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Hey everyone! First of all, meet my new friend, Pricy the Terrifically Expensive Unicorn:
Well, how to start this tale of woe, which shall explain how this poor innocent creature came to earn her terrible name? Alas, it begins in June, back when every week was grinding by at a horrible pace as I approached the date of my first ever trip outside of Canada, when I first recalled that it was cheaper to ship a Windstone inside the states. With my best buddy Anna’s blessing, I ordered Pricy, a foop that came to be named Cedar and a kitsune whose current title is Soon-to-be-‘Fox-of-Many-Colours’-Whenever-I-Get-Around-To-It-Which-Might-Not-Be-Soon-But-Probably-Should-Be. Sigh. What a long name, but at least it promises great things right?
Pricy and her bros. (Plus Lone Star Fuzzy! <3)Pricy and her friends were thus sent to Anna's house in the wonderful state of Texas (love that place - definitely going back next year,) where they waited for me to arrive. After an exhausting ordeal involving two layovers, three planes (one of which was ironically freezing as it sped over Arizona,) and two empowering tablets of tranquilizer which made the entire journey possible because airplanes give me panic attacks, I arrived. Now, first of all, my plan to bring these Windstones home to Canada seemed sound, yeah? I was going to bring all three PYOs back with me in my carry on and save on the horrible shipping fees which USPS charges when sending stuff to Canada. I was like "Yes! I'm going to get all these Windstones and NOT have to pay $80 CAD for this unicorn!" (Well, right now with shipping a PYO unicorn to my house comes out to approximately $83 CAD.) I felt incredibly brilliant. The shipping for the package to Texas was only about $20, which was a sweet deal.
Then I realized that my carryon wouldn't fit Pricy. 🙁
I have no idea why I didn't think of this. I think because I'd spent the last year staring at my actual suitcase, which is much larger and I forgot my firm decision to just bring a carryon because of my three gruelling flights (hours in the air totalled as much as a flight to Europe from some Eastern points in North America at over seven hours.) I looked at Pricy's internal box and cried inside.
So I took my foop and my fox and left Pricy behind with a American fifty to see her shipped home, which I thought would be more than enough considering that it only costs me $20 CAD to ship stuff to Anna. Two months later, Pricy finally arrived a couple of days ago and her final price tag is just under $160 CAD and I had to send Anna another $13 USD to do it. (I could have not bothered, because Anna said don't worry about it, but why should she pay for my being dumb? Besides, she's in university and needs every penny!) In the end, I could have saved approximately $75 by just shipping Pricy the normal way, direct from Windstone to my house.
My consolation prizes are that I learned something (this is a mistake I won't repeat) and the lone star fuzzies which Susie sent, which were so ridiculously thoughtful! Anna and I both treasure them! <3 And hey, Pricy will hopefully earn herself a new name soon after she gets a paint job and becomes my mom's unicorn. (Also, Pricy arrived in one piece despite my changing out half of her packing peanuts for boxes of fancy American oreos which Anna gave me, so that's a blessing too. Actually the oreos made great packing material haha! Only one box died and it was a flavour that we have here in Canada anyway, so no big loss.)
But will I ever tell my mother that her unicorn cost me $160?
NOPE! 😉
And next time, I'm just ordering straight to here in Canada - or, y'know, getting a flight itinerary with one less connection and bringing proper luggage.
And thus concludes my extremely expensive little adventure with a PYO unicorn. I hope y'all enjoyed! 😀
Check out my finished artwork at http://falcolf.deviantart.com/ and my sketch/studio blog at http://rosannapbrost.tumblr.com/
Excellent!
What an adventure! 😀
Every act matters.No matter how small💞
(Wanted......Brimstone Lap)
Male Hearth....one day🤞Dream on.XD yep, I’m glad that I can laugh at it too. I’m sure some people out there would think it was a complete disaster, but to me it’s just funny. It’s good to find your mistakes amusing I think.
Check out my finished artwork at http://falcolf.deviantart.com/ and my sketch/studio blog at http://rosannapbrost.tumblr.com/
Excellent!
Wow, what a trial you and Pricy have had!
I think my closest feat was when I saw a male Griffin in the original Wolf color for sale at a convention, and bought him on the spot. Only later did I realize that trying to fit a piece that big (with protective box) into a carry-on backpack means that you’re going to have room for maybe one slim paperback and a couple of kleenex along with it, if you’re lucky (and you better hope you have a big enough backpack… and that its zippers don’t break under the strain)!
Not to mention how much fun it is to haul 15 pounds of gypsum on your back through three large airports. 😀 😀 😀
Thankfully he did make it home safe, and I learned my lesson about large souvenirs, so I guess we can learn from each other’s stories when it comes to “how not to buy a Windstone”!
(I am a little surprised you couldn’t have purchased a slightly-larger carryon bag, though, unless it was just a very last-minute packing job and you didn’t have time!)
