A^3's Cube

I got the notification from Bank of America that the Euros I ordered were ready to collect, so this afternoon, Lisa and I drove to Reno/Sparks to collect it. First we went to drop off the recycling, because Lyon County has no collection nor drop-off for any sort of recycling, and the Washoe County (Reno) drop-off closes at 3 PM. After doing that, we drove over to the Sparks Bank of America. There I realized to my horror that I'd left my wallet at home! I went ahead and drove home (being careful to stay under the speed limit) and as we neared home, I thought that possibly we could get my wallet and get back to Sparks before the bank closed at 5 PM.

We got my wallet and we headed back to Reno, which just under an hour before the bank closed. Just as we passed USA Parkway (the road from the giant Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center, traffic ground to a halt. Apparently lots of businesses change shifts at 4 PM, and they all flooded onto westbound I-80. There are no alternative routes.

It would be several miles before the next exit, so we just ground our way along. The traffic started to speed up again, and we concluded that there was no accident or incident blocking traffic: just too many cars and big rigs for the freeway to handle. We decided to see if we could possibly get to the bank, which is on the east side of the Reno/Sparks metro area, before they closed. Somewhat to my surprise, we got there with just under ten minutes to spare.

There were no other customers in the branch. The clerk went to the vault, got the cash, counted it out for me, and I signed for it and left, with them locking up as I left. Whew!

I suggested to Lisa that we go to the Sparks Nugget and get our favorite meal there, the shrimp pan roast at John's Oyster Bar. The restaurant is named for John Ascuaga, who built the Nugget and grew it until he and his children sold it to corporate interests when John retired. We like that the casino kept the name of the Oyster Bar and preserved its nautically-themed decor.

It had been a long time since Lisa and I had been there together. We initially had the place all to ourselves, but more people arrived while we were eating.

Lisa initially wanted to go grocery shopping, but in deference to my having to work tomorrow, agreed that we should just go home. Amazingly, the heavy westbound (toward Reno) traffic from USA Parkway was still creeping along on freeway, but westbound (toward Fernley) was wide open. We'll go back for groceries in a few days.

Both Lisa and I have separate European trips planned this year. I have two shorter trips to the UK (July and October), and Lisa has a long trip to mainland Europe (which is why she's skipping Westercon and Worldcon). As we've done in the past, we buy travel insurance for these trips, not for many of the things they advertise, but in case of catastrophic medical problems requiring emergency medical repatriation, which can run into a six-figure cost. (Consider the price of buying a bunch of seats on a flight and also paying to have the seats taken out and replaced with a hospital bed.) While the chance of it happening is quite low, the cost is astronomical, so the insurance gives us piece of mind.

With my two shorter trips, it turned out to be cheaper to buy a one year policy (up to 45 days over a 12 month period) than to insure each trip separately. I bought that and moved on to Lisa's policy. Her trip is longer and cost more. I filled out the forms online and put up the credit card. The website announced that there was a problem; however, when I checked my credit card, I found that I'd been charged. So I sent an inquiry to Allianz and decided to wait for a reply.

Today, the charge came off my credit card, so I felt free to try again. This time, I tried using Chrome instead of Firefox and everything worked as it should, so Lisa's trip is now also covered.