The bucket list continues...
After seeing my nom de plume mentioned on rsd about blogs, I realized that I had been just as guilty as everyone else out there, taking the winter off. So to fill the void, here we go.
When last we met, I was just returned from Hawaii participating in my first Kaimana Klassic. About a month prior I had received an invite to play with a US team at Paganello the second weekend in April. I had to defer because I had a monster mainframe conversion scheduled for the last weekend of March, and for people in the know, you know you have at least a couple of weeks to a month of fallout after something like that, so there was no way I was going to be able to run off to Italy a week later. And it had already been postponed a couple of times. We joked that deadlines get pushed all the time but I had zero faith because of the high level visibility and the fact that we had already delayed twice (although not because of us). Well, lo and behold we got pushed out to the end of April. I immediately checked airfares and they were sitting around $630 to Bologna, maybe $560 to Milan. The difference in train fares made it a wash flying into Bologna, and since I had been to Milan before, I went with Bologna. I checked in to confirm there was still space on the squad and booked my flight for Wed afternoon-Tue morning.
Imagine my horror when Jim pinged me a week later to say that flights were now ~$400 and he was contemplating going (primary horror on the ticket price, secondary horror on Jim coming...). I went back to my Orbitz reservation to see what it would cost to change the ticket, and they have a $250 change fee! It would have ended up costing me another $50. So imagine my surprise when I saw Orbitz price guarantee which said that if someone else buys your EXACT ticket for less, you will get the difference refunded to you. So after I saw that, I worked on Jim to go and he eventually got approval from the man of the house. I had to send him my exact itinerary because of the mix of airlines (and it showed up like 30th on Orbitz, so no one would have picked it by chance), paid him $20 for the extra $20 it cost, and 2 weeks later I got an email from Orbitz saying that I would be getting a check for $221.40 30 days after the completion of travel. Woohoo!
I was last in Italy maybe 13 years ago, passing through briefly and spending a day in Venice, a day in Milan, and a day in Portofino. I have missed all of the standard spectacular sights in Florence, Rome, Tuscany, and guess what, I'm going to miss them this time also. We get into Bologna Thursday morning, and I suspect we will jump right on the train to Rimini. After that it is tournament Fri-Mon, then EARLY train Tuesday morning and a 10AM flight home from Bologna. I expect that I will be a complete wreck Tuesday night, with 4 days/nights of ultimate and partying and jetlag under my belt.
Another interesting experience this season has been that I have been more aware of the 'cost' of being injured then ever in the past. As in, I never ever thought about it before, even when I was getting calf problems. It never changed how I played the game. Or that I ever thought about it while I was playing. With the Hawaii tourney and now Paganello, which one could consider once in a lifetime opportunities (especially at my age) AND tournaments with large upfront costs, getting injured before the tournament would SUCK. This winter/spring I have been playing a lot of goaltimate, and while I haven't consciously changed any of my play, I think about getting injured periodically. And I imagine even the thought of it is probably changing how I play, which of course makes it more likely that I WILL get injured because it is no longer instinctual. Ah well. Interestingly enough, I have one more round of Goalty this Sunday, and as I'm writing this, I'm thinking that I won't post it until Monday. I can't figure out which would be worse luck. Posting it or not posting it before playing (but writing it). Well, I'm posting it Sunday afternoon after just getting back from Goaltimate. I tweaked my hamstring at yoga and got a nice charley horse from Jeff Graham at Goalty, but I should be good for Paga.
The Paga team is called Los Ox, which I have NO idea what it stands for, and is composed of a bunch of Jam players, 5 Boston players from Ironsides and DoG, and $ from Bravo/Machine/Revolver, hell, wonder which team will be next for him. I'm looking forward to playing with a high octane team, hopefully one which has its act together more than the Southern Dandies did in Hawaii. I expect that it will because of the much smaller squad size.
I did a quick check of the major travel booking sites and it appears that Orbitz is the only one with a price guarantee like this. I have to admit, based on personal results, I may have to let Kayak guide me there going forward if Orbitz is one of the selections. I'm just sayin'...
We are staying at a pretty swanky place, the Hotel Bikini, which is apparently right near the fields/beach. They have wireless internet access, so now the debate is whether I bring my real laptop, or just use the stunt crappy laptop (without wireless) that I was going to use so that I could stuff it in my backpack and have two carry on bags and no checked baggage. Decisions, decisions.
