Ski Season is Open! Who Knew?

Paradise Found?
I was reading PlanetSki while passing the time before the first pitch of Thursday Evening's Giants vs Padres game. The headline caught my eye: "First Resort in the Alps Opens" It turns out that there's some hairs being split in order to claim "First"...to say nothing of the parsing of the word "Open"...

The article reminds the reader that Switzerland's "Zermatt boasts of being open 365 days a year and only closes when the weather closes in." Over in France, "Tignes has just closed for summer skiing but re-opens within the next two weeks."

The resort opening Friday is Slöden, high in Austria's Tyrol and is the site of the first World Cup Ski Race each Fall. This year the FIS racers wax 'em up for October 22nd-24th. Friday, just four of Solden's 34 lifts will open for skiing 9:30AM to 3:30PM.

I noticed yesterday @borealmtn was tweeting temp and snowmaking hopes. He said they want to fire up their snowmaking guns in September. On KCRA3's Noon News Thursday, the weathergal said the weather in Sacramento was more like late October than early September.

You can count on Boreal to open no later than Halloween every year...even if they open for just Halloween. I suspect that given enough nights with snowmaking temps, and a forecast for continued cold, Boreal might find themselves with Halloween competition this Fall...that would be a first, that strangely would be right in line with all the weather strangeness we've been living with all year.

September Baseball
Well, the San Francisco Giants got off to a fine start against the San Diego Padres down in SoCal. The first Giant up to bat got a triple...and scored before the 1st inning was over.

In the 3rd inning, the Giants extended their lead to 3-1. That's about the time I noticed a swarm of tweets citing a plane crash beneath the San Francisco Airport's flight path. Intrigued, I clicked the TV to KPIX5 between innings.

It was a scene out of Dante's Inferno. In fact it wasn't a downed aircraft, it was a ruptured 24 inch High Pressure Natural Gas Line that may have been "nicked" by a backhoe digging on a waterline project. The resulting explosion and fire storm made for riveting television that held my gaze so I missed a couple of more Giants Home Runs.


The Giants prevailed 7-3 and I'm still watching the San Bruno Fire coverage as the clock strikes midnight. The explosion happened at 6:15PM...I started tuning in about 7:30PM. PG&E got the Gas Main shut off by about 8PM. The firestorm ended when the fuel was shut off. There's still fires throughout the neighborhood. These are small individual gas lines in burned out homes that are safer to let burn until daylight.

The News is reporting 53 homes destroyed, and another 120 damaged. I just saw footage of the blast crater. it fills a whole intersection. 50 feet across, easy. What a mess. Three reported fatalities, and the very American scene of civilians pouring into evacuation centers carrying bottled water, blankets, toilet paper, snacks, pizzas, and stuffed animals to donate to displaced residents. Volunteers outnumber victims by 4:1. Pulling together...it's what we do.

The scene at first light is going to be stunning. I'll be up for a while tonight.

Raining All Over

Well...technically not all over...widely scattered is more to the point. There is some rain in the North State. Wednesday evening I heard from Chico Dupre: "Storm burst! The real deal in Chico just now. A true deluge of biblical proportions introduced by an enormous thunderclap. Un-freaking believable."

Sister Sweetly called out her rain and wind in Humboldt County. KCRA3's 11 O'clock News talked about the rain in the Big Valley and over the Foothills and the Sierra.

Here in the Inland Valley, it seemed like it wanted to start raining any minute...all day long.

Reno's ABC Afilliate, KOLO8 streams their 11 O'clock News, and they were talking about the cold, blustery conditions. I tuned in too late to hear their weathercast, so I didn't actually gaze upon their radar images.

Reno's AFD calls a snow level of 7500ft, but adds there's not enough moisture to make actual precipitation once the temps drop after the front passes.

I looked at the webcams just before sundown. Lots of clouds and fog, but no actual rain or snow.

They say that's all for a while. Good!

I hope it doesn't snow at the Reno Air Races next week! I've been going since 1982, and I've only seen it snow once...flurries really, it was freakin' cold that year...the approaching squall line actually pushed events ahead of schedule! That was the only time I've ever seen the events run ahead of schedule!

