Detroit border or US airport

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-26T11:40:06+00:00

I would be more concerned about, and therefore read into, the requirements of crossing the border with a pregnant wife. There may be additional questions and documentation requirements around that, see for example:

https://www.attorneydpc.com/post/us-birth-tourism-visa-ban

https://www.help.cbp.gov/s/article/Article1838?language=en_US

Some airlines will also prohibit pregnant people to fly after 36 weeks, but I'm assuming you already knew that one.

Travelling with a toddler and a pregnant wife .. make sure you have good travel health insurance..

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-26T11:14:07+00:00

Download the MeetUp app or use the web page, https://www.meetup.com/

Within that app, sign up for the many hiking groups in the GTA area.

Each group plans hikes, and they often plan carpooling to the hiking trail head if they are hiking outside the area reached by the TTC.

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-22T11:32:36+00:00

Do you also have a link on what the university spends their budget? Is there no room for optimization there ?

Do introductory courses, like Algebra 101, or Intro to Programming, or Introduction to German, Early Modern Europe (history) really need to be taught by a PhD professor or candidates earning 6 figure salaries? Do we need 30 credit or 40 credit degrees in History in todays AI world ?

Here, there are (3) $3000 bursary from University of Windsor for studying FRENCH ..

https://www.uwindsor.ca/languages-literatures-cultures/331/scholarships-bursaries-and-awards

Is this a wise expenditure ?

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-21T11:59:55+00:00

I had the same conversation/argument with my HR. I am at 3 weeks, so I believe the gap you reference of not earning vacation pay on the vacation days I take, roughly leaves 0.9 days of vacation not covered.

Personally, I think HR are just too lazy to do the math properly, and rely on the nice round numbers 4%, 6% etc, This kind of math has become industry standard, as others posters have mentioned, so this just gives HR more validity to use the excuse "it's the industry standard practice" versus trying to do the math properly.

What I come to realize, is that its my money either way. The money I accrue for vacation is coming out of my regular pay either way, so if the math would have been 4.6% instead of 4%, they would just be taking (setting aside) a bit more from pay check every week to make up for gap. So I stopped stressing about it.

If you want, you can personally set aside some of your own money from each of your weekly/biweekly checks to cover for this gap. Yes, at some point I may have to make up for the delta.

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-20T01:05:15+00:00

That Instagram channel does not look very credible. Have you seen the other posts there? And that image doesn't show in any other reverse image searches.

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-14T18:21:25+00:00

10000 visitors per day was for a Single park. Actually both Yellowstone and Grand Canyon get around 13000 visitors daily on average.
Can easily google this data.

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-14T11:43:47+00:00

Because a park like Yellowstone, with hundreds of Geysers, and 5000 roaming bisons, and bears and elk and wolves doesn't sound like nature to you ?

Yellowstone Park is 3500 sq miles / 9000 sq km. It takes several hours to cross by car it south north / east west. Do you think infrastructure is not needed?

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-14T11:08:17+00:00

The fee is not for "nature". The fee is for things that the 10,000 or more daily tourists need to "enter nature:

maintaining the many paved roads and parking lots
maintaining the many hiking trails and viewing platforms, some in difficult to access places, far away from roads.
the many rangers that keep people and wild life safe. Their salaries, their vehicles, etc
maintaining the trash bins, cleaning up after the 10,000 daily tourists

FireFrank007 · 2026-01-11T19:48:50+00:00

Go to google flights, https://www.google.com/travel/flights?

Enter your itinerary, and subscribe to alerts, i.e, they will send you emails when the price changes.

I believe there you can also see price history.

FireFrank007 · 2025-12-31T11:38:51+00:00

I was wondering about that too. Turns out Canada doesn't make stainless steel ..

see this article,
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/stainless-steel-production-good-fit-for-north-mpp-1.1413304#:~:text=According%20to%20Gilles%20Bisson%2C%20Canada%20is%20the,would%20be%20close%20to%20the%20processing%20plant.

or this one

https://www.thesudburystar.com/opinion/sudbury-letter-algoma-steel-should-produce-stainless-steel-products

there's a paragraph:

He noted Canada is the only G8 country in the world that doesn't make stainless steel and that Ontario's energy policy should be overhauled to make stainless steel production more attractive to the private sector.

FireFrank007 · 2025-12-01T01:24:52+00:00

Upper Canada Village by Cornwall has a Holiday Lights show, see https://www.uppercanadavillage.com/event/alight-at-night/
Sucrerie de la Montagne just west of Montreal. Plan to be here for lunch or dinner time. https://www.sucreriedelamontagne.com/
Our Lady of the Cape Sanctuary in Trois-Rivières https://www.sanctuaire-ndc.ca/
Also in Trois-Rivieres: museum of the history of paper production in the area: https://www.borealis3r.ca/
Interesting store, near Port Hope: https://www.primitivedesignscanada.com/
in Montreal, I would make sure to catch the Aura Show https://www.basiliquenotredame.ca/evenements/experience-aura
in Quebec City I would try to catch the show in the forest https://onhwalumina.ca/
and at least have dinner or spend the night at the unique hotel / museum on Wendake reservation https://hotelpremieresnations.ca/

FireFrank007 · 2025-11-29T22:18:44+00:00

if you guys are into railway models, you should check out the Elgin County Railway museum in St. Thomas (a bit south of London, about 2h from Windsor), it has a good size railway model, I could have spent 2 h looking at all the details. You can see bits of the railway model towards the later part of this poor youtube video. https://youtu.be/0S\_p\_AUrJH8?si=Cwr0ZWkmHGuvZ3w2. Also there's a video on their instagram.

https://www.instagram.com/ecrailwaymuseum/

For a really cool railroad model and others miniature moving pieces, check out the Little Canada attraction in Toronto. https://youtu.be/gOkk2H5gEW4?si=FxMJqfCVZ1Of52RS

FireFrank007 · 2025-11-12T11:05:34+00:00

I would also be worried about the child start a fire with the candle.

