Note: If people want to read a thoughtful report about what I saw at Sunday and Wednesday's ice dance practices, and during the dance events read Emma Abraham's reports :-) I pretty much agree with everything she says LOL
Let's see, this would be Monday.
Woke up, surprise! No luggage! The night before, the air hateada representative told us that our bags had flown to Minnesota and from there were headed to Vancouver. I then got a load of bull that they were probably sitting in customs right then, just waiting to be delivered to our hotel! Then for effect, there was some sob story that there had been a bomb threat at Heathrow and two 747s from London had landed in Vancouver earlier that weekend without luggage and the luggage from these flights was just hitting customs. Hmmm. Well, the front desk of our hotel had played along and said they'd deliver our bags any time of the day or night, and did they want us to call even if the bags came in at 3 AM?
HA!!! Men's Qualifying rounds were scheduled to start this morning at 8:30 am. I'd found out the night before that all of the skaters I really wanted to see were in the later group (YAY!! LOL) so, I decided that I'd call air hateada once again. Finally got through and this time was told they couldn't even confirm our luggage was in Vancouver. But, helpful sorts that they are, they offered us $100 apiece for necessities like socks and underwear. All we'd have to do is send the receipts to the "delayed baggage" claims department in the handy air hateada envelope that we got instead of our luggage. YAY! they couldn't find our luggage but we could be assured they'd find a reimbursement check for us? HA! I pretty much lost it at this point. EVERYONE I talked to that week who'd ever flown this airline knew their reputation for lost luggage.
So, too early for the malls to be open, so we did a very fun vacation activity, laundry GRRRRRR!!!!! After our chores were completed, we met up with Fab & Rik and hit the mall. Dave's necessities cost about $75. Somehow mine were over $200, amazing how that works LOL
Dropped the necessities off at the hotel and it was finally time for skating. I think this was the day Rik actually made it to see some skating, yay! Got to the arena and was told by a very disappointed ticket taker that I'd missed Todd, Elvis and Timmy. I tried to act contrite LOL We had fairly decent seats, on the end of the lower bowl, 17 rows up. Pretty good for seeing the entire ice surface! YAY (Was able to try out conventionally good seats during the CD's, but they all ended up having camera obstructions, ours were better :-)
Saw many of the same skaters I'd seen in the men's practice the day before. Go Panagiotis, Go Yon! Our favorite practice skater Gregor Urbas was there too, YAY!!! I did not take notes during any of the skating all week, so if you were expecting any sort of technical details, forget it LOL Angelo Dolfini of Italy seemed to really enjoy being there and played to the crowd. Finally got to see Sasha Abt skate live YAY! Loved voidy Danilchenko and Yunfei Li. Neil Wilson had fab spins Yags did not skate well :-(
The events were scheduled pretty tightly, so after the Mens QR I decided to ditch the opening ceremonies, which I predicted would be lame, in favor of a nice long break without bathroom lines. LOL Found my early week smoker's prison as well, which I'd share with ISU and skating judge types LOLOL
Went back in time for the pairs short. Don't really have a lot of memories of this. Was sitting by a Canadian with a huge flag, so the Wirtz's crash and burn was extra painful. It's a shame what happened with Abitbol and Bernadis, there program was fun in a kitschy kung-fu way. The people in my section were ROFL at the extra kung fu sound effects in their music ( ayyyyy yaaaaaaaa!!!!) Probably enjoyed seeing all of the pairs that ended up in the top 9 LOL
After the skating was over, we snuck Rik onto the shuttle and headed back to our hotel, which for some reason was the designated meeting place that night. Maybe because there was an outdoor patio with a propane heater for smoking breaks?
Sharpie and the Guv were waiting for us, so we decided to quickly drop our stuff off upstairs before joining them for dinner and such.
Got up to the room and tripped over OUR LUGGAGE!!!! YAAAAAAYYYYY!!!! Oddly enough, it had tags on it from the Westin Hotel. ( not our hotel, in case you hadn't guessed) So, it had been on it's own tour of the city. Figures it would turn up after we'd done laundry and shopped. Grrrrrrrrrr! Still, I did a happy dance and gave each piece it's own hug. Plus, I was able to show off my truly bad skating snapshots and present the Brits with their grits :)
Had a delerious dinner and drinks. The bartender was in a void and forgot us while we were seated. The waitress seemed to be rehearsing her stand up routine. We stayed there for about an hour after they tried kicking us out. Wheeee, I had to celebrate getting my luggage back. I think everyone else must have been celebrating too, as they wouldn't have to hear me bitch about it anymore LOLOL
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