Thursday, 21 August 2014

My Vacation in the "Soo" - Part C - by Anne Shier (a.k.a. "Annie")

August 17 – 25, 2014

Tuesday August 19, 2014 – Day 3 &
Wednesday August 20, 2014 – Day 4:

Today, I called the front desk at my hotel and asked them if I could extend my vacation to next Monday August 25th.  They said that was fine and asked me to provide my credit card again so that they could re-swipe it and charge me for the additional three nights.  So, I have now paid for all eight nights here already and that will make my checkout very fast and easy next Monday morning.

Today (Wednesday), I am going to call the Greyhound bus terminal to ask them how much my one-way fare back to Toronto is.  I had already paid for my full bus fare (as an advance purchase), but now that the date of my return has changed, I’ll probably have to buy another ticket, unless by some miracle, they can just change the date of my current ticket.  I’m also hoping to get the seniors’ discount because I am now 62 making me eligible for it, I believe.

First, I looked on the Greyhound web site and it told me that I could pay for my new ticket by phone using my credit card and then pick up my ticket the day I want to travel home.  However, it seemed like a much better idea to me to just take a cab over to the bus terminal this morning and pay for my new ticket in person.  That way, I would be able to board the bus next Monday morning right away and not have to worry about standing in line to get my ticket first.  After all, there could be a lineup for tickets and I do not want to take the chance of not being able to get a seat on that bus.

So, now I have my new ticket, which cost me $84.30, instead of the full price of $124.30, which means I got the seniors’ discount – thank God!  Also, there is a good possibility that I will get a partial refund of my old ticket.  To get the refund, I had to mail the old ticket into the Greyhound corporate head office today and they should be able to refund me about $74.00, I think - at least, that’s the amount I would want back.

I was also hoping to be able to get one of my prescriptions re-filled at the Station Mall Drug Mart store here in the “Soo”, due to the fact that I was unexpectedly running low on it.  They first had to call my Shoppers Drug Mart store in Ajax to confirm that I have an existing prescription there and then they were able to fill it right away for me – thank God!

Finally, I had to purchase a new backpack for the journey home.  The original one that I’d brought with me is pretty much garbage now and should not be re-used.  The price I paid at Sears was about $48.00 – a little pricey for me – but, it was a discounted price, so I was still ahead of the game in this respect.  One more thing to be thankful for today!

I started preparing several postcards to advertise my second book in the United States in a different way.  I’ve never used these postcards before in this way.  They were part of my original marketing kit from Authorhouse and I finally figured out a good way to use them for marketing purposes.  I just hope that the Barnes and Noble book store owners start noticing my book this year, or as soon as possible.  This time, I am aiming for book store owners that I have not yet approached before.

I’ve been watching several of my favourite full-length feature DVD movies – ones that I haven’t seen in quite a while.  For example, I’ve seen “Black Widow”, “Employee of the Month”, “The American President”, “Green Card”, and “Fatal Attraction”, so far.  I brought enough DVD movies to watch for the entire nine days, which is a good thing considering I was only going to stay in the “Soo” for six days in total.


Hopefully, tomorrow and/or the weekend days are going to be better, weather-wise.  It’s been kind of rainy and cloudy out this week – not very sunny.  However, if it’s sunnier tomorrow, I am going to spend more time out on the boardwalk again; that’s a really nice place to be when the sun is out.

copyright 2014, Anne Shier.  All rights reserved.

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