What goes up................

I'm home! I thought I might have to sleep at the airport last night, but I managed to get home. It was very late, and I'll nap later today. Wait for that story!

The day started with the daily geocache; although I knew there was an Adventure Lab at the airport, what if I forget? Someone has posted a geocache at many of the hotels in the area, and they are quick and easy to find. 

My geocache of the day

So all was good in that area, and I had to take the car to get breakfast as it was raining. Very welcome rain, so I didn't mind. But I got a chuckle out of my car parking the night before. 

Remember I said that I parked indoors. Well, not exactly. Yes -- there was SOME underground parking, but I was on the cusp! So half the car was wet, and half was not. 

My "indoor" parking

Toronto has moose - Winnipeg has polar bears. I spotted a couple of them but only got one picture. But they are decorated depending on their location to match their surroundings. This was a Canadian-named hotel, so having maple leaves all over it made sense. 

Decorated polar bear

Then when I got back to the hotel, it was time to repack the sample suitcase. I had crammed stuff in the night before and needed to organize it. The rain had momentarily stopped by this time, so I did it in the parking lot. 

Packing the sample suitcase

It is interesting to look at some of your stuff in the daylight! Those "white" squares are not all white! Some of them are a definite cream, but not visible in the lighting in my house. But I'm OK with that -- it reads as white. 

What happened to those "whites?"

And while I was standing there, I heard a rattling noise and looked around to see an empty can rolling around the parking lot. It was bizarre because the can rolled right up to my feet, and it wasn't going in my direction when I spotted it! A message in a can?

A message in a can?

We had a full house for the serger class, and the ladies had a great time making their serger bag and learning about the PFAFF Amber Air 7000 and the Husqvarna Viking Admire Air S600. Both are the air threading sergers with cover stitch, and well, I would NOT be without mine. They are beautiful sergers, and you can do much with them! And I have a ton of samples that I want to make!

Serger class

And Brenda and Margot are with me at the end of the day. It was so much fun to spend time with them and get to meet new people as well. Some of the attendees were part of a huge family. How huge is huge? They were 19 siblings in that family. Yikes! 

Brenda, me, and Margo

Then it was off to the airport, which took a bit of time as there was construction on one of the bridges. But I arrived, quickly got rid of the rental car, and checked my bag, which did NOT get weighed even though I was careful to keep it just under 50 lbs. The suitcase got plopped onto a giant conveyor belt, and I assumed it was in the system. WRONG! 

When they asked for people to gate check their luggage, I was asked if I had a checked bag. YES, but apparently, it was NOT activated in the system, whatever that means, so it got activated, and both bags arrived home. It didn't take long for the luggage to come out when I arrived in Toronto. 

I spotted this chocolate store, but I didn't buy anything. I was bad and ate jelly beans that were sitting in the store, so I did NOT need any more sugar. 

Chocolate store at the airport

And yes, the plane was late! But only by 25 minutes, so that was OK. As I was waiting at the gate, I had to chuckle. Each crew member is an individual person -- well, of course, they are, but they are just peons in a system and most likely get "randomly" chosen for these flights. The captain arrived and was waiting, and then the first officer arrived, and they didn't know each other, yet they were a "team" flying the plane. It just seemed weird to me that two strangers would get together to get us home!

Here's a view of smoky Winnipeg after we took off. It was very hazy, but guess what? There were NO talkers on the plane! I almost died! 

Winnipeg from the air - the airport is on the right

So it was a quick flight as I could nap on the plane. I usually put the map on the screen, and I think there was a problem as it showed us flying from Vancouver to Winnipeg, not Winnipeg to Toronto. 

OH -- we are flying away from Winnipeg, not TO Winnipeg

Oh -- I forgot to tell you my escalator story. So I arrived at the departure level of Winnipeg airport after dropping the car off. Oh boy -- where are the escalators to take me upstairs. Found them! Now I probably should have gone to the elevator - remember, I had a 50 lb suitcase, a carry-on bag, and a backpack. But no -- I can easily do the escalator - I've done it before. 

I'm about 3/4 of the way up, and I took my hand off my carry-on, which I thought was entirely on a step. It was not. So it fell backward and proceeded to slide down the entire escalator!! HELP! I couldn't leave the other big bag as it was teetering, so I watched as it kept sliding down. Thankfully a man was at the bottom and grabbed my suitcase, and since he was also on his way up, he brought it up. THANK YOU!

So I arrived in Toronto, got my luggage, and headed to the Uber pickup, which requires going down an escalator. I've done it many times, so I wasn't worried. I got to the bottom with no events and opened the Uber app to find this. 

Price gouging!

That's price GOUGING if I ever saw it. A ride that is usually $40 was over $100! There was no way I was bowing to that pressure, so I was off to find a taxi. Guess what? The taxis are one level up! So there I was at the escalator once again with all my luggage. I asked where the taxis were because I couldn't spot them. It appears that I'm not good at reading signs at the airport. 

As I trundled off to the taxi stand, I rechecked the app. OH -- the prices have gone back down again. So I hit ORDER and took my bags back down the escalator. Only to have the app not work, I got a message that the prices were higher due to high demand, and I couldn't get the low fare. CRAP! So back up the escalator with my bags to find the taxi. 

Before I got to the taxi, I spotted the limos. I asked the price, which was $20 more than the normal Uber price, so I grabbed the limo and was off without further ado. 

So even though the plane arrived at midnight, I arrived home at 1:30 AM, and I live very close to the airport. Let's say I got my workout in for the day by pushing and pulling that luggage up and down the escalators for an hour! 

It was great to be away, but it's even better to be home! I'm not sure what's on the agenda for today, but I definitely will need a nap and get myself organized for the weekend. I have FIVE Zoom sessions, and then it's also the Virtual Retreat. 

Here are the links for that:

Saturday evening (June 24) starts at 6 PM

Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89254233911?pwd=VGQrTnFybW1HMWpleHA4M2Q2NGVwZz09 Meeting ID: 892 5423 3911 Passcode: 982797

Sunday (June 25) starts at NOON

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86119598156?pwd=ZDFxcElxS0NmeTRjczdSR2FXd3N2Zz09

Meeting ID: 861 1959 8156
Passcode: 053861

On that note, I'm off to make a pair of girls very happy!

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!!!