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| These Hornbill mates are often very noisy around us, asking for seeds. They sure have us trained, says Tom. For more photos, please click here. |
Over the past several months, we have been accumulating supplies to travel with us that have been waiting to be shipped to us in Arizona. While doing so, we don’t have the opportunity to inspect each item, each piece of mail, or each article of clothing we purchase when it arrives at the mailing service. Returns are an unlikely possibility.
However, they will open mail, scan it and place it in the system to see at the cost of $2.00 per page. We request this service on occasion. We can tell, based on who the sender is, if we need to have it scanned.
We had a good idea of what should have been in the 40-pound box but weren’t sure about some items. It’s the nature of our lifestyle, and we comfortably live with it as we continue on our travels.Last night when the package finally arrived at 7:00 pm by UPS, we couldn’t open it fast enough, especially when I suspected a few items wouldn’t be there.
One was the Cardiac Watch, which I’d ordered a few months ago. It wasn’t in the box. Immediately, I contacted the company, and they apologized that the order got “screwed up,” and it was never sent. They promised it would go out in today’s mail. Hmm, I’m suspicious of this one. We’ll see if it arrives.
I noted it on my calendar, and if it doesn’t arrive within a week, I will ask for a refund and, if that’s a problem, I’ll contact the credit card company to resolve the issue. They are very good at handling such matters.
Also, the two sets of earpieces we’d ordered from Google were missing from the box or our phones. The wireless versions were “out of stock” for months to come, and with the $100 credit we had at Google, we went ahead and ordered the wired versions, which also weren’t in the box. I’ll check on this today.Then, the most annoying news of all was from the state department. They didn’t like the photos we’d included with our four-year passport applications, which we’d processed in Minnesota in December.
This morning we headed to Walgreens and started over, having new photos done, heeding their comments in the included letters, hoping the new photos would be satisfactory.
After grocery shopping at Safeway, we drove to the closest post office in Apache Junction and mailed the photos in the provided envelopes with the letters. Whether the passports arrive at our mailing service before we leave the US remains to be seen.
If they don’t arrive on time, we’ll have them mailed to us once we arrive in the UK in a few months. Sending them to India would be impossible for several reasons.
Then, a bill for $157.50 from the Urgent Care facility we visited in Minnesota shortly after we arrived when the cough and virus I had was becoming unmanageable. We’d paid in full for the services at the time.
Since we had no US insurance that covered such care, they required we pay the entire bill in advance of $189 to be seen. This morning I called their billing department, and they acknowledged the bill was an error. They removed it from their system.
Speaking of medical bills, today, after receiving the invoice, I paid for my visit to the Minneapolis Heart Institute. We suspected it would be as high as $800, but much to our surprise, the hour-long appointment with a highly competent cardiologist, was $449.
After doing considerable research from equally competent cardiologists and medical centers worldwide, I discovered that those patients not taking statins do well with a litany of supplements that have been found to aid in cardiovascular disease.
I ordered the supplements online from Puritan’s Pride when they were having a sale, “buy two, get four free.” Oh my goodness, there were dozens of bottles of supplements in the box.
Last night Tom and I consolidated the bottles when often the bottles were only filled one-quarter full. We narrowed it down considerably, and this morning we loaded them into the third supply suitcase, and they fit well.
You would not believe the trash generated as we opened the box of items. It practically refilled the entire box the items were shipped in. Whew! All I have left to do today is go through the many packages containing the three prescribed medications I take and reduce that to a minimum.
We’re staying at the same hotel in Mumbai on both ends of our two months in India. We’ll likely have them hold some of our luggage until we return to board the cruise in April.
Today, we’ll work on a few remaining projects and financial matters and stay in tonight for a great dinner of roast beef, mashed potatoes (for Tom), veggies and salad. There are no big plans for the weekend other than watching the Minnesota Vikings game tomorrow. We’re rather excited about that!
Happy day!
Photo from one year ago today, January 10, 2019:
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| This is Basket, the Bully, who scares off all the other warthogs, including Little and Little’s Friend. For more photos, please click here. |