SturgeUrge and I talked about getting a Trout Fishing Trip in, combined with the Air Races. Could be epic...will be fun. Weather permitting...

Another Round of Red Flag Warnings

I was minding my own business Labor Day when this showed up in @CorduroyPlanet's Twitter Feed. The Reno newspaper's story of the Reno NWS issuing Red Flag Fire Warnings for Tuesday afternoon, noon to 8PM.

A quick look at Reno's AFD assured me that there's no lightning forecast to accompany the approaching Winter-Style Low that triggered the warnings. Serious winds over the Sierra Front combined with the very dry air pulled the Red Flag tripwire. Humidity will recover with the passing of the front.

The SFO/Monterey AFD cited the Winter-Style front too. All across the West it's a winter-Style pattern this week with temperatures dropping some 20°F overnight. Some precipitation will fall, though the NWS isn't talking deluge.

It seems like every interest I enjoy is caught by this Summer's cool regime. I've been seeing lots of Green Tomato stories and recipes on the Food and Garden Blogs I read. Early Snow news from across the Northern Hemisphere, a record cold Winter in South America, and chilly SSTs around the world. Even the waters around the Tip of Baja are running cool this year.

I found the weather to be absolutely Autumnal Tuesday. Crisp was the adjective that best described my world. I finished another part of the Diggins' irrigation...without much sweat.

Next week I'll be at the Reno National Championship Air Races. That's the weekend that I traditionally see the Autumnal Light for the first time near the end of every Summer. It's my undeniable marker that Fall is at hand, and Winter is coming on fast. I start thinking about venturing my educated guess on what kind of Winter we're in for.

There's no telling this year. The only discernible weather trend this year has been cooling. In the 21st Century that means Snowmaking will be a "GO for Throttle Up" November 1st. This probably means chairlifts will turn before Thanksgiving, though I'd venture that my Mountain will open Friday, Saturday, and Sunday only until Thanksgiving Weekend.

I'm not looking forward to that. Opening early on Man-Made Snow is very expensive, and there's no more fickle clients than early season skiers and boarders. The Brass from the Front Office are likely to have hair triggers when cash is flowing out of our accounts faster than it's flowing in. As with the larger economy, I suspect that the cash will be sitting on the sidelines until there's good conditions to play in. These are the times when working the Graveyard Shift is a Godsend.

Around The World in 70 Centimeters

I spent a lazy evening after a hard day of fishing on San Francisco Bay. SturgeUrge and I returned to the Richmond Marina where we'd encountered the Finn Gold Club last week. Saturday was our last shot for the season to catch a King Salmon, and the forecast and the tides were in our favor.

I checked the local buoys online at 0700 and the data said Normal...the forecast, Normal. We're all systems GO.

I unpacked my digital camera from my tackle bag and the waterproof Pelican Case so I could capture a picture of the top of the boat ramp follies with a minimum of muss and fuss. Saturday was the final day of racing the Finn Class sailboats. The World Champion would be decided on San Francisco Bay Saturday afternoon.

To my dual delight and disappointment, there was no forest of Finn Dollies cluttering the ramp (and making a great photo op) We launched the boat, deployed the coffee and cheese danish, and motored out onto the Bay.

It was a glorious day on San Francisco Bay even though the Salmon didn't come out to play...or the Halibut. Still the wind was moderate, the tides favorable, and the overcast burned off around noon, revealing a glorious day. We couldn't see the Finns contesting the Gold Cup, but we were treated to a picturesque Club Race featuring forty or more 20-something foot long sloops sailing downwind with their colorful spinnakers full.

When we returned to the Marina, there was little sign of the Finns themselves. The Gold Cup World Champion had been decided about two hours before we returned to the ramp to recover the boat.

There was a new class of clutter jamming up the works now...all the Regatta Support Boats were pulling out of the water after spending the week afloat. Judges' and Referees' Boats, Tenders, all manor of Zodaics, Boston Whalers, RIB Inflatables, Antique Yachts and Yacht Club Flagships were tied up at the ramp's docks, sitting on trailers all over the tiny bit of unused parking at the top of the ramp, getting washed down, power washed, and secured for towing...all by men seemingly oblivious to everyone else around them.

