About to get busy, again.

I really haven't spent much time at my own house in Calgary this past month. The next couple of weeks will not be an exception either, I'm preparing for a 10 day trip that will occupy all of my 10 available days of work.

I just returned from Vancouver where I was able to spend my 5 days off. Love the coast. I wish to return one day, but alas, the jobs just aren't as plentiful as they are out here. I did have a meeting with a YVR based corporate/charter company to learn more about them and to enquire about possible employment. I had a great meeting, but got the answer I was expecting, they were looking for a bit more experience, something that I could return back to them within a couple of years. However, at that point I could be pretty high on the totem pole at my current company with an early jet command, which is something I will not find anywhere else at my current experience level. So it appears I'll stick around for a little bit further and see where this road takes me.

My 5 days off started early in the morning on Thursday. 4am early! The flight was on our turboprop aircraft flying empty for an early morning pick up in YVR. I got approved to travel on the flight and was even able to bring some precious cargo (a 42" HDTV) for Ian. It fit quite nicely strapped into the back of the airplane. I should have taken a picture. My time in YVR was great, meeting up with friends, attending a couple of house warmings, just relaxing and breathing in that great sea level fresh air. I feel healthier just being on the coast. Westjet returned me home last night, and I was lucky enough to fly on a brand new 737-800 LR (Long Range) which boasts even more legroom than Westjet's normal fleet and an added bonus was the relatively empty airplane (less than half the seats occupied). Another interesting tidbit from this flight was that after checking in the night prior online, I was offered to use an "electronic boarding pass" or an E-BP. I read the little blurb online and thought, what the heck, a little less paper is always good. So it sends a message to my blackberry and is essentially an email with all of my pertinent information (name, confirmation #, seat #, flight #, gate # etc etc). I have to wonder though, anyone could create one of these and walk through security without actually having to be on a flight. At any rate, this new option worked great, until one flaw became quite apparent. As everyone was lined up at the gate to board the airplane, everyone with their boarding pass and photo ID all prepared, the line was moving very fast, until it was my turn. The agent has to take the extra time to punch in my reservation # into the computer and manually check it, instead of just scanning the barcode that was printed on everyone else's boarding passes. This caused the very free flowing line to come to a screeching halt, I'm sure a few people looked up and wondering what the hell I was doing. Will this stop me from doing it in the future, well....... probably not, haha, It's just too easy, I'll take the extra 30 seconds at the gate versus fiddling with a check in machine/kiosk for 3 mins. Time is money!

Speaking of money, just dropped a little coin today on my eyes. Had an eye exam so I could order a new set of contacts. My work health plan, don't ask me why, does not include vision, so I'm forced to pay fully out of pocket. So, $114 for an exam, and $160 for a 6 month supply of contacts later and here I am, just that much poorer.

Also, my winter tire fiasco. I got an email saying that my tires which should have been delivered by now from 1010tires.com, have been delayed coming from the manufacturer, and the only information they have is that they'll be delivered to them sometime in November. So I will have to come to a decision in the near future whether to just keep the order open for now or to totally abandon it and pick a different winter tire solution. Just irks the hell out of me, seeing as how I'd found this great deal. It has already snowed twice here in Calgary (just quick evening flurries, mostly gone by morning), so I haven't been really messed up yet with my summer tires. However, it is getting too close to take any more gambles and I'll spend the time tomorrow removing my summers and swapping on my all season rim/tires. I still do want to get a winter tire put on those rims in replace of the all season tires because I had a couple of close calls last winter in regards to stopping on a snowy/icey road and I don't wish to gamble again this year. If I haven't heard of any updates from 1010tires by the 10th of November I will likely end up going with a different set of tires. Perhaps the Kuhmo KW17 or the Hankook W300 Ice Bear, both similar but cheaper variants of the Yokohama AVS 901 Winters which I have currently on order. The nice thing with the Yokohama tires is that they also provide good dry weather performance and I don't have to worry about burning off a really soft winter tire compound when the roads dry up. Calgary is known for little bits of winter, but a lot of the time the roads are bare and dry, so I would like a tire that also performs half decent on the dry as opposed to just a fully dedicated winter tire.

Ok, and finally to address the title of the post, my upcoming busy schedule. Looks like a full 10 days, not a crazy amount of flying, but a full 10 days away from home. I'll start off by laying over in Penticton from Thursday to Sunday, then straight out to Toronto for a couple of days. A local flight around Toronto early the next week and then a flight down into Detroit and then all the way over to Fresno California, only to come back the very next day. At the end of all that I will be on day 9, and then likely commercially fly home from Ontario on day number 10.

So, we'll see how much of that actually sticks.