I'd never been to DDR Storm before so when it was announced this year and happened to land on the same weekend as my 16 year dance game anniversary I figured it was about time!
With lots of other stuff on our plates, Sean and I didn't end up having time to practice for any of the tournaments. I mean, I did practice some ITG stamina stuff and Sean dabbled with ITG and PIU leading up to the tournament. We played a bit of other stuff here and there too but there wasn't a whole lots of preparation beyond that. It didnt matter though as the social aspect was our real motivation for making the trek out!
Since we hadn't properly practiced, were unsure of which, if any, tournaments to register for. In the end, however, we just decided to sign up for everything. We knew we wouldn't do well in anything but figured it'd be good practice and was better than just standing around all weekend. $262.05 (before cash back!) later, we were both registered for all the dance game tournaments available! For Sean, that meant DDR Ace, DDR Extreme Pro, PIU XX, PIU Prime 2 tech, and ITG tech/timing stuff - 5 tournaments all in all. For me, that meant the same plus a PIU XX female tournament. :)
Time to sort logistics!
Flights with Delta and Spirit:
-My sister is a flight attendant for Delta now so I get free flights again! Accordingly, I didn't have to pay for travel this time.
-For Sean, we booked a flight on Spirit Airlines. We paid $174.21 (after redeeming $108.27 worth of vouchers we had and before cash back).
Rental car from Routes:
-We needed a rental car so we went through EasyRentCars and found and booked with a company called Routes. We paid $41.25 for 6 nights (after redeeming a $30 referral discount for one of us referring the other and before cash back)!
Accommodation at Howard Johnson near Orlando and Days Inn near Daytona:
-Our first hotel was Howard Johnson by Wyndham Tropical Palms Kissimmee at 4311 West Vine St Highway 192, Kissimmee, FL. We paid $72.62 for 2 nights (before cash back)
-Our second hotel was the Days Inn by Wyndham Ormond Beach at 1608 North US 1 & I-95, Ormond Beach, FL, 32174. We paid $225.44 for 4 nights (after using a $22 coupon code, before taking into account LOTS of cash back)
Day 1 - 6/26/19 (to Orlando):
We'd been up for like a day when it was time to head to the airport. Technically, I could've stayed home and gotten close to a full night's sleep but I wanted to see Sean off at the airport and be more or less on his sleep schedule. Sooo, around 11pm, Sean and I hopped in an UberX to Las Vegas' Mccarran airport's terminal 1, where both of our flights would be leaving from, for $13.76 (including tip but paid with free credit we get through normal spending on our Uber credit card, which we pay off monthly and don't pay any fees on).
It was a bit of a gamble that they'd actually let me through B gates, where Sean's ~1am Spirit flight was departing from, like 7 hours before my D-gate-departing ~6:30am Delta flight but I figured I'd take my chances. I don't believe all airports do but they seemingly hesitantly let me through security! The nice lady checking IDs and boarding passes gave me a funny look at first but I explained. After looking at Sean's documents too and checking with him that we were together, she said, "okayy, you can do that." and let us through. Awesome. :)
I walked with Sean to his gate then and kept him company til he had to board just before 1am. With a layover in Dallas, he'd get into Orlando before 11am eastern time. I wouldn't arrive til 5 hours or so later so it'd be a long day apart for us! :p Anyway, I finally had to say goodbye for a bit and spend the rest of the night all by my lonesome. Lol
The airport was DEAD after that. I started the long walk and tram ride to D gates, found a spot near my morning flight's gate, and set up camp. As far as choosing my spot, I thought I'd look for something with an outlet but kept finding these horrible, fake outlet stickers instead. 😂 Luckily, a cleaner guy saw me searching for a spot like a pup finding the perfect place to poo and came to my rescue by showing me where real outlets were. Too funny!
With a layover in Salt Lake City, where my little sis figured I'd have the best chance of getting on a standby flight, I'd be getting into Orlando just before 4pm eastern time. It'd be a pretty long day so I figured I should get some shut-eye but that just did not work out at all. I tried everything - even melatonin - but couldn't sleep a wink!
