- The difference a degree makes – raining rather snowing in Les Gets
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Geoff’s Twitter Updates for 2008-01-30
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Monthly Archives: January 2008
Sharing the good life….
Just thought I would share with all (8) readers my google reader statistics:-
As you can see I’m averaging about 1500 new posts a working day down to around 600 a day at the weekends. I’ve been reading more consistently here in Les Gets as there seem to be fewer distractions, I can only hack about 5 hours a day riding the slopes
For those interested how I do it.
I use Google reader in List View, set to display updated items only. I then click on All items and then the first item. Using the J key takes you to the next post, K takes you to previous. Using the cursor keys scrolls down any long posts. Pressing S tags the post with a star, Shift S shares the item. To email the post I press e. (Other shortcuts press the ? key when in reader)
I also use Google Notebook which I have set up with pages for my interests. To add content I just highlight the text of interest and then click Clip on the relevant notebook page- this adds the clip and the posts url. Google notebook is in the cloud so I always have it.
The friends shared items works OK for my friends, so Sally sees me in her shared items but I cannot see hers
However I get to see Roberts, Davids, Hughs,Loics and Stowes shared items.
So there we go, George et al do their sudoku I do my google reader stuff. Its a good life here in Les Gets with 5litres of red for 10Euro 
and a season ticket for 199 Euro for us golden oldies.
Geoff’s Twitter Updates for 2008-01-29
- Reading: "Jeremy Zawodny’s blog" (http://tinyurl.com/2kngtp) #
- Reading: "The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard" (http://tinyurl.com/ywzbqt) #
- Good day boarding 4000m descent and 60km total travel. Now to watch more Father Ted with George #
- O2 upgrading my iPhone contract to 600mins and 500 texts per month from mid-march at no extra cost 35quid a month unltd data in UK inc #
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My Local MP in action…
So this is what we pay our MP’s to do:-
David Howarth (Cambridge, Liberal Democrat) Link to this | Hansard source
On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I am having some difficulty understanding how motion No. 1 on today’s Order Paper can be in order. It appears to have been made under Standing Order 15(2)(b), in so far as it is a motion to be moved by a Minister of the Crown
“to the effect that any specified business may be proceeded with at this day’s sitting…until a specified hour”—
namely 10 o’clock. Since motion No. 1 is such a motion, whether it says so or not, it should be taken not now, but at 10 o’clock. However, if it were taken at 10 o’clock, it would have no effect, because it would be too late. Therefore, in my view the motion seems to be out of order.
Taken from the excellent site They Work for You.
Bear on a mountain..
There seems to be some rum goings on here in Les Gets with the lift company and local politics.
One of my favourite lifts, Grande Ourse (Big Bear or Plough constellation), is out of action on Mont Chery.
This two seater chair lift is ideal for both the snowboard park and the only blue run, Ourson, on Mont Chery.
So why is this lift out of action? The official line, at the tourist office, is that as part of an economy drive there is no need for it to be open as there is an adjacent drag lift, Super Chery.
Well any skier/boarder will tell you its a bit of a no brainer which folks would rather use! Especially when the lift companies site shows that of the 49 lifts here in Les Gets only 2 are not open!
So what is the real story? Who knows, but apparently the new owners of the recently restored La Grande Ourse restaurant suspect that it is an attempt to starve them of customers and avoid competition on the mountain.
The restaurants previous owners, The Belvedere restaurant allowed it to be derelict for 15 years. According to the IGN maps it used to be The Ski museum which is now housed in the Belvedere lthough many people I’m sure don’t realise that!
So its British owners with real spirit are battling on , La Grande Ourse has magnificient views over Mont Blanc and according to this review really excellent food. It certainly seemed quite busy yesterday from folks who had contoured around Mont Chery to enjoy the gorgeous hot sunny day.
It will be interesting to see what happens in the local mayoral elections later this year it looks as if one candidate is already into the affairs of the lift company.
I can now see why Loic le Meur emigrated to the USA to set up his new company Seesmic given the lack of support that a small business in Les Gets are getting from local officialdom.
[Update 30 Jan 2008] Lift open today!
[Update 5th Feb] Reply to my complaint from Emmanuelle L’hermite:
Following your complaint dated 25 of January 2008 which reffered to the closing of the Grande Ourse ski lift.
Taking into account the fact that the “Grande Ourse” doubled with the ski-lift of Planeys and the ski-lift of Super, we had decided to open the ski lift only for the February holidays. It was a test to evaluate the relevance of this lift for the possible evolutions of the field (and future investments).
Because of many expressed dissatisfaction (access to the blue run and the snowpark noneasy), we thus decided to open the “Grande Ourse” since January 30.
Thank you for choosing Les Gets.
Geoff’s Twitter Updates for 2008-01-28
- Reading: "Shareaholic – The browser add-on extension to share, bookmark and e-mail web pages quickly" (http://tinyurl.com/33q9lo) #
- Reading: "Web Hot or not?" (http://tinyurl.com/2rld6e) #
- Reading: "Burning our money: Do You Want Fries With That?" (http://tinyurl.com/2o3yyk) #
- DocSearls Blogging is more like watering plants. Ya gotta do it often enough that they don’t die, but not so often that you drown the things #
- Looking at: "omega titanium bikes and custom made titanium frames and cycles" (http://tinyurl.com/2lbj8m) #
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This mornings webfinds
A couple of good sites cropped up in my google reader this morning.
Share a holic
Shareaholic is a firefox extension that makes it easy to see if the website you are on has been social bookmarked eg Digg and more importantly for me makes it easy to twitter to your friends about the site.
Here you can see it installed in my firefox, it adds a green RSS symbol to the address bar.
and produces a twitter like this:-
GeoffJones Reading: “Shareaholic – The browser add-on extension to share, bookmark and e-mail web pages quickly” (http://tinyurl.com/33q9lo) 22 minutes ago from web 
Web hot or not
The other site is webhotornot a bit of fun from Martin Varsavasky
(one of my all time favourite speakers) . its still new so not many sites to rate as yet. I added some of my protégé bloggers , Ellee, Sally, Philip, Felicity so maybe they will pop up later today
And of cause i shared it with shareaholic…
Now its time to hit the slopes in Les Gets, Its so cool having broadband in my apartment here.
Geoff’s Twitter Updates for 2008-01-27
- Brilliant short video here on story of stuff http://www.storyofstuff.com/ or how in USA only 1% of stuff is still with you after 6 months. #
- @emjo He just popped up in my reader Can’t wait to sample your cooking! #
- @gapingvoid Never thought of you as a climber or boulderer Hugh? #
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Geoff’s Twitter Updates for 2008-01-26
- Just signed up to Yabb.com to discover that Euan has been there for 2 months. Not clear to me what it can be used for with Skype #
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Les Gets header
Managed to get around to uploading a new header today . 
George took the photo using my Olympus SP-560UZ camera (A Christmas present from Sally).
I know it looks photoshopped but its the actual image from the camera just resized to 940 pixels wide (from 3264 wide).
The photo was taken on Mont Chery outside the Belvedere Restaurant looking towards Mont Blanc 40Km away. The difference in height is 4810m – 1541m = 3269m!!