SturgeUrge backed the tow rig down "our lane" of the ramp, and I floated the boat onto the trailer. As we were pulling the boat up the ramp on our way to the Washdown Station, Urge said: "Watch me run over a $1000 Finn Mast"..."Umm, I replied, that's probably a bag with five $1000 masts in it!"

The Mast Bag was laying across the lane between the ramp and the Washdown Station...the "Main Drag"! As we drove by the bag, the fellow washing his boat (not at the Washdown Station) kinda glared at us for driving so close to "his" mast bag...

We made quick work of unloading the boat, washing the rods and reels, the boat and the trailer, as we chatted up the guy doing the same in the other washdown lane. We flushed the outboard while we ran the carburetors out of fuel mix. When we were done, I strode back towards the ramp to change into my shorts in one of the dozen or so PortaPotties set up for the event. That's when I watched GlaringBoatWashing Guy pull away and out of the Marina...the Mast Bag was still laying there, obviously not his! Still begging to be run over...right in the middle of the whole show...

Once we got the boat parked in it's spot at the SturgeUrge Compound, we unloaded the tow rig and KirkVallus sauntered in, back from a reunion get together downtown. We had a Dark&Stormy Cocktail on the deck, and caught up for a half an hour.

Back at the Ancestral Digs, my Sister K was in town and was holding dinner until I arrived. We enjoyed gnocchi and converstion, and we all turned in early.

Sunday morning I woke up and brewed a pot of French Roast, and realized I hadn't blogged for Sunday publication. I looked around the internet for some "Wrap Up The Week" items.

I'd been wondering since I heard a radio news tease about the 7.1 Earthquake in New Zealand...did the quake cause any avalanches on New Zealand's Ski Slopes? New Zeasland Ski Reasorts have been on my radar since their season started this summer and I saw a news story of a lift tower failing under huge deposits of rime ice. I wrote about the event here.

So I looked at PlanetSki online (we PlanetWhatevers stick together) and yes...12 avalanches, no reported damage, and no injuries...the temblor occurred when most Kiwis were still in bed.

While reading the NZ Avalanche story, I saw another story citing  70cm of snowfall in the Alps. My handy online Unit Converter says: 70 centimeter = 27.559055118 inches, so for my American Readers...27 1/2 inches of snow fell in the Alps...more "Early Snow"

I'm seeing lots of "Early Snow" stories this summer...that's right, it's still summertime.

On the Atlantic Hurricane Front, there's a lot of Post-Earl hub-bub over the lack of "performance" by Hurricane Earl. Resort operators across the Eastern Seaboard's Hurricane Earl Watch & Warning Areas are pretty upset with the National Hurricane Center's forecasts, and they're plenty angry with the 24/7 Cable News Channels for hyping the hurricane to the degree that the Holiday Weekend Travel Bonanza was denied the tourism sector who, at worst suffered a few hours of heavy rain while their customers were scared off by the media's over the top hurricane hype.

Ongoing hurricane coverage is the ratings motherlode for the Cable News outfits during the otherwise slow Dog Days...hurricanes mean lot's of viewers checking in over and over again...with the Fifth Anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the All-Time Summer CableNews Blockbuster at hand, there were plenty of high hopes for a repeat performance of the off that charts ratings bonanza.

I can feel their pain, High Sierra Ski Resorts often suffer at the hands of overzealous weather and news outlets over-hyping the weekend forecast. At My Mountain we stand to lose a quarter million dollars a day when Holiday Crowds avoid the mountains at the behest of an overheated forecast teased all week long heading into a holiday weekend. When the "difficult mountain travel for the Holiday" doesn't materialize, it costs us...big time. All things being equal, Ski Resorts tally all their profits on Holiday Weekends, and the Christmas Holidays...period, bottom line. To paraphrase the late Senator from Illinois, Everett Dirkson...a quarter million here, a quarter million there...pretty soon you're talking Real Money!

Gadget Gripes

Yesterday gadget lust...today gadget grumbles. I do love the iPod...it's the iTunes Software that gives me fits!

Back in February, I finally got my new laptop. The old one was just past six years old and counting. I was holding my breath for the last six months there...I even ponied up the $55/yr for Carbonite the online backup service. I had too much irreplaceable stuff on the Hard Drive to lose.

