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On Thursday, my final package from Temu arrived thankfully with a lot of stuff needed for my upcoming trip.
Thursday night, I shockingly remembered that my Driver's Licence expires on my Birthday when I am 75, and that I will be flying from Guayaquil to Toronto that day.... And I would need to drive home from Calgary after January 8th.. OMG, I was panicked!
Friday morning (the 13th) I headed to the Strathcona Registry which always has lesser lineups than the others. They said "No big deal, you just need to get a medical performed, and we have some practitioners listed on the bulletin board over there who do it cheaply"... In hindsight, it would have been quicker to go to my own doctor's clinic but I headed to the south end to the Parsons Road Clinic which was jammed with people... I asked how long I would have to wait and the receptionist said just 30-40 minutes... She tried to email me the application to fill out, but it would not come through, so I had to fill out papers by hand. That ate up the wait time. Then they took my blood pressure and I talked to a doctor for 2 minutes and I was done! I thought it was pretty shoddy for a medical exam but acceptable enough for me to get a temporary licence right away!
Back at Strathcona Registry, no lineup, and 10 minutes later I had my papers. The new licence will come in the mail, but not likely before I leave, (IF I get to leave!).
A very sweet old lady, Marica, 93 years old, lives on the first floor, and apparently had a fall in the hospital and the rumor was that she had broken her hip. I found out that she was in the Royal Alexandra Hospital so I went by Dollarama to get get cookies and treats. I eventually found her room and the poor thing was out for a Catscan so I waited. She is in a room with 5 men and she looked thinner than usual, and thankfully without anything broken, but she must have twisted her back badly. I did not stay long because it was obvious that she neede to sleep to take her mind off the pain. She kept repeating "It hurts everywhere" with a strained look on her face. Apparently she has a daughter in BC somewhere but she is alone here. I miss seeing her wandering the hallways.
Last night, I finished that Ken Follett "Century Trilogy", almost 3,000 pages in total. I love historical fiction that follows the truth of events.
Today, I got up after a 12 hour snooze and, honestly, I did not want to get up... But I ran to the Library to get the last available book of Vince Flynn's Mitch Rapp series. The very last book in the series has just come out and I am apparently #32 in line for a single book... so it just might be close to being available for me upon my return...
There was a Farmer's Market set up on 104 street so I cruised by and got into a lot of conversations about the Gio. There was a lot of badly overpriced stuff available from carrots to woodwork.
I was shocked to run across information that the pilots of Air Canada are ready to strike, even after being offered a 30% pay increase, because they still will be on the low side of the international scale. Of course, Air Canada is who I am flying to Colombia with... So, our main hope is that the Government will step in quickly and force binding arbitration.... Whether all this can be done before my planned flights remains to be seen and I am not overly hopeful at this point... My poor old brain really does not need these complications....
I hope you enjoy the pictures. That was the day’s excitement.
Al
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Farmer's Market closing up 
Loved the reflection 
Reflection looks like a Jester? 
Our Streetcar from Australia is still running.. 
St Joachim Church next door 
Flowers out front are still adding beauty 