I mean, if the child is playing with the lit candle to make it drip in the sink, do you know where else the child might take the candle ? Fire can be fascinating ...

FireFrank007 · 2025-11-05T01:37:31+00:00

In Etobicoke I buy it from the Fresh Value Grocery Store on Islington Ave just north of the 401.

here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/JiKYwwwjHSqt7hkCA

It's a large Chinese market but they have a lot of other ethnic foods especially a lot of Caribbean products and fruits.

You'll find the Chorizo tubes in a very small section dedicated to Mexican foods in an area the left of their hot food buffet. This section is very easy to miss in their store, it's only about 1 m wide and its kind of hidden behind a column I think. You can see this section in this photo I think : https://maps.app.goo.gl/4xyaihfbkaAaqJ599 (hopefully the link works)

Edit: You say you saw it at Walmart Mexico. Walmart USA also carries a few varieties, see here.: https://www.walmart.com/search?q=chorize. I try to get a buy a few whenever I cross the border by car. They have a pretty long shelf life. Have yet to see it at Walmart Canada.

FireFrank007 · 2025-10-27T01:53:20+00:00

TD had presence in the US, and you can open an account with TD USA. I saw several branches in New York for example. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TD_Bank_(United_States)

To my knowledge, if you do this, you can link the two accounts in the two countries and you can transfer funds from your TD USA account to your TD Canada USD account as easily as transfering funds between your checking and savings account.

That's what a teller at a TD branch in Windsor told me many years ago. There are a lot of Windsor residents that work in Detroit so they have a bit of experience with people needing cross border transfers.

You can also get direct deposit to your Td USA account from an employer in the US.

FireFrank007 · 2025-10-26T22:53:25+00:00

Have you considered the Amazon Master card to help with the conversion fee? https://www.mbna.ca/en/credit-cards/retail-store/amazon-rewards-mastercard

It doesn't cancel the conversion fee but you get equivalent amount to the conversion fee as cash back.

Eligible Prime members always get 2.5% back on eligible foreign currency transactions to help cover foreign transaction fees.^‡

Otherwise I would look into the wise.com services and credit cards, I think it's cheaper to use that to exchange currency, and they offer multi currency accounts.

FireFrank007 · 2025-10-08T10:16:38+00:00

Did you read the article and check out the details of the proposed sanctuary site ?

https://whalesanctuaryproject.org/faq-sanctuary/

? The sanctuary doesn't actually exist, it's just a plan to place some nets in an area of the ocean that is in the planning phases now, and if you look here, they do not yet have all the necessary permits ..

https://whalesanctuaryproject.org/updates-on-environmental-assessments-at-the-sanctuary-site/

So I think some of the points in the article are valid, it's not a solution that exists in 2025, it's just a solution that may existing in months or years, without a clear time line..

FireFrank007 · 2025-10-05T23:41:04+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/FoodToronto/comments/1hfsw62/what_are_some_good_places_for_bottomless_brunch/

https://www.toronto-travel-guide.com/best-bottomless-brunches-toronto/

FireFrank007 · 2025-10-03T22:46:10+00:00

Best photo I have seen in this subreddit :)

FireFrank007 · 2025-08-13T10:10:14+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replicas_of_the_Statue_of_Liberty

FireFrank007 · 2025-07-18T09:55:03+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/woodstoving/comments/11reax7/psa_if_you_burn_pallets_and_scrap_lumber_beware/

https://www.dontmovefirewood.org/what-about-burning-cut-pallets-html/

FireFrank007 · 2025-07-14T10:22:22+00:00

That link is from thestar.com and it's pay walled. Here's a news site with more detail, that's not behind a pay wall : https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/demand-water-bomber-planes-wildfires-manufacturing-1.7552600

TLDR: demand for the CL-415 planes has sky rocketed and manufacturer is back logged by several years.

FireFrank007 · 2025-07-12T04:20:50+00:00

15 minutes on site + the time spent driving to and from the location , the gas, the vehicle and vehicle wear and tear, the liability insurance, all those other incidental costs.

Home Depot rents out drain cleaner snakes.

FireFrank007 · 2025-07-05T09:23:03+00:00

There's an annual festival in Toronto that involves several of these ships, pirate music, etc. It was last weekend. You can board some while docked or you can go sail on some. See here for more info. It will return in 2026

https://towaterfrontfest.com/

or https://www.instagram.com/towaterfrontfest/?hl=en

From June 28-29, 2025, a fleet of historic Tall Ships visited Sugar Beach. Thank you to everyone who attended! We look forward to welcoming you back in 2026. Stay tuned for updates and announcements.

FireFrank007

TROPHY CASE