perth

Four star, my foot

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When I made the hotel arrangements for this so-called "four star resort" for Worlds, I agreed that, should the need arise, the two 2-bedroom rooms we have would move into two 1-bedroom rooms, with the additional persons sleeping on the sofabed or a hotel-provided-at-no-fee rollaway bed. From the pictures on the website, the place looked roomy and cushy enough that, well, even if we did, we'd be moving for the night before the finals only, so, hey, no problem.

Several days ago, Lynelle stopped by the room and said, as per our agreement, you need to reduce rooms. To me, that meant reduce from a two bedroom to a 1-bedroom as agreed.

To her, that meant move from two 2-bedrooms into 1 2-bedroom, since weren't most of our people leaving on Saturday anyway, and, oh, could those two 1-bedrooms that I also reserved, could they move into one 2-bedroom.

Except only one person was leaving on Saturday. And the two 1-bedroom families each had infant children. My original reservation for four rooms was dropping to two rooms, and this "four star resort" was asking us, pushing us, to having seven people in one room with two bedrooms and one toliet.

I'm glad Brynne was around.

After the disaster of confusion, negotiation, and foot-dragging (oh, and a shoulder breaking by Mark), Brynne put on her hard-ass persona and gave Lynelle a one-two about moving all the rooms around. She, Megan and Katie managed to keep all of our rooms, the latter by refusing to move in the first place.

My favorite part of the whole disaster (if disasters can have favorite parts) is Mark's, statement, "I know you think what you're offering is a good deal, but it's not," directly to Lynelle, words for some reason I couldn't say.

I should probably find my notes on this issue, instead of summarizing from memory. The event was so disastrous it makes my blood pressure rise thinking about it, so maybe just spewing will be sufficient. Regardless, I think I can mark this down as another reason why it's very unlikely Kris and I will ever bother to come to Australia again.

Three oceans down

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I'm a mountain girl. I'm not a water girl. Give me a hike in the mountains, through the forest, and around the lake over a swim in the ocean or a day lying around at the beach any day.

There are exceptions to my general mountain over ocean preferences: an ultimate game on the beach is preferable to a death march hike through the Grand Canyon, for example. For the most part, though, mountain over ocean.

For some reason I'm not quite clear on, I keep ending up at the ocean at these ultimate tournaments. Nationals was in Sarasota, Florida (a gulf more than an ocean, but a large body of water nonetheless), Worlds is in Perth, Western Australia.

So, in Perth, we're staying (ick! mixing verb tenses!) at a beach apartment complex, across the street from the beach, so all of maybe 50 yards from the waterfront. We wandered across the street to the beach,

"It's cold. I don't want do it, but I want to have done it." I smiled and said, "Well, the only way to have done it is to do it. Let's go."

The water was cold, close but not quite unbearably so, so we rushed out into the water, letting the waves crash higher and higher up our bodies. Eventually Kris went under, and a few waves later, I followed. I didn't go completely under, so chose to ride the next wave back towards shore.

I pushed off poorly on the next wave, but started swimming as fast as I could toward shore. Unfortunately, I also started after the wave started crashing. Instead of getting an easy ride to shore, I was dumped under the water, with the wave crashing over my head.

As I went under and couldn't find my feet under me, I kept thinking of my scuba diving qualification dive at Zuma Beach, and felt the brief tickle of panic that accompanies that memory when I'm in the water. Before it could become panic, my feet struck sand, and I surged forward, running to the shore.

I can now say, I have swum in the Indian Ocean. Kris can say the same.

I suspect I'll be heading back in the next few days, though. Once doesn't seem quite enough.

Dumb flies

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"Why does this fly keep divebombing my nostrils?"

Megan offered, "Because you smell good?"

"What? Because my boogers smell good but the rest of me doesn't?"

I don't know

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Come on, people, I don't freakin' know. I don't know. How many times do I have to say it, I don't know?

I'm not your mother. I'm not your guardian. I'm not even your team captain. I'm not the team organizer. I'm not the housing coordinator. I'm not the ride arranger.

I'm not responsible for your well-being. I'm not responsible for your ticket. I'm not responsible for your food. You know what? I'm not responsible for Kris, either. He is his own person, and he makes his own choices. He can even act and thinking independently of me. Shocking, eh?

You know what else? You are not my responsibility, either.

Start thinking for yourself. Figure it out. Look around. See what's there. Find the solution by solving it yourself.

Stop asking me. Stop depending on me. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it!

Because, damn it, I don't fucking know.

And I'm tired of the hundred questions.

Update: Kris commented to me in passing when I complained to him about everyone asking me questions, that, hey, you know what, I'm listed as the team captain on the tournament records. I submitted the bid, so, I'm the captain.

Great. Abdicating responsibility. I suck.

Time to embrace. Come on, world, ask me anything. My new answer is going to be, "Doesn't matter."