Snippets and Side Quests

  Like many people, Erika discovered Wrexham, Wales by watching a TV show where two celebrities buy a football/soccer team in a small town in Wales. Over the past five years, the team has had amazing success, winning an unprecedented back to back to back promotions, moving up from the lowest division to the second highest division in the English Football League. It’s a great sports story no matter how you cut it.   Even more inspiring than the team is the town itself. As profiled in the show, the town and team are deeply entwined through good times and bad. Despite countless hardships and tough economic times, the people, the town, and the team persist. Go watch Welcome to Wrexham and tell us if you don’t feel inspired.  Two years ago, we got to see the team play in a Vancouver, BC friendly and lucked out to be seated in the same section as a bunch of hometown fans. It was awesome. Doubly lucky, we applied for tickets and actually got some for a home match in Wrexham....

You may not have heard from us in a while because we’ve been preparing for a big quest. This one is taking us to Wales, England, Scotland, and Ireland.   We left home late afternoon bound for Liverpool but didn’t get there for over 40 hours.     Long story short: there was a bad storm and we ended up delayed with an unexpected night in a Dublin airport hotel.   This was after we flew to Liverpool, circled it for a couple hours, and they sent us back. Aer Lingus took care of us but it was an ordeal.   We had a planned layover in Dublin, so the last leg to Liverpool was on a commuter jet with about 80 people. After spending 20 hours with these strangers who quickly became temporary friends, our whole plane cheered when we finally touched down in our destination. Wishing everyone well, we stumbled out of the airport having clocked only about seven hours of sleep in two days.   It was a rough start for this much anticipated journey. We also missed out on going ...

The World Cup has come to a close. It was good while it lasted. We, well maybe mostly Erika, set out to try as many different fan experiences as possible during the World Cup. The idea was to make the most of getting together with other people who love the game. Celebrate the once in a lifetime energy of the most popular event in the world coming to our town. So we tried a lot of different ways to capture the magic.  It was an exercise in patience.    A lot of the options looked great but suffered from bad or incomplete information or difficult logistics. There were experiences we never tried because we couldn’t show up several hours ahead of the match, or figure out what we needed to bring with us, or didn’t want to pay a lot of money for an uncertainty. Some of the bigger watch parties and VIP experiences fell into this category.  Businesses wanted to cash in, and who can blame them, but some didn’t seem to understand that they needed to do more than put up a big s...

We were lucky enough to get a set of tickets to a World Cup match that didn’t require missing a mortgage payment. After waiting online for over seven hours on the first day of general sales, only one match was left: Egypt v Iran.   Erika was excited to see Egypt. Their captain, Mohammad Salah, is a notable star and it would be fun to see him play. However, the US president had just started a war with Iran. What would it mean to be at the first World Cup where a team played in a country that was at war with it? This wasn’t the only tension. Seattle has one of the largest pride celebrations in the US, with a full month of community events and programs that culminate in a celebratory pride weekend. Designated the pride match by the local host committee before the teams were chosen, the match would celebrate Seattle’s pride heritage and build awareness and inclusivity. However, Egypt and Iran’s governments both criminalize queer people and asked FIFA to ban pride symbols as culturally ...

The United States received the most wonderful gift for our 250th birthday. Based on the fact that we haven’t been playing well with others recently, we probably didn’t deserve such a gift, but it was pre-ordered and non-returnable, so the world gave it to us anyway. Nicknamed the Great American Sleepover, the 2026 World Cup is both our birthday gift and the party that we really needed right now. The internet has been awash with stories of visitors discovering joy in their experiences in the United States. Of foreign teams forming unlikely bonds with the residents of their American host cities. Of large groups of exuberant fans invading and captivating major cities. It’s so wonderful to be reminded of the best that our country can be, and that is such an amazing gift.  The World Cup even generated enough energy to thaw the Seattle freeze. If you are not from around here, this is the reputation amongst some for being polite but not that friendly. It’s kind of like in  The Hobbit...

Apparently, the best margaritas in Texas are at Esparza’s, a Tex-Mex fixture in Grapevine. Never heard of Grapevine, Texas? If you’ve been to DFW (Dallas Fort Worth) airport, you’ve been in Grapevine, although Erika would say you haven’t been to Grapevine. So what brought us there? Was it country music, barbecue, or sports? No! It was BGG Spring, a five day board game convention. BGG stands for Board Game Geek. The convention itself was fabulous. It was in the airport. Literally. The hotel was just outside the C concourse, which seems weird, but somehow worked great. We played three or four different games a day, met a bunch of interesting and fun people, and brought home half a dozen FREE games. What could be better? Texas is known for its friendly people and hospitality, but there can’t be anywhere more friendly than Grapevine. When DFW airport was constructed on the cantaloupe fields and dairy pastures of this small town, this enterprising community shifted gears and doubled down o...