I agree with my Mom that this sure feels reminiscent to 8 years ago when I was living in Montreal filling in for a colleague who was on paternity leave. Living in the basement for the next two weeks does have some notable improvements over being 2,200 kms away:
- Meals are delivered to the top of the stairs
- I don't eat alone, using FaceTime to talk to Lola
- No time difference
- All the other comforts of being at home
Traveling during a pandemic was certainly a different experience. Wearing a mask inside airports and airplanes is mildly annoying when your glasses start to fog up or you want to take a drink of water and are wearing headphones that get tangled together with your mask and glasses. Other than this and the odd feeling of being close to people after almost a year of being told to practice social distancing, the flights are the same as before if not a little better (you now get a little care package early in the flight with a disposable mask, small water bottle, hand sani, antiseptic wipes, headphones, pretzels and cookies - perhaps this is why it was almost $1,500 to fly to Montreal and back, both ways through Toronto and taking almost a full work day to travel).
Upon arrival in MB, I thought I would be smart and go to make sure my car would start after being parked at the airport for 4 days in -25*C (and colder) temperatures before getting my checked bag. Note - I don't normally check a bag for a short trip but since we were doing "cold weather testing" I brought my cold weather gear which included my big Sorel boots, multiple gloves and toques, ski pants, etc. In the end, I didn't need these since I appear to be fully accustomed to a MB winter which is much more severe than a southern QC winter.
My car started just fine, to my pleasure. I thought about letting it run while I went back to the terminal to get my bag but wasn't able to lock the car with it running (darn safety features). So, I turned it off.
I went back to the terminal and waiting about 40 mins for my bag to arrive on the carousel. It seemed like everyone on the flight in had multiple bags. According to the bag agent, there were over 200 checked bags on our flight of less than 200 people. Finally with my bag in hand, I went back to my car.
This time, my car was ANGRY. I tried to start it but got multiple failure messages (transmission failure, adaptive cruise control, on and on). After repeated attempts of trying to start the car, I called Roadside Assistance. Not much assistance if you ask me, I spent over 10 mins explaining where the car was located (in the Economy Parking lot at the Winnipeg International Airport, Row D right across from the Courtyard Marriot). I don't know why they needed a street address, CAA would know exactly where to go...
Anyways, after 15 mins on the phone I was put on a waiting list to get the car towed - initially to the Hilton, just down the street to an Electric Vehicle charging station. I said "no, to the dealership please". There was no estimate for how long it would take to get the car towed because of the extreme cold.
Then I texted Lola with an update, she was going to come and pick me up. She had the great idea to bring the EV charger from the garage to see if it would help. Couldn't hurt.
While waiting, I read through online forums but found nothing about how to deal with the issue I was having, or to force the car to start amid the fault messages. Equally, there wasn't anything of use in the Users Manual.
Lola arrived and I grabbed the charger and plugged it in. The charger was giving me some kind of a cryptic fault message - a house with an "X", the charger and then my car. No idea what that meant but I continued to plug it into my car. Then, I tried to start the car again and this time it came to life - thank goodness! I'm not sure what the problem was, could have been a system boot-up issue that was resolved by having the EV battery cycle with the plug being inserted. Either way, I was relieved that Lola had the great idea to bring the charger.
After a couple laps around the parking lot to get the car to warm up (and transmission to shift), I made my way home, stopping at the drive-thru COVID test location to get an initial test as recommended by Shared Health for travelers returning to Manitoba. That was an experience I would not wish on anyone. I had heard stories about the swab going so far up that you feel like it is tickling your brain so I knew it would be uncomfortable. But that wasn't the worst part - the worst is the spinning of the swab to get a good sample. That was unpleasant. There was no line to get in and get tested so after less than 5 mins of entering the parking lot and drive-thru building, I was on my way home.
Lola was ready for me to come home, posting lots of reminders in the entrance as well as creating a countdown for 14 days. It was good to be home.
After disinfecting my things from the trip (which had undergone similar disinfection steps after daily use), it was time for supper which was delivered to the top of the stairs on a tray. I have everything I need to survive two weeks in the basement:
- cutlery and some dishes
- cereal and milk
- and the Keurig with several boxes of coffee pods
- Oh, and some gin, rum and Baileys (the Baileys is for my evening coffee before my System Safety course I'm taking for work on Monday and Wednesday evenings; learning is so much better when Baileys is involved)
After supper, I finished unpacking, did some laundry and then watched TV with Lola - we both watched the same recorded show and only had to tell each other after every commercial break, which we fast forwarded through, when we got to a certain point so we could sync up our video.
I'm hopeful that the next two weeks will go by fast - work during the day and my class two nights this week will certainly help. But, Lola will need to work on the puzzle on her own without my assistance. Not that I've been much help with the puzzle the last few weeks...
Now I think it is time to put the stationary bike to use, I'm not going to be able to get too many steps in for a while.
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