Drum roll please

Announcing the FOUR TIME NATIONAL COLLEGIATE FORMATION BALLROOM DANCE CHAMPIONS!

I am so incredibly excited! It was such an amazingly fun weekend! We left Thursday night, at nine fifteen, and drove to LAX. We had the red-eye to Minneapolis, and then a layover of about an hour I think. I don't actually know, because I slept on the airport floor, and apparently my eyes were open part of the time, even though I was asleep, I didn't know I could sleep with my eyes open! We had played cards on the plane ride to Minneapolis, and then tried to sleep, but Andrew kept moving, so neither Kaitlin nor I actually got any sleep, although Andrew says he did. How he did, I have no idea. I did sleep some on the flight from Minneapolis to Columbus though. Which was really nice. We got into Columbus and everyone was really hungry and tired, but we had to practice on the floor that afternoon, and decided it would be better to practice first and then sleep. So, we went and got our fifteen passenger van, which was red this year, and crowded in. It wasn't quite as cozy because five people went with Carey and his family. Carey lives in Columbus, so that was very convenient. So four of the seniors decided they would rather stay in a house than with us in the hotel. Personally, I think they missed out. But hey, whatever works. It did make the van much more comfortable though. It was an adventure getting out of the parking lot! We had to tell Chris where the signs were, and then he missed a turn, and we had to back up and turn around... it was impressive. That van is humongous.

We got to the hotel, dropped our stuff,and then went to the little fast food place right there for lunch. It had decently good sandwiches, and Troy and I split a sour cream doughnut hole because we thought it sounded so interesting. We also learned that if you get something to go, you don't have to pay sales tax on it. Interesting Ohio quirks. So, we went to the convention center and practiced for a while. We were all so exhausted that it wasn't a fabulous rehearsal, but apparently it still looked decently good. Chris was impressed with us. The floor was sticky this year. It was so different from last year, when we were slipping all over the place. I wish it had been in between, although I'd take the sticky over the slippery.

We went back to the hotel, and I showered and then we were all going to take a nap, except that Troy had a friend of hers from high school who was in the area come over, and they were talking in the hall, except that it was really loud, so Kaitlin and I made them go into our room, and moved into Andrew and Sandor's room, since they were the only two in there, and they were sleeping. It was so funny, because Andrew woke up and looked at us as we came in, and we each took a side of one of the beds. And we slept for a couple hours. But apparently, Sandor and Andrew had no recollection of us coming in. They both woke up and were wondering why there was a girl in their bed. It was really funny. So we had to explain. We got up and went to Carey's house for dinner, because his parents were kind enough to cook for all of us. We had quiche, and salad, and really good cake. It was so so nice of them to do that. We had a good time too. We learned that apparently Carey dressed as George Washington for two years, every day, because he thought Lincoln got too much attention and Washington deserved more. That's impressive, for a six year old. Now I know where he gets his political tendencies.

We slept well that night, and were up at nine the next morning to get ready. We got there in plenty of time to finish getting ready and mess around for a while before the west coast swing competition. It was very sad, we found out that they had moved a bunch of stuff around, so they put lindy on Sunday at the very end. It was horrible! Because we weren't going to be able to stay until the end, we had to catch a plane! But, we found out when we got there that they had to be completely done with everything by five on Sunday, so we were hoping that maybe just maybe we'd get to stay and compete. If they ran it early enough. Andrew and I were really hopeful. We competed WC, and made it to the semi-final round, which was awesome. We were the only couple to do so, so I was very happy. It would have been nice to have made it to the final round, but, our last dance they put on groovy lindy music, and we couldn't not do lindy styling, so I think that's why we got cut. There's video somewhere though, so I'll get to watch and see what we actually looked like. I think we looked good though. :)

We went across the street to North Market for lunch. It's kind of like a farmers market, kind of. There's a huge building, with all kinds of vendors, except most of them are cooked food, and they're all permanent. It was really good. They had some fun choices. We went back to the comp afterward, and watched Lukas and Stephanie compete bronze standard. I got ready for gold, and was ready way way early again. Lukas and Stephi did really well! They made it through several rounds, which was awesome! No one's done that in standard before. Adam and I and Justin and Ari didn't get called back at all in standard. It was sad. I totally messed up the waltz, so I felt really bad, but it wasn't surprising we didn't get called back for waltz / quickstep, but we were disappointed that we didn't get called back for tango/foxtrot because we did well on those. *sigh* Oh well. We tried. It was rush and get ready for medley time then. And I got ready as quickly as I could, and ran out just as they were finishing running through stuff. I'm kind of glad I missed it, because I hate running through things before and then messing something up. It's so nerve wracking. But, I really should have warmed up more, because I regretted it later.