Interested in buying or trading for: GB Pebble Sitting Red Fox in dark grey, Lap Dragon Test Paints (Water Sprite, Glacial Pearl, Opulence, Pastel Rainbow, and many others - see my Classifieds ad), Blue Morpho OW, GB Pebble Loaf dragons in blue/aqua/teal, and Griffin Test Paints (Black Rainbow or Frosted Jade).
……… I guess we can learn from each other’s stories when it comes to “how not to buy a Windstone”! ….
That should be a thread, seriously! lol Or rename this one, any one else got stories on how not to buy windstones, i wanna hear! 😀
Recently married to the ever lovable BiPolarBear (little John)
www.weaselsoneasels.com | www.facebook.com/weaselsoneaselsAs seen on This is Life with Lisa Ling on CNN (2018) !
Always open for pyo commissions, repairs and fine artwork! Email me for current prices! awier(@)weaselsoneasels.comWow, that’s a crazy experience. Were you going to Texas for another reason, to visit your friend or just to pick up the Windstones? Wouldn’t it be expensive to fly there or did you fly with points? Why did it cost so much to go from Texas to B.C.? When I order stuff from Windstone with first class mail, I usually pay under $20 for shipping if the piece is that unicorn’s size or smaller. Do you use first class or priority? You get the same tracking with first class although for larger items over 4 pounds you would have to use priority I guess.
Looking for rainbow or pink & teal grab bags!
This was a great story, thanks so much for sharing it ! 🙂
Its the customs fees that kill me when shipping into Canada… oh, and our crappy low dollar…
Lets hope this upcoming election will see some changes that help out our pathetic dollar :/
I do agree I hope the dollar goes back up. It’s a hard to swallow having to pay $400 Can. for a piece that’s $300 US. I luckily don’t usually get charged customs though so but I used to so know what a pain that is.
Looking for rainbow or pink & teal grab bags!
Well, I hope you had a great visit to Texas, at least!
Yeah, it was wonderful! I can’t wait to go again, and go to other parts of the states too! 😀 I got bit by the travel bug HARD! 😀
Wow, that’s a crazy experience. Were you going to Texas for another reason, to visit your friend or just to pick up the Windstones? Wouldn’t it be expensive to fly there or did you fly with points? Why did it cost so much to go from Texas to B.C.? When I order stuff from Windstone with first class mail, I usually pay under $20 for shipping if the piece is that unicorn’s size or smaller. Do you use first class or priority? You get the same tracking with first class although for larger items over 4 pounds you would have to use priority I guess.
I went to Texas to visit and meet my best friend Anna for the first time, so I figured I’d order some Windstones as icing on the cake. 🙂 It cost me around $600 for the round trip tickets, I don’t have points sadly. I’m planning to eventually replace my existing credit card with an airline credit card (probably Alaska) to help with my travel addiction, but for now I have to pony up big bucks to fly anywhere. Considering that a round trip flight to Edmonton can cost me over $300 so I think $600 for a set of flights (three!) to Texas was great! Hopefully next time I’ll be able to nab a better deal though (and avoid LAX. Although the flight out from there WAS beautiful… t’was a very brief but treasured glimpse of California.)
For buying Windstones, I always pick the cheapest shipping, because that’s all that I can afford. As of today, the cheapest possible first class international shipping for a PYO unicorn to my part of Canada would be $26.25 USD or $34.83 in CAD. Shipping for a dragon is $20.45 USD/27.24 CAD while a larger PYO like a keeper was something like $40 USD/$53.28 CAD which is waaaaay too much for me and makes me super grateful for the one that I own which I got in a trade (thanks again Ela-hara!!)
I’m not sure why it cost $63 USD to ship Pricy from Texas to British Columbia. It generally only costs me $20 CAD to ship stuff in vice versa and those packages are just as heavy as Pricy was. (Gotta keep my buddy well stocked in Canadian chocolate bars y’know. XD) Anna tried to refuse the extra $13 (I originally only gave her $50 USD, never dreaming that the shipping would be more) but why should she pay for my mistake? So Pricy was very pricy indeed. XD 🙂
This was a great story, thanks so much for sharing it ! 🙂
Its the customs fees that kill me when shipping into Canada… oh, and our crappy low dollar…
Lets hope this upcoming election will see some changes that help out our pathetic dollar :/
I REALLY hope that this election fixes our dollar. I’d like to have an easier time with my Windstone addiction and with stateside travelling!
Glad you guys enjoyed my tale of woe haha. 😀
Check out my finished artwork at http://falcolf.deviantart.com/ and my sketch/studio blog at http://rosannapbrost.tumblr.com/
Excellent!
When I ordered my GB Cougar, $250 plus $19 shipping quickly turned into $365 once converted to Canadian currency. That’s a nice hard shot below the belt!
Remember when our dollar was on par with the US dollar? Ahhhhhhh, the good old days!
Wanted: "Dragon Fruit" Male Dragon ~ "Fire Berry", "Paradise", "Dragon Fruit", "Tie Dye" ~ The brighter, the better!
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