Cashing In

[kevin_standlee]

Today I remembered to cash in for the Worldcon trip.



This is roughly €30 and £25 left over from previous European trips. I've been keeping this in a lock box upstairs and remembered to go retrieve it today on account of I'll have a chance to spend it again.

We would also have had around kr5,000 (worth about $40), but on our return from Iceland after the Helsinki Worldcon, we figured we'd be unlikely to be in Iceland again and converted it back to USD, despite the conversion charges, except for a bit of small change like a kr1 coin with a fish on it as a keepsake for Kuma Bear. I wish I'd known at the time that we'd decide to make another stopover in Reykjavik. After our first trip, we thought we'd had our fill of the city, but we decided that a few more days (this time we hope at a more comfortable hotel) might be nice. It would be even nicer if IHG ever managed to crack the Icelandic market.

Around 1:30 this afternoon I logged out of my work computer and am now officially on vacation until Labor Day. I walked over this afternoon and got a trim on my hair (and my eyebrows, which were starting to droop and foul my eyelashes!). Packing starts tonight and runs through Sunday. I'm trying to squeeze as much clothing as I can into airtight bags to make the most of my luggage space. It will be a challenge. I'm seriously considering paying the roughly $200 in excess luggage fees (round trip) to bring one extra bag between Lisa and me. We'll figure it out before we leave for Millbrae on Sunday.

Comments

[were_gopher]

Is that the new polymer £10?

[kevin_standlee]

No, the £5 is a polymer note, but the £10 is the older type.

[were_gopher]

You'll need to ask a Uk friend to swap it then. The paper notes were withdrawn from circulation last spring.

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/polymer-10-pound-note

[kevin_standlee]

Ouch! Well, the web site says they can be exchanged at a post office as well. Thanks for the heads-up.

[delosharriman]

At this point I wonder if it's optimism to assume that anybody in Belfast will be accepting Bank of England notes in another two weeks…

[kevin_standlee]

Well, I'd expect them to be doing so until the end of October, but after that all bets are off, I think.

[delosharriman]

If you upgrade to a higher class of accommodation, an additional bag may be included. So if you were planning to do that anyway, you should count the extra bag fee against the cost.

[kevin_standlee]

The problem here is that you don't know whether you'll get the upgrade until a couple of days before the flight. For example, our bid to update SFO-KEF was accepted, so we'll be in Saga class that far, but we still don't know whether we'll get the upgrade KEF-DUB, or for the two segments DUB-KEF and KEF-SFO coming back. In fact, due to our three-night stopover on the return, we won't know whether we're upgraded on the last leg until after we get to Iceland.

Lisa has decided that, as convenient as it would be to be able to carry more things, it's offset by the hassle of shepherding all of those bags. We've done it before, but pulling a train of 4-5 pieces of luggage (literally; Lisa tied them together) gets tricky at times.

[delosharriman]

I hadn't thought about the multiple-leg problem, as I somehow managed to get cheap nonstops for this trip. You're right about the hassle, but I don't have much choice this time around, as I need to bring my display materials.