Toronto -- 12/11/00

I flew up to Toronto late Sunday afternoon. When it's possible, Nancy likes to drive me up to T.F.Greene Airport (airport code = PVD for Providence, although it's actually in Warwick, RI) to catch my flight. She has a very bad cold, was too sick to go to work on Friday and was still very sick on Sunday. Jennifer had offered to drive me but she had had very little sleep and we didn't want her driving back through very heavy traffic while she was that tired... Warwick is also home to two shopping malls plus several strip malls plus a lot of big box stores (like Home Depot, Sports Authority, Sam's Club, etc.) and this was a prime Christmas shopping Sunday. So I drove myself up and left my car in long term parking... at $45.00 it is cheaper than the sixty bucks that a taxi with tip would cost.

I was flying Air Canada (or AirOntario flying for Air Canada in a code share arrangement with United... sometimes it's hard to tell what airline you're flying on these days) and, much to my amazement in these days of crammed-full over-booked flights, the plane was three-quarters empty! It was a Dash 8 prop that holds three dozen passengers and there were only eight of us.

I took a bus instead of a taxi into town from the airport... Hey, I really do try to save the company money... especially since I'm staying at the Marriott Eaton Place (which is not exactly Motel 6). I don't think the hotel is too busy at this time of year because I've got a great room -- on the 17th floor overlooking Trinity Church, beautiful view of Toronto.

Temperatures seem to have dropped during the day today and it began to snow around lunchtime. [The weather forecast for Rochester, Minnesota -- where I'm headed on Wednesday -- says the high temperature was in the low single digits (F not C) and the wind chill effect was 25 to 25 below zero. I'm not looking forward to that.] Toronto is one of my favorite cities, but I think I would enjoy these few days here more if it were summer.


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