Ooops!
Dear Friend,
This weekend we find ourselves in an odd situation that you may find yourself in from time to time if you choose the nomadic lifestyle.
You see, next week, our US tax returns are due. No biggie. I mean, the accountant has finished everything, and sent the whole caboodle to us via UPS Red (overnight) to our cozy campsite on the beautiful Straight of Georgia (that’s right, not “Puget Sound”).
Anyway, that’s where simplicity ends.
UPS informed our CPA that they would deliver to our locale on the next day, Friday, only that they couldn’t guarantee the time. It could be as late as 8:00 p.m. Fed Ex could not make this guarantee, so we decided to go with UPS.
We were anxious to get to the Pacific coast, so around noon we checked out of our campsite, made reservations for the Pacific coast campground, and patiently waited in the parking lot in front of the current campground’s office for the guy in the brown shorts to drop by.
UPS’s website at UPS.com showed that the package had arrived early that morning in Richmond, BC (near Vancouver), and was “Out for Delivery.” “Fantastic!” I thought. But since their last delivery time was at 8:00 p.m. Pacific Time, we had no choice but to wait. And we did just that.
About a quarter to eight in the evening, after watching my wife pace nervously for eight hours around the tiny floor area that is available for such things in an RV, I finally raised a living UPS representative on their 1-800-PickUPS phone line. He promptly told me that UPS does not guarantee next day delivery to our locale. “This new fact would have been nice to know before we laid out over $50 to send a one pound envelope from Virginia,” I told him.
“So fine,” I say, “when will we get this critical package into our little hands?” “Oh, you’ll definitely get it sometime on Tuesday,” he says.
Now understand, I just spent my entire Friday waiting for this thing. Well, it seems that Monday is a national holiday in Canada (Thanksgiving), and the package is in the back of a truck, somewhere. But UPS just doesn’t know exactly where.
Perhaps the driver took it home for the weekend. Maybe he’s using it to help his neighbor move to a new apartment. Who knows? And until that truck starts out from wherever it might be and actually drops this little envelope off at a place that I will then be long gone from (the old campsite), there is nothing that anyone can do, I am told.
Well, you can imagine what I was thinking at that moment. Nevertheless, it was dark, and we needed a campsite fast on a Friday night on a holiday weekend, so we dropped everything, got to our campground’s office and managed to get a nice site (the last) on a crowded row overlooking the Straight of Georgia. Or at least I’ll take their word for that, as it was pitch black and I saw nothing.
After getting re-hooked up in the dark and getting the army to bed, we decided that tomorrow we’d call UPS and see if the package could be rerouted to a more convenient location. We also took note that the medications that we take were both running out, and at about the same time, so that matter would have to be dealt with tomorrow as well.
After a comfy slumber, the next morning I picked up the cell phone and dialed 1-800-PickUPS. What I heard next I could not quite believe.
“Hello! UPS Canada is closed for the holiday weekend. Call back on Tuesday,” was the gist of it.
UPS is closed? CLOSED? I immediately imagined that I was a heart transplant patient (as a friend is right this moment). After months of waiting, the perfect heart was found in, say, Kansas. I am immediately prepped for surgery. The precious organ is packed in ice, put into its ubiquitous cooler, and swiftly delivered by ambulance to the local Kansas air terminal.
“Send it by overnight air,” they say to the UPS rep, “This is definitely urgent.” “No problem,” the rep says, “That’s what we do.”
The organ arrives in Vancouver, where it is promptly carried off the plane and placed into the back of a swift brown truck.
The organ arrives at the hospital. Unfortunately, all of this is achieved five days later. The life saving heart is shriveled and quite dead. As am I.
What do I think of UPS now? Nothing. I’m dead, remember? But my ghost is pi**ed. And I’m gonna haunt those bozos to no end.
Anyway, you get the idea.
But then there’s that medicine thing that I mentioned earlier.
No problem, I thought. Both of us had a prescription filled in Montana, and each had refills coming. We’ll just have the prescription transferred to a local pharmacy when we settle next.
I call a local pharmacy to take care of business. “Sorry sir, we can’t accept prescriptions from US pharmacies,” I’m told. “Oh. OK. Wow.” Well, I figure I’ll have to get hold of my doctor back home and have her call in a new one on Monday, the day my current supply runs out.
On a thought and to be a bit extra careful, I call another pharmacy, but this time I mention the doctor call idea. “Sorry, sir,” I’m told, “We can’t accept prescriptions from US doctors,” they say. “But you can get a new prescription from a Canadian doctor.”
Now, how the he** am I going to convince some Canadian doctor on Tuesday that if he doesn’t diagnose my condition right now, a condition that took some years to diagnose originally, and that requires me to take these pills for life, then I’m gonna drop dead on the floor in front of him? That is, of course, if I can get an appointment with him, not being his patient, first thing in the morning after a busy holiday weekend.
Anyway, that image aside, I think that we could always just transfer the prescription to our home pharmacy, and have a friend send the medicine to us at whatever campground we might be waiting at via Next Day Air. Hmmmmm. Didn’t we just go there?
Now, I knew that many Americans ordered their meds from Canadian pharmacies. I must admit to something of the kind myself. So I checked with an online Canadian pharmacy that I had an older prescription with. That place was very far from our current location, but it was worth a shot. “Yes,” they told me on the phone, “They could transfer the tiny remainder of an old prescription of mine that they held,” (enough to get me by for a while). This wouldn’t help my wife, but at least our kids wouldn’t be left orphans.
“However,” they pointed out, “I would have to find a local pharmacy that can accept a prescription from a US doctor.” That again. And which pharmacies can accept prescriptions from US doctors? Nobody knows.
“Well,” I asked, “Could my new pharmaceutical friends just send the last few pills directly to me in Canada?” “Yes the could!” “Fantastic!” I thought. They had a few in stock, and they could send them on to me if I gave them an address. “Terrific!” They couldn’t guarantee delivery, time, though. Could take a week. “Could they send it via Next Day Air?” (as if that gave me a sense of comfort). “Oh yes they could!” However, their shipping department was closed for the holiday. “Call back on Tuesday,” they said.
So, realizing that, no matter what heroic efforts that I made, nothing was going to happen until Tuesday, we decided to continue on with our journey to the Pacific Coast of Canada.
We had a two night reservation, and were a day late due to our parking lot camping experience at the last campground. Luckily, the new campground graciously allowed us to cancel our first night’s reservation on Friday and just tack on another night on Sunday.
And, after hours of glorious fall scenery across the high mountains of Vancouver Island, what do we find on arrival? The most beautiful campground that we have yet experienced in North America. In the most inaccessible area of the rocky Pacific coast, we finally find paradise. And we cannot stay. We gotta get back eastward to our tax returns and medicine debacle.
That, my friends, is the downside of the nomadic lifestyle.
See, my life isn’t all Margaritas and roses. 🙂 But I’ll still take it over anybody’s.
You see, despite the bureaucracy and the headaches, we will make it work. That’s what people who are truly in charge of their lifestyle do. And sometimes, that means we have to flex to the rigidity of others. It’s a pain, but it can be done. And it’s worth every effort.
So, despite my rant, I’m feeling fine. Preparing for funeral arrangements if my medical issue isn’t settled. But otherwise, just fine.
I hope that you are too!
All the best,
Hugh
