Wednesday, May 16, 2007

When all Goes Awry

My trip to Toronto was a string of what I'll call "bloopers" connected by a few wonderful highlights:

Blooper #1: waiting to check in for my flight from Denver to Toronto on Sunday, I heard the man behind me say something about his passport, and a dreadful realization dawned on me: My passport was serenely tucked away in my nightstand drawer in Laramie, a mere 2 and a half hours drive away. I decided to soldier on and see how far I could get -- I managed to get into Canada on my driver's license and charm, and out of it on the same charm and a faxed copy of my passport from Footslogger. Needless to say, I worried about this CONSTANTLY while in Toronto. Sunday night I had to say "Everything will be ok; everything will be ok; everything will be ok" in order to get to sleep.

Highlight #1: Lunch with colleagues from graduate school at Bistro 990, where the omelette was PERFECT and the frites were all that.

Blooper #2: On Monday, I checked out of my hotel room and into my friend Marilyn's (smile). I neglected to listen when the clerk mumbled something about the room; when I took my bag there, I realized that it was a smoking room. Not good! When Marily arrived we had to do some arm-twisting to get a non-smoking room, but . . .

Highlight #2: . . . the new room was not only non-smoking, it had 2 beds instead of 1. Since I'm a loud sleeper (translation -- a bit of snoring, I've been told) this is a good thing.

Blooper #3 [connected to Highlight #1]: I didn't look at the map, and we decided to walk to lunch at Bistro 990. I thought it would take about 10 minutes, but it was actually almost 2 miles and took us over half an hour. We were late, but our friends graciously forgave us. On the plus side, Marilyn and I got an excellent workout.

Highlights #3 and 4: Dinner at The 360 Restaurant in the CN Tower, with former advisor and aforementioned friend Marilyn. Presentation with both colleagues and friends at the International Reading Association; they're so smart and cool, and they make me feel smart and cool by association.

Bottom Line:

Your passport. Don't leave home without it.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Bottom Line #2:

Your ID. Don't leave home without it when you are flying.

I did that two years ago (left it in the back pocket of the jeans I'd worn the night before) and it was MISERABLE. It took pitiful 'ol me ONE HOUR to get through screening (that doesn't count waiting in line FOR the screening). And that was just going. Coming back wasn't AS bad, but there was still a LOT of screening to fuddle through. Ugh.