Tag Archives: parking woes

More FlexPass woes

Even though I bought my FlexPass to the Thunderbird parkade ages ago, I’ve only tried using it about three times. All three times, the pass failed to register with the receiving antennae and I’ve had to take a spitter ticket instead. It was frustrating, though; from what I knew about the FlexPass, I should have been saving money and paying only around $8 per use instead of $14.

Flex Pass: Your parking solution

The solution that turned out not to be the right solution after all.

So yesterday I went to UBC Parking Services and inquired about my FlexPass, which had seen no use. They were all like hunnnnnnnh? and said that the pass should have been working.

Then the lady who was helping me told me that at Thunderbird Parkade there’s a flat rate of $7 all day. So to park there for a day it is actually cheaper to take a spitter ticket than to use the FlexPass.

Oh.

Luckily, the lady said I could refund my pass although apparently that’s not allowed and I am now FlexPass free. And FlexPass-woe free. I even returned the actual pass thingy, because I’m pretty sure I won’t be driving to UBC enough to warrant a pass in the future. Watch me eat my words. Huffah!

FlexPass woes

So I bought a FlexPass for parking a few week ago, which makes parking a little cheaper for me in the long run.  I get 11 uses out of it, which is good because I take transit to school most of the time. You can’t go in and out of the parkade, though, which is too bad.

When I was buying it, I thought “hey, Thunderbird is an excellent place to park my car!” So I chose to activate my parking pass for the Thunderbird Parkade.

Now here is a list of the pros and cons of my decision:

Pros:

  • It’s close to Osbourne.  There are kinesiology classes in Osbourne.

Cons:

  • I have only one class in Osbourne next term. 
  • It’s 109238409283097 metres from everywhere else. Including all the exits off campus. 

My conclusion? I’m turning out to be more of a goof than I thought I was.

PS. SpellCheck is telling me ‘parkade’ isn’t a word.  Am I doing something wrong?

Day of the Longboat (or oversized canoe!)

Stroke, stroke, stroke, stroke! Golly, that word sounds weird after a while.

For those you you who haven’t heard about it, Day of the Longboat is a UBC REC event held at Jericho Beach.  Basically, you form a team with whomever you like (I went with a faculty team) and you race against other teams in an oversized canoe.  It’s more fun than I describe it to be, I promise!

Here’s how my day went:

  • I got up at 6am this morning.  Yes, on a Sunday (the horror!).  There was no sun, and the moon was still high in the sky (and it was really, really bright).
  • I drove to Jericho Beach, which took me half an hour.  It was a lovely drive because all the lights along my route were pedestrian lights, and since no-one was out at 7 in the morning… What? Of course I didn’t speed!
  • Paying for parking at the lot was a pain for three reasons:
    • Today, you have to pay for parking; tomorrow, parking is free.
    • $3 an hour.  Seriously, why so outrageous?
    • I had no coins, which meant I scrambled around for twenty minutes looking for people who had change for a $10 bill.
  • I met up with 8 other first-year kinesiology students. Our team name? The Kintagious Kinky Kinners!   …Oh boy, do Kinners love their puns.
  •  We went out in our oversized canoe longboat and paddled hard. I’m pleased to say that there was no capsizing of any sort, although we came close. There was, however, lots of screaming, splashing, cheering, and laughing.
  • We did not come in last place. 😀
  •  We soaked in the (really, super-duper-ultra-hot) hot tub for a bit, and then went out for lunch and cheered and heckled incoming teams from other heats.  There were a lot of kinesiology teams out there, and we cheered for them all!

The KKK: After the race!

What disappointed me (a little): after we finished up, it felt like there wasn’t much to do. There was a feeling of “What now?” once we got out of our lifejackets, and there seemed to be no incentives for us to stick around. (Maybe that’s good, because we all had to study for our physiology midterm).

Still, I’d say Day of the Longboat is one event that all UBC students have to do at least once.  If you’re looking for spirit, you’d find it here!  It’s definitely a team bonding activity, so I’d recommend that you gather a group of friends, or people from your floor, or your faculty. And for goodness’ sake, not that kid you really can’t stand. 

Can’t wait for next year!

TEGAN AND SARA TONIGHT!

The weather’s crappy, but I’m still having a pretty good weekend.  Here’s why:

  • I went to the UBC/SFU Night Class dance on Friday. To be honest, it wasn’t as great as I’d expected.  Was it fun?  Yes.  Would I do it again? Probably not, seeing as it’s not really my thing.
  • I participated in the Longboat clinic yesterday, in preparation for Day of the Longboat next weekend.  Basically, we learned today what we had to do for the actual race.  Parking at Jericho Beach Park is expensive at $3 an hour (you know I hate parking fees), but it’s probably worth taking a car if you leave a change of clothes in your trunk.
  • TONIGHT I’M GOING TO A TEGAN AND SARA CONCERT AND ERMAGERD I’M SO EXCITED! Cue squealing.

They’re my favourite band/duo 😀 and they’re Canadian! So here are three of my favourite Tegan and Sara songs!

And yay for music about Vancouver!

Happy Sunday everybody!
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Driving to UBC

Today was a special day for three reasons.

  • I had my first ever 3-hour-long chemistry lab.  It was incredibly confusing, and I made a whole bunch of silly mistakes.
  • I finally met my fellow Blog Squad bloggers.  They are a cool bunch 🙂  We had breakfast together and it was lovely.
  • AND I DROVE TO SCHOOL!

Yes, it was exciting.  For the past two weeks, I’ve been taking public transit to and from school.  There’s a reason for that! And it’s not because I’m scared of driving.  Although I do get a a little nervous on the big streets…

A pretty-close-to-accurate depiction of myself. In a car. Behind the front wheel.

No, the reason why I don’t drive to school usually is because there is no cheap parking left after 8:30am. I kid you not.  The $6 flat-rate parking lots were 2/3 filled up by 7:45am this morning.  I think it’s kind of insane.

So if you have classes after 9am (like me) you really have no chance of getting those coveted parking spots. But there’s a bonus for you 8am class-takers!

Anyways, even though parking’s expensive, I like driving to UBC.  It definitely takes less time than taking transit, even if you consider all the traffic lights you skip when you’re on the skytrain.  You can blast music and not bother other people.  You can bring as much stuff to school as you like.  And there’s something nice about taking in the city view(sort of.  Some parts are nice, some parts are meh), as opposed to staring at the broken zipper of someone else’s backpack whilst desperately clinging on to the bus rails.

Example: did anyone else taking the 99 bus notice the CVC (Chinese Varsity Club) picket signs along University Boulevard?  The bright yellow paint, the dancing bananas, the boards that said “OPPA GANGNAM STYLE”?  Yeah, me neither.

But would I recommend driving to all commuters? No.  It really is too expensive to do all the time, especially since you’re already paying for the U-Pass.  And if you don’t have an 8am class, it’s close to impossible to get (relatively) cheap parking.  So I’m just going to keep taking the bus to school and getting excited every time I have to go to school early. 😀