We went to both supermarkets in Atlántida today: Disco (which gives a 10% discount on the purchase of ten bottles of “fine” wine) and Tienda Inglesa. For both, I used the Alaska Airlines Visa card we’ve had since 1986.
We lived in Oregon from 1986-1995, and often flew Alaska. Charging all office expenses to the card gave us significant mileage rewards – as did showing up early for the 8:00 AM flight from Portland to New York, insisting they start a “voluntary bump” list, always to their objection, predictably getting bumped and a free ticket. After a leisurely breakfast at the airport, we’d fly out on the 9:30 AM flight. Those were the days, my friend….
I generally check receipts soon after purchase, curious about the exchange rate (great right now as the USD has “strengthened” – which, alas, cost me USD 14 as a result of the retrograde Mercury mattress purchase and refund; stay tuned for that quintessentially-Uruguay-business [and retrograde Mercury] story).
I sat down at my computer, placed the receipts in front of me and – holy something! –their totals were within 1.1 pesos of each other! (Prices are still calculated with centésimos and rounded, though the last coin smaller than one peso- the 50 centésimos – ceased being legal tender in 2010, shortly after we arrived.)
There’s the difference in USD from Visa online – three cents!
I find that rather remarkable, but then my attention was drawn to the digital clock* today at 3:33 and 5:55 today, so maybe Universe is saying something.
*on the computer; our only other two clocks on the house are analog. Speaking of which (we were?), did you catch this? — Schools are removing analogue clocks from exam halls as teenagers ‘cannot tell the time’
Seems like the teens are stressed, but the accompanying photo suggests a more quintessentially teenaged reaction: whatever.
Just went down to the breakfast room in our hotel. The hotel seems to have housed 847 teenagers last night and most of them were there. Gundy had decided to skip breakfast. So did I as soon as I arrived. I drank a coffee and left quickly with a cup of hot water so Gundy could make tea in the room. I got on the empty elevator for the ride to the 7th floor and discovered the departing teenagers had pushed every floor button. Every time the doors opened there were people with bags and stuff trying to get on to go down and I just kept pointing up. On the fifth floor a young Englishman just got on and said he would go up with me and come back down. I explained the teenagers had pushed every button and he commented, we´ve all done that at some time. I had to agree.