I had an amazing day. I'll share the story for anyone who enjoys a tale with a happy ending.
I was speaking to my girlfriend who lives in Canada planning her next visit. This will be the last time she'll be able to see me for the foreseeable future and it's in celebration of our anniversary so we wanted to make it count. She doesn't have transportation so she secured her bus and train tickets in advance.
I found a dinner theatre screening of our favorite silent film,
Metropolis during her pending stay. I am always proactive so I checked ticket availability and found all links redirecting to a showing a month later. I phoned the venue and learned that they ran into a legal rights issue and had to postpone the screening, so that date night was canceled.
I'd also found a local Broadway performance of
Beetlejuice: The Musical which she was excited to see. Again, being proactive, I checked ticket availability. I found there were just THREE adjacent seats left on ONE particular night of her stay. All other nights for the week were fully-booked for adjacent seating.
Ticketmaster wanted $13.25 in TM fees on top of the $37 per seat ticket price. Then I discovered that Ticketmaster forces patrons to purchase all three adjacent seats to maximize their profit. I would have to buy the empty seat beside us and pay the surcharge on top of our occupied seats.
So I phoned the box office. A very kind gentleman there explained that while he can't sell me tickets by phone, if I drove downtown to the box office, he could sidestep Ticketmaster's forced third seat, AND waive the $13.25 per seat surcharge, (they charge just $3 for handling).
It was a race against the clock, as I'd watched the other remaining seats sell out while I had the website open.
I threw some clothes on and raced outside, only to find my car encapsulated in a thick sheet of ice. (We had an ice storm last night.) I couldn't even prise open my car door.
In an act of desperation, I phoned a neighbor friend who has come to my rescue many times in the past. She raced over and took me downtown. The city block where the theatre is was blocked off for construction, so I never would have found it on my own, but she directed me on how to get there on foot.
The tickets were still available when I arrived so I bought them on the spot for just $37+3 each. It will be a magical way to celebrate our anniversary and I may not see her again until next Christmas, so this will mean the world to us.
Yay!
