Gone to Seed

With Halloween behind us, our Jack-o-Lantern's days are numbered. However, as is our practice, we give him an extended career serving the local wildlife.

( Seedy Character )

From our past experience, the birds and chipmunks will be very happy with this latest development. As I'll be away, I won't get to see it, but Lisa will keep me updated.

Geeting Back in the Travelling Groove

It has been a bit over two years (August 2019, post-Dublin 2019) since I last traveled by air. What few overnight trips we've made since then have been by car, which allows us a certain sloppiness in packing. Tomorrow morning I fly from Reno to Montreal (via Denver). Today I packed for the trip and drove to the SureStay Hotel at Reno Airport. And by "at" I mean that if I had taken their parking package (which costs the same as the airport's long-term parking), I could have walked to the terminal, and walked a shorter distance than I have inside other airports, such as O'Hare, for example. Just to confirm it, after checking in, I walked over to the terminal. Walking back, as it happens, the hotel's shuttle was leaving at the same time I left the terminal. Because the shuttle has to take a more circuitous road than the walking path, I got back to the hotel about the same time as the shuttle.

Anyway, back to packing. There are many things that I take on trips by air that I had difficulty finding. One of them I'd resigned myself to not having until I just happened to realize that it was sitting on a shelf right next to my work desk. I just didn't realize it because it didn't look right.

( Watch That Dust )

Similarly, I had to figure out how to pack everything I wanted to take with me. For Day Jobbe reasons, I have to bring three computers with me including my personal one. It's a good thing they are all relatively lightweight. Nevertheless, my backpack, filled with computers, power supplies, cables, and sundry whatnot, weighs about two-thirds the weight of my fully-packed luggage. I expect it will take me a long time to go through Terrorization, what with having to take out all of those computers and then put everything back together again.

I should be able to fly, however. My COVID-19 test results came back negative, and thus I was able to complete my ArriveCAN information to tell the Canadian authorities everything they wanted to know. I have the information on my computer, my phone, and printed on paper, so that should be okay. But after I write this message, I need to sign in to United's web site, as they want me to provide them the same things I provided to ArriveCAN.

I'm staying at the airport hotel for two reasons. The first is that my flight is at 5:30 AM tomorrow morning, so it seemed like a good idea to stay close and minimize travel time that morning. The second is that moving into the first hotel room usually smokes out what I've forgotten. That proved to be the case here, and I'll have to pop back to the house in a little while to collect the one thing I left behind that I'm pretty sure I'll need in Montreal: my jacket!

Unfortunately, that means less sleep tonight, but it's better than only remembering my jacket when I get off the plane in Montreal.