Re: Itunes 7.6.2 Error -50(Vista)
It's probably blocking the port that iTunes uses to connect. I think my Spanish teacher at school had this problem (he downloaded Spanish songs for us to translate), though I'm not sure of the port that needs to be forwarded.
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1629 says iTMS uses 80 and 443, so you could ask your dad to go into the settings and forward those, and hope he obliges.
There are some other ports on that page that list "iTunes Radio Streams" which could be the podcasts you're talking about, but I'm not sure.