You can find them at the Cooperativa di Cortina, a marvelous gear and food store in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy.
When I was there this Summer, every single time I went to check out, I was shortchanged one Euro. No matter how obvious I made it that I was counting the change.
They must make good money on an hourly wage shortchanging all the tourists there.
It didn’t seem to matter what checkout clerk I went to, the theft was storewide.
I’ll email management.
Just happened upon this old post in my archive:
I assume that happened back when Bluehost.com was unable to protect me from those vandals. The current host, WordPress.com, is never hacked.
There’s a brilliantly tongue in cheek article on Vagabondish laying out the reasons why:
Step One: Get Crazy Cheap Airplanes!
Step Two: Staff Almost No One
Step Three: Don’t Waste Money Training Aforementioned Staff
Step Four: Punish Passengers for Bringing Luggage
Step Five: Distract the Passengers In-flight
Step Six: Arrive on Time So Nobody Can Say Otherwise (and Mum’s the Word!)
Vagabondish – A Tribute to RyanAir: Decoding the Perfect Business Plan
If you want more, get the book Ruinair by Paul Kiduff.
My first and last flight on this airline was a comic experience.
RyanAir does not provide those small luggage tags … but still requires your name and address on luggage. I was forced to write my name on my pack in ink.
Some of the airports they use have no other commercial airlines. And almost no services.
Worst of all, you must print your own bording pass before getting to a RyanAir flight. If you forget, that will be a 40 Pound ($64.37) surcharge!
It’s the only airline that actually weighs your one allowed carryon. Maximum weight 10kg (22 pounds).
Their biggest competitor in Europe is EasyJet, not perfect, but far better than RuinAir.
The best discount airline I know is WestJet in Canada.
The company that hosts GymnasticsCoaching.com is down.
That company is Bluehost.
Hundreds of thousands of sites they host. Even their own site.
… How are they going to blame it on me this time?
This is the first seat sale I’ve seen for Iceland since I started tracking those flights months ago. I guess the “high season” finally ends October 1st.
To Reykjavík from: Berlin, Copenhagen, London Gatwick, London Stansted and Warsaw.
Prices from: €69, £55, … one-way including taxes and fees.
When to buy: Open for sale from 14 CET (that’s 1pm UK time) until midnight tonight, Monday 21 September.
When to fly: From 1 October to 10 December 2009.
That’s with Iceland Express, the supposedly low cost airline.
I like Iceland Express better than full service Iceland Air, a company that treated me, a potential customer, very badly over the past few months.
Leo Laporte:
At least the trains run on time.
Leo Laporte was elected President of the Internet.
Certainly our President should either be Leo or Tom Merritt. The are the two BIG PICTURE internet experts I admire most.
Both Leo and Tom … and everyone else I follow on the WWW agree that Apple IS the new Evil Empire.
Apple is riding high right now. But when the Empire falls, as it inevitably does, management will look back to this era with some regret. Now is the time to be making friends and building partnerships, not crushing competition.
I’m still riding the Apple train. None of the others run on time.
… No one is afraid of Microsoft any longer. MS was formerly the Evil Empire for their frequent crushing or buying competitors to maintain as big a monopoly as possible. And for lying bald faced to one and all.
Love it. Love it. Love it.
But only because of the proprietary Apple headphones system added with the 3rd generation.
Click PLAY or watch a review on YouTube.
My only complaint is the 10hr battery life. That’s much shorter than my iTouch used only for audio.
The feature Apple doesn’t explain on their website is this:
• Double-click and hold the center button to fast-forward
• Triple-click and hold the center button to rewind
Essential for audio books and podcasts.
Now, Steve, when can you sell me an iPod with decent wireless headphones?
What a shame.
Edinburgh, Scotland has the most fantastic traditional architecture.
Blighted by this …
see more ugly photos on Skyscraper.com’s Top 10 Ugly Buildings forum thread
It’s difficult to capture with photos just how UGLY this complex appears in context. Who’s idea was it to feature bamboo as an important element?
… From the outset, the building and its construction have proven to be highly controversial. The choices of location, architect, design, and construction company were all criticised by politicians, the media and the Scottish public. Scheduled to open in 2001, it did so in 2004, more than three years late with an estimated final cost of £414m, many times higher than initial estimates of between £10m and £40m. …
It consistently ranks in lists of 10 top ugly buildings and monuments.
It amazes me all the tourist trinket shops in the world can stay in business. Even with an 80% mark-up.
Who buys this crap?
In Europe it’s still mostly Japanese tourists. Rushing from one “famous” tourist attraction to the next. Snapping photos of one another at each. Buying at least one authentic (made in China) souvenir at each bus tour stop.
The only others I’ve seen actually pay for anything in those shops are suspiciously blonde, suspiciously busty, loud American women who like to be seen clambering on and off trains with awkward armloads of shopping bags. As if it’s Christmas Eve.
=== On a completely unrelated topic, I’m shopping for a novelty Scotland t-shirt.
Any recommendations?
… Cell phone users in the U.S., Spain, and Canada pay more for mobile phone service than cell phone users in other parts of the world, according to a survey published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
The OECD surveyed mobile carriers in its 30 member countries. The report showed on average how much consumers spend over the course of a year.
For a consumer subscribing to a medium-use package that provides about 780 voice minutes, 600 short text messages, and eight multimedia messages, the survey found that the monthly price of service ranged from $11 a month for service in the Netherlands to $53 a month for service in the U.S. as of August 2008.
On a yearly basis, American cell phone users are spending about $635.85 on cell phone service. Spanish cell phone users pay about $508.26 for the year. And Canadian cell phone subscribers pay about $500.63. By contrast people in the Netherlands and Finland pay the lowest amount for cell phone service, only $131.44 per year. And cell phone users in Sweden only pay $137.94 per year.
Rick McCharles 