"MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS HAVE INCREASED TO NEAR 75 MPH...120 KM/HR... WITH HIGHER GUSTS. NOEL IS NOW A CATEGORY ONE HURRICANE ON THE SAFFIR/SIMPSON HURRICANE SCALE. HOWEVER...IT IS EXPECTED TO LOSE TROPICAL CHARACTERISTICS WITHIN THE NEXT 24 HOURS. NOEL SHOULD THEN STRENGTHEN AND INCREASE IN SIZE AS AN EXTRATROPICAL CYCLONE. INTERESTS ALONG THE U.S. EAST COAST FROM NORTH CAROLINA NORTHWARD SHOULD CONSULT STATEMENTS ISSUED BY THEIR LOCAL NWS FORECAST OFFICE."

Tropical Storm (and potentially a hurricane) Noel has veered left of its last forcasted track and is now bearing down on Prince Edward Island. This seems to have saved me a drive to Cape Breton.

I've got a digital video camera, a sunroof, and a willing wife. Should be legendary.

The absolute best places for hurricane & weather related information is from the two government agencies that track the weather. In Canada that is Environment Canada in the US it is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Both organizations have weather specific sections to their sites.

• Environment Canada's Weather Office
• NOAA's National Weather Service

Hurricane Specific Links:

• Canadian Hurricane Information
• National Hurricane Center

I'm an extreme weather junkie and this is the kind of thing that really gets me going. It's not a hurricane yet but is forecast to be one.

I'm charging the camera & GPS batteries, prepping the car, and patching up the Goretex.... Check back here for updates.

Little did I know that my Garmin (Vista HCx) can save GPS tracks with the timestamp intact! This is great for geotagging photos, loading timed tracks into Google Earth, etc.. Up until now the only way I knew to do this was to not save my tracks on the GPS and get the 'active log' from the GPS. A clumsy process. Here's a better way:

As far as I can tell this only works for Garmin models with an expansion card (MicroSD)

On your Garmin GPS: Go to the Main Menu -> Tracks -> Setup -> Data Card Setup.

The 'Log track to data card' should be checked. It then will save your track files to .gpx files on the MicroSD card. If you don't have one you should! They are very cheap and well worth it! It is important to note that the tracks don't show up on your saved tracks page. They are just stored on the card.

To get them turn your GPS in a USB mass storage device by going to Main Menu -> Setup -> Interface ->USB Mass storage

Then just plug your GPS and open it like a drive. You'll see a lot of GPX files sitting there waiting for you!

All of the tracks will be in a GPX format which look like this:

<trk>
<name>ACTIVE LOG070216</name>
<trkseg>
<trkpt lat="46.260431" lon="-63.131050">
<ele>31.502</ele>
<time>2007-10-30T10:02:16Z</time>
</trkpt>
</trkseg>
</trk>

The GPX files can then be easily converted to .kmz or .kml files for viewing in Google Earth/Maps.

Enjoy!

New Facebook application idea:
Allow users to indicate whether they are ill or not. Give them the ability to list symptoms and submit a diagnosis if they have one from a doctor.

The application could then provide healthcare providers with abstracted data about disease movement. It could also warn you not to go to a concert because there is a 30 percent chance you'd get the mumps based on current confirmed attendance.

Geocaching is basically a treasure hunt for nerds with GPS devices.

"Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which the participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers (called "geocaches" or "caches") anywhere in the world. A typical cache is a small waterproof container containing a logbook and "treasure," usually toys or trinkets of little value." - Wikipedia article on Geocaching

If you're bored on PEI and have a GPS device there are a few caches to choose from...

While it truly is geeky it's a lot of fun. It will take you to places on PEI you've never seen. Use geocaching.com to get your cache details.

We've been redesigning the silverorange site since 2004. As most service companies know, it's hard to concentrate on your own stuff when you're so busy working for other people.

Today we reached a tipping point. We received an email from a friend who thought our old site was broken due to the lack of news (last post was September 2006). That single email triggered a multi-hour, many-person effort to make what was previously just a concept our live site. We're pleased to say that there is now a new single page, super simple, silverorange site.