The new Dell laptop is a wonder, as is the Windows 7 operating system. This machine is so fast, so powerful, it's almost impossible to slow it down.

It was just a coincidence that Apple released their latest iTunes Update just as I finished unboxing the Dell. After I downloaded the new printer drivers, I downloaded and installed Apple's latest and greatest...

...and that's when my grumbles began. I won't go into the long blow-by-blow. Bottom line? iTunes 9.0.3 crashed my iPod Touch, period. I couldn't download to iTunes either. I couldn't synch the iPod to my computer...I couldn't do anything, except search for a work-around. Unfortunately, I then installed the thing on my old laptop with the same outcome! Fortunately, I could keep the Touch in service by manually downloading my podcasts every night via my WiFi Network, when I got up to get ready for work. So, instead of having iTunes handle all my content gathering automatically, I would spend a half an hour or so every evening getting enough podcasts together to listen to at work later that night.

I look at the iPod exactly the same way I look at all the tools I employ. If a tool does the job, and helps me do my job, I'm on it. A tool that makes work for me? Nope, I've got a job...I'm not spending any of my hard-earned cash to buy another job!

Back to my story...I dutifully performed the podcatching task every evening all the way to the end of the season. Once I was "at liberty", I went to war with my body clock to reset it to the "daytime awake/nightime asleep" setting. Once I won the reset war, I focused once again on ironing out the iTunes problem, and some other tech dilemmas...some from the move to the new laptop, some with other new high tech gadgets.

Now at leisure, I was free to do my research into my troubles. I spent a few days looking through Apple's Support Forums, where users with iTunes troubles help each other online. I found a website posted to the Apple Support Forums that offers older versions of iTunes for free download. (iTunes from Apple is free) Thanks to a How-To posted on the forum, I was able to uninstall all the myriad Apple programs that loaded in the background when I installed iTunes, download and install the older version, and finally, synch the iPod to my old laptop. All in all it's 8 hours of my life that I'd like back! I even blogged about it!

I've got the old iTunes working on my old laptop...I'm waiting 'till the bugs are eradicated from iTunes 10 before I install it on the new machine.

I will start getting my 8 hours back once ski season begins again...I'm thinking I'll be banking 25-35 minutes every worknight. I should be even by the end of this coming season.

OK...there's a couple of new software products from Apple that I'm coveting today...When Apple released the new iPhone4, they also debuted the latest operating system software, iOS4 for download. iOS4 will run on my Gen3 iPod Touch. I'm hot to get the newest iTunes software running on my new laptop, as well.

So, having learned my lesson back in February, I went straight to Apple's Support Forums when iOS4 came out, so I could avoid making more work for myself.

Sure enough, the new OS was giving upgraders fits worse than the iTunes 9.0.3 debacle that ensnared me in February! It's three months since the release of iOS4, and I'm still on the fence, though there's hope. Wednesday, Apple updated to iOS4.1, and it looks like most of the bugs have been addressed...I've moved on to the new iTunes 10 circus...There's still trouble in Paradise apparently...I'll give it a look after Daylight Savings Time ends this fall.

By then, the torches and pitchforks should be back in the shed, and the natives will be rested up...not restless. I'm guessing that by then, iTunes 10.1 will be available. 10.1 could be the solution I'm dreaming of...

Gadget Guru?

Well, Apple's done it to me again. Yesterday Jobs and Co. showed off their revamped line of iPods, their new iTunes, now featuring "Ping" musical social networking, and their updated video/internet streaming box, AppleTV.

Typical...I grabbed my iPod touch back on Black Friday 2009.  I wrote about my search for internet in my Groomer last fall. after considerable research and soothsaying, I chose the iPod Touch because it was the best handheld solution for my needs, hands down...until yesterday...

Apple's added a new, more beautiful touchscreen, iOS4 multitasking, a faster processor from the new iPhone4, a built in microphone and finally, a pair of cameras. A 3 megapixel still camera on the back, and a frontside videocam for video chat. Like Steve Jobs says: "It's an iPhone without the phone" The microphone makes it a phone, as long as you're within range of a WiFi Access Point and have a Skype Account!

Prices went up about 10%

It looks like my ideal handheld device...damnit!

