brilliantly except for the 1am crashing to desktop bit.

ETA:  I enabled AwesomeStory and now it continues happily after 0:59am.

I use the 50% flavour and that feels like a good speed, not super fast but fast enough to see results. 

haha you are not kidding on the length of time taken to clear rubble, mine was an absolute new creation and I actually managed to go make a quick cup of coffee and when I came back she was still at it.