We were to go third out of six teams. The first team was a standard medley. They were alright. A four couple routine, there's not a lot you can do with four couples. Six is much better. Our standard medley would have beat them no problem whatsoever. Then, came Irvine (Wes's team). They came out of the back hallway, so no one had seen them in costume before. It was incredibly intimidating! The girls were in white unitards with strips of white fabric for their skirts. They had a black tassle attached to the hood of the unitard, and white face paint with black eye and lip makeup. The men were dressed in black with a piece of fabric wrapped Japanese style around their heads. They were... impressive. The lifts they did at the beginning were really amazing. We got a little intimidated by the whole thing, and decided that we needed to get into place, so we missed a good chunk of their medley because we were moving. But, from what I saw, it wasn't as good after the lifts at the beginning. We were next. And we had the crowd from the start. It was awesome! They were cheering so loudly almost the entire time! Everything worked well it seemed, our formations, our moves, it all seemed to work. PC and I lost hands at one point, we were sweaty, but it didn't do anything at all, so that was good! It wasn't the best I've danced it. But it was good. And I was so excited when we got off the floor. Oh, and it was really funny, in the routine, there are two places where we're supposed to put our skirts back down. (You'll understand when you see the dresses and the routine.) But I forgot the second time, and realized a few seconds later that my skirt was up really really high! Fortunately there was a perfect move right then to pull it down again, but it was really funny. Anyway, it was a great performance. The audience loved it. It was good. We were just hoping the judges liked it as much as the audience did.

As we walked around the floor, there was another team waiting, and they were telling us how great we were, and one girl said "great music" to me. I thought she just liked Bond music. No, they had two of the same songs, in an almost-Bond-themed routine. I felt so incredibly bad for them! We totally blew them out of the water. It's a good feeling, but I'm sad for them, since they had to follow us. But yes, the other teams were... no match for us. There was a showteam from ASU, which had like fifteen couples, and amazing formations, they didn't have much in the way of dance though, so we weren't too worried about them. Except that their formations were amazing. But basically it was between us and Irvine. Sandor kept assuring me there was no way we wouldn't win. But I couldn't believe it until we actually heard it. And when they announced Irvine as second, and us as first, it was so incredibly exciting! So so so exciting! We did it again! We did it.

We also had excitement between medley and the awards. We were taking lots of pictures, and at one point the guys decided we needed pictures of our lift at the beginning, so we were up, and apparently Troy came down a little too hard in a funky position, and thought she had broken her foot! So Andrew and I booked it down to the food court and got ice for her. It was a long way! And I felt bad, because Andrew has asthma, and he's sick, and so it was not a happy run for him. But, Troy was thankful, and that's what really mattered. She's fine. No major damage, she was up and walking again that night, which was good. But it was scary for a while.

So, we went and had dinner at Boston Market, and then went to see the professional show. Sandor and I made snarky comments about costumes to each other the entire time, which was really fun! And it was amazing to see them dance. They are so good. There was one couple who did a tango to Beethoven's Fifth. It was amazing! I didn't know you could tango to that! And her dress was gorgeous! It was black with green rhinestones. Such a cool effect. Some of the dresses were really hideous though. We left before the end of the awards, and went back to the hotel, where Kaitlin, Becca, Andrew, Sandor and I ended up talking and goofing around for a while. It was so much fun!

Sunday we got up, and got breakfast, got packed and took everything to the competition. They were running well ahead of schedule, so that was really exciting. Sandor and I competed latin, did fairly well, but didn't get called back. It was an adventure out there on the floor. It was really crowded. And I accidentally smacked some girl. I felt really bad. But she was alright. Which was good. None of the couples competing silver got called back, but our gold couples did, which was exciting! They were so good! But they didn't make it past the second round because none of the judges looked at them! It was so frustrating! They got majorly jipped. It was so sad. At that point, it was time to pack things up and go to the airport, which was really sad because we didn't get to do team match or lindy. So, no really pretty dress, and no lindy with Andrew. I'm most sad about the lindy, because all the boys who know Lindy graduate this year, and then I won't have anyone to compete with. And dang it, we would have done really really well! Because Andrew won it last year, and I got third.... and we're better now. *sigh* Oh well. In SF. We've decided. It's lindy domination there.

The flight back was uneventful, except that I started loosing my voice. And, we were watching Die Another Day, and got to like the last five minutes, and then Chris's computer died. It was really funny. We got back, and went to bed, since it was about one in the morning. It turns out, I'm actually sick. I have absolutely no voice today, and a cough, and my muscles are really sore in my neck and back. But other than that, I feel great. I'm going to get my work done and get to bed though. I want to get rid of this. I want to be able to talk again! Sign language is so frustrating sometimes! But yay! The weekend was awesome! The team was amazing. I love these guys! :)