FaceTime the iPod Touch Video Chat App

You may remember the last Apple Big Show back in June. The iPhone4 was introduced to wide acclaim. Tech junkies lined up around the block at every Apple Store in the country to get the new device. It was another fairly large step forward, and almost as if on cue, AT&T's cell phone data networks groaned under the strain of all the newbies surfing the net everywhere. (In America, the iPhone is still exclusive to AT&T's cell network) Within weeks, major carriers announced the end of their "All You Can Eat" Data Plans, and the coming of Tiered Data Service. I was a little troubled, I hadn't forseen the end of "Unlimited" Data Plans...in fact, I was waiting for aggressive bundling to drive pricing down before I took the Smartphone leap.

All the furor over data plan billing quickly took a backseat to widespread reports of iPhone4 antenna design problems that threatened to take the shine off the apple...so to speak, and the whole wireless sector faded away from the spotlight.

Never out of the limelight for long, Apple's Jobs, debuted the new music and media gadgets in time for Holiday Shopping Season again, Wednesday.

Not to be outdone, Verizon announced Thursday that they will offer Pre-Paid Data Plans on all their Smartphones starting in late September, including an "Unlimited Plan" at $30/month on top of your voice plan, and a 25Mb plan for $10/month. Back in November, I decided to wait on a Smartphone, and go with the iPod Touch. I opined that the price of the Data Plans would come to me. Nine months later, I'm looking like a swami...or semi-swami.

As with all things tech, there are tradeoffs to consider. Smartphones cost an arm and a leg. You can spread the misery a little when you sign on to a Data Plan. Buy a rich enough Voice/Data Package, and the carrier will "subsidise" your new phone, usually knocking about $300 off.

The Pre-Paid Data Plans don't subsidise your phone, so you pay full pop, or buy a used device...perhaps you've noticed, I'm the King of waiting out a bargain!

So, I'll still be biding my time...the newest whiz-bang tech will come to me in time...and at my price.

Privacy On the Slopes?

I'm sorry, Dave...

I'm taking a break from working in the Diggins to watch the Noon News. I multitask, so I took a look at my Twitter feed. KFBK, Sacramento's blowtorch AM News/Talk Station has a story that I find a little disturbing. 

Now, I do love me some gadgets, and I do play Social Networks online, but I draw the line at these Position Reporting Apps. I know it's not as fun, but just leave the front door wide open when you're out and about, or out of the country on vacation, or even out for some first tracks on a Powder Day. Give the burglars a leg up and broadcast your security vulnerabilities without bogging down your handheld devices!

I listened to the report (it's available at the link), skiers can have the tracking info sent to their Facebook page, or Tweet it to their Twitter Followers. The data is posted to the App's website in real time. When did "Look at me!" become the leading motivator in our society? I think this is just vanity wrapped in unrealistic desires to "be famous"...must we all live on stage at Andy Warhol's 15 Minute Theater? I wonder how many kids on the net even give any thought to their privacy, let alone their physical security!

Now, I may be dating myself, or worse...outing myself as a grownup teenaged SciFi Nerd, but I read enough sci fi novels set in the dystopian future where your every move is watched, cataloged, and entered into Big Brother's mighty all-seeing computer network database, to know that avoiding that possible future is one of my Prime Directives.

That being said, I'm not a bookish paranoid who sees Stanley Kubrick's evil HAL9000 hiding behind every potted ficus, but given any chance to play into the clutches of the nebulous "Evil Overlords" as feared by basement-dwelling Boomerang 30-Somethings, I don't plan on buying in...ever.

I certainly am not a humorless scold, but I do understand the Slippery Slope Theory, and it's way more than just a theory. It's bad enough that our government has mandated that all our cell phones be "GPS Enabled". This little bit of tech makes it possible to track the cell phone user to be tracked in real time, ala the Will Smith movie, "Enemy of the State".

We can't opt out of these regulations our bureaucrats have enacted "for our protection" but we can opt not to fly mothlike into the flame of these privacy killing Apps.

I for one don't want to be famous...even for all of "my" 15 minutes. I want to be left alone to live my life freely, and without notoriety...call me Al Nonamus. Someone more interesting and attractive is welcome to have my 15 minutes...I don't plan on using 'em.

Mr DeVille, find someone else for my closeup!