graham’s blog

More bad weather

This is another one of those weather posts but it does emphasize the lack of any notable news here in Geneva. It has been rather wet these past two weeks and every time I leave home to go to work - or leave work to go home I have to see if it is raining enough to get out my umbrella.

Paradoxically I’m a Great Britain (slight pun intended) and always pack my umbrella but use it as little as possible. My jacket has a hood and I prefer using that to using an umbrella that i have to keep on my knees and avoid getting anything else wet during public transport.

Here is a tip I learnt from my Dad. Always carry a plastic bag with you and put the wet umbrella into it during transport. When you get home, or at work, dry the umbrella conventionally and turn the plastic bag inside out to dry for the next run.

Brrr!

We thought Spring was just around the corner but the cold weather is back with a vengeance and a freezing wind has been chilling me at the bus stop these past few mornings. The thermometer has lost almost 10 degrees celsius and both scarf and gloves are necessary.

The wind was whipping up a storm in the garden too and we have had to redress pots and recover umbrellas on the lawn.

Luckily the forecast is for warmer weather this weekend. (Icy) Fingers crossed.

Geneva Roundup

 The main story of these past few days is that following on from a surprising popular vote just over a week ago, our local government - who is also my employer - has passed a law banning smoking in the vast majority of public spaces from the 1st of July this year.

I don’t think I mentioned the results of the vote but more than 55% of the population voted and almost 80% approving banning smoking in public spaces.

The government’s buildings are smoke-free since the 2nd of January this year and the general ban on smoking enters into force in the same year. It’s almost too good to be true.

I’m an intolerant ex-smoker and smoked almost two packs a day before giving up 25 years ago. I’m looking forward to going into restaurants and bars that were previously too smoke-filled for me.

I’m very pleased.

Two other pieces of news :

• The Geneva Motor Show will start in a few days time and Geneva will live the effervescence of the event as usual. Don’t plan to visit over the next ten days as the hotels are all booked up.
• Geneva will be recycling some of Naples waste (180,000 tonnes of it) in our incineration plants.

Pleasant Tea-Rooms

This is a local post in my series of nice places to visit. Yesterday I had a meeting with colleagues in the building where I used to work until the Spring of last year. It is in a district of Geneva called “Grand-Pré” which itself is next door to “La Servette”.

We had afternoon tea in a small tearoom with charming hostesses that are eager to speak and practice their English. The Tearoom is spotlessly clean and comfortable with a good choice of sweets and savouries and a flat screen entertainment device. It is also 100% non-smoking which is great.

Here in Geneva we are called to vote on an initiative to ban smoking in all public premises on the 24th of this month. I really hope that my fellow voters will vote yes and that our government will apply the new laws required as swiftly as possible.

As a side result of this however, smokers will be obliged to smoke outdoors. Here in Geneva the terraces are open from March to October and it might well be that smokers will be out on the terraces and non-smokers will have to enter the establishments in order to be smoke-free. Let’s hope for high winds! 

Incidentally the Tea-Room is called “Au Pt’ Creux” which is a phonetical rendering of a quaint French expression meaning that you are not really hungry but are in need of a snack. (A small hole or indentation to fill)

Yes I do want to make a difference!

One of my Twitter friends mentioned that he has signed up for Earth Hour 2008. I think that’s a great idea so I’ve signed up too. As it is in 60 day’s time it might not make it big here in Geneva but you never know…

Memorable evening

Last night my wife and I went to a Roland Petit Gala evening with all ticket sales going to a local charity (Clair Bois)[fr].

We were treated to an evening with excerpts of pas de deux and solistes of many of Roland Petits greatest Ballets including “Pink Floyd Ballet”, “Proust ou les Intermittentes” and “Le pas de deux - Esmeralda Quasimodo from Notre Dame de Paris”.

We were totally enchanted by the dancers and amazed when Roland Petit himself appeared on stage at the end of the evening.

Roland Petit and Zizi Jeanmaire have lived in Geneva for many years. In fact many celebrities from stage, screen and sports live here too. I think a lot of this has to do with being able to live their lives peacefully without the media attention that they suffer elsewhere.

Apple Premium Reseller Blues

I don’t want to start a personal vendetta but I’m extremely disappointed with one of our local Mac stores here in Geneva. For this reason I won’t divulge the name.

Those following me on twitter know that I’ve been looking into solutions for speech transcription software professionally and have ordered and obtained several copies of Dragon Naturally Speaking Mobile and ascertained that it can’t (without a lot of training) cope with my somewhat pronounced English accent when speaking French. Those who know me also know what I mean. It’s been quoted as being cute, even charming but it’s too thick for Dragon.

I did have a lot of success with speaking English though, even from a dictating machine (Philips) and recognition was well over 95%.

Unfortunately it wasn’t working too well here on my iMac at home using Parallels. I couldn’t figure out whether it was the headset (a Logitech USB) or other problems.

I decided to make a visit to a local Reseller and decided on a specialist rather than just a chain store that sells Macs.

I waited in line and then asked about headsets with microphones and was promptly recommended one of only two headsets they had in store. It is precisely the Logitech headset I am trying to use. Either I made a really good choice, which I doubt, or they don’t know what headsets are really adapted to transcription against those that are better suited to Skyping or IM. Either way I must admit that the choice of USB headsets is very limited in the stores I visited.

Moving on I asked about CD and DVD burning software for OSX as I have several large FLAC files with corresponding .cue files enabling them to be burnt onto CD thus reproducing the original CD. It used to be my favourite way of archiving CDs while retaining a lossless format. I haven’t yet found a Mac app that will read the cue file and burn the CD.

You may not believe this but neither of the two shop assistants had heard of FLAC files and had absolutely no idea of what I was talking about!!!

Sometimes I wonder why I ask for advice in stores. A lot of the time I have more knowledge than those that I am asking.

I won’t be going back to that store again. I’ll just muddle on or contact support I guess.

The Bliss

J’ai découvert “The Bliss” en 2001 et j’ai passé une excellente soirée dans une salle à Carouge à les écouter live. Leur premier disque fait parti des disques dans ma collection, signés par les artistes. Plutôt qu’un longue discours vous pouvez écouter un morceau de leur dernier disque et écouter davantage sur leur site.

I came across “The Bliss” on the web in mid-2001 and had a really great email exchange with them over a short period of time. I was also lucky to have seen them in concert in the basement of a restaurant here in Geneva (Carouge) just after the WTC tragedy. I lost track of them shortly afterwards but their music lives on in my collection and serves to remind me of that great concert.

I googled them today and discovered that they are still making music and have two new disks so I have ordered them and written asking if they will be playing locally soon. If so I’m definately going to the concert and hopefully taking a few pics. Hopefully you will be able to listen to them here if the embedded player works.

Garden hardware dance

New video today. I wanted to try out some time based filming. The camera really shows it’s limitations and we have a surprise visit by my wife’s feet but all in all it was pleasant experience. I think I’ll try again using photos.

Vintage car

Vintage car Originally uploaded by JustGraham.

My wife and I went out on a photo expedition this morning. Its a public holiday, as it’s Swiss National Day, so was a good opportunity to get out and about.

Of course we went to have a coffee at a local Boulangerie - Tea-room and leaving I caught site of this car. I have no idea what it is as I’m not really a car person.

You can see the other photos that I’ve uploaded by following the link.