Liam and John left the other day, a pair of very disappointed guests. Disappointed that they had to leave! Liam in particular was bemoaning how much he’d miss the scenery. We had a dusting of snow overnight and the trees this morning looked like they were caked in icing sugar. It’ll all be gone by lunchtime, though.

Next up on the visitor list is the lovely Leah, who must like it here as this will be her second visit! We’ve got some plans for while she’s here so hopefully some more interesting things to tell you about. I may also have a trio of Italians popping over from Torino later in April. Andrea, Allesandro and Sara are trying to sort out a weekend that’s convenient for them all to come over and play in the snow.

I last saw Andrea in August when he gave me an old map to find my way over the peaks of the Park Grand Paradiso as part of my 1000 Mile Walk. Alessandro put me up in Turin for a couple of nights as my feet recovered from the walk from Giuly’s parents’. Giuly herself won’t be able to make a return visit as she’s shoulder-deep in work. A shame as she really enjoyed her last visit.

Wow. That was a lot of links.

Well, workwise here I’m prety busy with a lot to do as the season comes to an end and resorts close. Here in Chamonix we have one more week of guests, and a handful of other resorts close in just over a week as well. I’ll be getting a fair bit of the IT equipment back for a clean down and reconfigure in preparation for storage and next season.

In amongst all that, I’ve got quite a few more tasks. Geek hat on:

• Set up emails for Austria, Switzerland and Italy
• Configure file upload/download accounts for all resorts
• Write documentation for next year’s training on the above
• Set up every resort PC for multiple users/email accounts
• Document all procedures and make them accessible as WordPress posts on the intranet
• Configure backup procedures on the Ubuntu server
• Setup automatic backups on local desktop machines
• Configure spare PCs as hot-swap backups
• Clear out all the rubbish we’ve not used this season and recycle / skip it
• Provide a full inventory of IT stock
• Move accounts data onto the server and secure it
• Write a fax notification routine for the server

And anything else that comes up. Oh, and airport transfers. At least this Sunday will be the last one with the full complement of guest transfers. Theoretically, this means less possibility of screw-ups.

The thing with theories, however, is that they are often disproved…

(Oh, and a quick “hello” to Gerry – thanks for the email and the kind comments!)