When last we met, I was just returned from Hawaii participating in my first Kaimana Klassic. About a month prior I had received an invite to play with a US team at Paganello the second weekend in April. I had to defer because I had a monster mainframe conversion scheduled for the last weekend of March, and for people in the know, you know you have at least a couple of weeks to a month of fallout after something like that, so there was no way I was going to be able to run off to Italy a week later. And it had already been postponed a couple of times. We joked that deadlines get pushed all the time but I had zero faith because of the high level visibility and the fact that we had already delayed twice (although not because of us). Well, lo and behold we got pushed out to the end of April. I immediately checked airfares and they were sitting around $630 to Bologna, maybe $560 to Milan. The difference in train fares made it a wash flying into Bologna, and since I had been to Milan before, I went with Bologna. I checked in to confirm there was still space on the squad and booked my flight for Wed afternoon-Tue morning.
Imagine my horror when Jim pinged me a week later to say that flights were now ~$400 and he was contemplating going (primary horror on the ticket price, secondary horror on Jim coming...). I went back to my Orbitz reservation to see what it would cost to change the ticket, and they have a $250 change fee! It would have ended up costing me another $50. So imagine my surprise when I saw Orbitz price guarantee which said that if someone else buys your EXACT ticket for less, you will get the difference refunded to you. So after I saw that, I worked on Jim to go and he eventually got approval from the man of the house. I had to send him my exact itinerary because of the mix of airlines (and it showed up like 30th on Orbitz, so no one would have picked it by chance), paid him $20 for the extra $20 it cost, and 2 weeks later I got an email from Orbitz saying that I would be getting a check for $221.40 30 days after the completion of travel. Woohoo!
I was last in Italy maybe 13 years ago, passing through briefly and spending a day in Venice, a day in Milan, and a day in Portofino. I have missed all of the standard spectacular sights in Florence, Rome, Tuscany, and guess what, I'm going to miss them this time also. We get into Bologna Thursday morning, and I suspect we will jump right on the train to Rimini. After that it is tournament Fri-Mon, then EARLY train Tuesday morning and a 10AM flight home from Bologna. I expect that I will be a complete wreck Tuesday night, with 4 days/nights of ultimate and partying and jetlag under my belt.
Another interesting experience this season has been that I have been more aware of the 'cost' of being injured then ever in the past. As in, I never ever thought about it before, even when I was getting calf problems. It never changed how I played the game. Or that I ever thought about it while I was playing. With the Hawaii tourney and now Paganello, which one could consider once in a lifetime opportunities (especially at my age) AND tournaments with large upfront costs, getting injured before the tournament would SUCK. This winter/spring I have been playing a lot of goaltimate, and while I haven't consciously changed any of my play, I think about getting injured periodically. And I imagine even the thought of it is probably changing how I play, which of course makes it more likely that I WILL get injured because it is no longer instinctual. Ah well. Interestingly enough, I have one more round of Goalty this Sunday, and as I'm writing this, I'm thinking that I won't post it until Monday. I can't figure out which would be worse luck. Posting it or not posting it before playing (but writing it). Well, I'm posting it Sunday afternoon after just getting back from Goaltimate. I tweaked my hamstring at yoga and got a nice charley horse from Jeff Graham at Goalty, but I should be good for Paga.
The Paga team is called Los Ox, which I have NO idea what it stands for, and is composed of a bunch of Jam players, 5 Boston players from Ironsides and DoG, and $ from Bravo/Machine/Revolver, hell, wonder which team will be next for him. I'm looking forward to playing with a high octane team, hopefully one which has its act together more than the Southern Dandies did in Hawaii. I expect that it will because of the much smaller squad size.
I did a quick check of the major travel booking sites and it appears that Orbitz is the only one with a price guarantee like this. I have to admit, based on personal results, I may have to let Kayak guide me there going forward if Orbitz is one of the selections. I'm just sayin'...
We are staying at a pretty swanky place, the Hotel Bikini, which is apparently right near the fields/beach. They have wireless internet access, so now the debate is whether I bring my real laptop, or just use the stunt crappy laptop (without wireless) that I was going to use so that I could stuff it in my backpack and have two carry on bags and no checked baggage. Decisions, decisions.
posted by Alex de Frondeville at 9:27 AM
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