We're hoping that our next update will occur before 2011. No promises. Weve also been flirting with the idea of not having a website at all. It would be like that Alanis Morissette song.

My sister’s birthday is in August. I’m not good with remembering dates. I always forget until the last possible moment. It was in this moment that I scrambled to send my sister and E-card. I ended up at Bluemountain.com (who knew they still existed?). In my panic I skimmed through the sign up process, saw a “free one month trial” and shamefully entered my credit card in desperation to get my sister a birthday greeting in time. The small type I didn’t read is in italics:

“Please select your payment method below. You will not be charged during your trial period. If you decide to remain a Member, you will pay just $14.99 for the rest of your 1 year Membership. You may contact us at any time during your free trial to request a cancellation.”

I falsely assumed that to "decide to remain a Member" involved some sort of choice in a month.

A month later… While checking my online banking information I noticed a charge from Bluemountain.com on my statement. I noticed only a few days after the charge went through and immediately went to the website to cancel my membership. It turned out there is no online tool to cancel your membership. You need to call their 1-800 number. So I emailed them :-). I received a form email back stating that they are unable to cancel my membership and that they hope I enjoy the benefits of being a bluemoutain.com member. Not being satisfied I reluctantly called their 1-800 number. While the staff was friendly I received the same line. I was too late to be refunded my membership fee. They did offer to turn off the “auto-renewal” so that I wouldn’t be charged next year.. How kind.

While I do realize that this was in part some of my own stupidity, I still thought something could & should be done. This was a year long membership that I was somewhat tricked into paying for and I had not used during the few days I had actually paid for the service. Surely someone would be able to help me.

I wrote a letter, a real paper one, to the company that owns and runs BlueMountain.com, the American Greetings Company. I explained my situation and asked them to help me out. I received this email from them this morning:

Thank you for contacting BlueMountain.com Customer Support.

Our records indicate that you registered for a free trial membership to BlueMountain.com on 08/13/2007. During your trial period, you were given free access to all of our content and member benefits, and you were free to cancel at any time without being
charged for continued membership.

Since we did not hear from you, you were billed $13.99 on 09/12/2007 for a full year of continued membership. Consequently, your membership is no longer refundable.

We have turned off the auto-renewal feature on your account. Your membership will expire on 08/12/2008.

Until then, I hope that you will take advantage of all of the great features and benefits of BlueMountain.com membership.

To learn more about your membership, please visit:
http://www.bluemountain.com

If you have had difficulty using the site and/or questions about the features, please contact us so that we can help you make the most of it!

Thank you,
Dante D
Your Customer Support Representative
BlueMountain.com

As you can see it’s a form email stating basic facts about my account that I already knew. So they have my 14.99 and are refusing to give it back to me by sending me essentially the same email every time I contact them. Well played American Greeting Company. Well played. Stonewalling tactics at there best.

In my letter I also suggested a few best practices for BlueMountain to follow:

1. Always allow users to be able to cancel a membership using the same medium they used to acquire it. Having to call a 1-800 number to cancel a membership I made on their website is ridiculous and I would wager a money grabbing scheme.
2. Send out a few friendly reminder emails of when your free month is coming to an end. Provide links and instructions to membership tools.
Avoid all of the above by making it opt in and not opt out.
3. Never send a form letter in response to personally written hard copy mailed correspondence from one of your customers.

I’ve sent one last request to have my account canceled and my membership fee returned in full or in part. Hopefully they’ll comply. If not I’ll be sending out greeting cards daily. Maybe I’ll send their customer support some cards :-).

If you’d like to contact Bluemountain.com or the American Greetings Company here is their contact info:

American Greeting Company
One American Road
Cleveland, OH
44144
1-216-889-5000

Has anyone else had issues with BlueMountain or similar experiences with other companies?

Update: After another phone call and the writing of this post they have agreed to give me roughly a 50% refund. That's not bad all things considered. I'm sure they've spent more with customer support than the 7.99 I ended up giving them.

They also let me know that if you have a membership and the "auto-renew" feature is turned on they will refund your renewed membership on the second year. If you call and cancel.