Sean got a free sandwich (normally $6) at 7 Eleven at the airport during his layover in Dallas using points. (We still had lots of points left over due to a crazy promotion). They were also giving out free bananas so he got those too.
On my end, the airport eventually got busy again as people started arriving for morning flights. I made it onto my flight okay. One standby passenger wasn't quite so fortunate but the rest of us got seats. The plane was a newer one: an Airbus A321. The flight was short but rough! I got a middle seat in the back of the plane and had to put my carry-on on the opposite side of the plane and 3 rows ahead of me as the bins near me were full when I got to board. There were outlets and seat-back screens but I was too tired and was feeling too nauseous due to turbulence to make use of the latter. I spent the flight trying not to actually vomit. Ughh I couldn't sleep at all and it was REALLY cold. I felt like they were trying to refrigerate us. I turned my air off but was still shivering the entire flight. They were giving out Cheez-Its and drinks but ran out of time due to the short flight length and had to completely skip the last few rows, including mine. >:[ I just got to sit there smelling the delicious Cheez-Its while hearing everyone in front of me crunch. So irritating, probably moreso because of sleep deprivation.
Once off that first flight, I had to walk pretty far to get to my already-boarding connecting flight and then had to wait in an insanely busy area to get on but I got on! I was given an aisle seat, again near the back of the plane, but someone was sitting in my seat. Luckily, his seat was the window seat in the same row so we just traded.
On this flight, I discovered that Delta has free wifi (limited to messaging and a few other things, I think). Better, however, is that T-Mobile customers like us also get an hour of free regular wifi as well as text messaging. I finally got my Cheez-Its on this flight too! A lot of people, including lady next to me, bought expensive snack boxes but I just took the freebies. Snack-wise, that meant either Cheez-Its, a Biscoff biscuit, a Kind bar, or Almonds. The flight attendants made two full snack and beverage rounds and I had to go with the long-awaited Cheez-Its twice over. For drinks, it was Starbucks coffee, hot tea, water, any of a handful of Coke products or juices,.. I opted for OJ both times as well but they brought coffee around immediately after the first round so I finally got my Starbucks too and without the line or the cost! There were outlets and seat-back screens with entertainment galore including hundreds of movies, TV shows, audio options, games again on this flight. I still didn't look through much or enjoy any of it, as I was still trying to sleep, but I saw that there was lot of new stuff, at least in the "New Releases" movie category.
Sean had spent over an hour fighting with the rental car company but eventually got our car. He'd then gone for a walk around a nearby park and did some shopping and exploring. When I arrived in Orlando, he was ready for me and met me at passenger pick up with lots of bags of jalepeño cheese balls - some of my favorite chips!! Omg.. Apparently, he'd stopped in a Dollar Tree store and picked up a bunch for me! <3 <3 <3
Hungry, our first stop was a place we don't have out west and hadn't been to in ages: a Racetrac gas station! We got a couple of $1 burgers there and threw on so many toppings we could barely taste the burgers anymore. XD
Not even gonna get into all the details here but we had a hell of an ordeal getting checked into our hotel room then. LOL Not sure how things manage to be so hard for us sometimes but we got there in the end!
There were cute, stray cats wandering around at our hotel! We got to hold and pet a couple of them over the weekend. :3
Sean collapsed into bed not long after getting settled in our hotel room and didn't really get up again for the rest of the night. My little sis Liz was flying into Orlando to hang with us though and would be arriving tonight so I stayed up to greet her when she got there. (I'd been up approx 2 days by that point and didn't trust an alarm to wake me if I got cozy in bed.)
Liz's flight landed at 11pm but it was probably nearly 1am by the time her Uber got her to our hotel. I chatted with her for a good while before she decided to walk to Walmart and TGI Friday's to get booze and food before winding down for bed. I passed out around 3am. Liz probably got to sleep around 4?
Day 2 - 6/27/19 (Orlando Exploration):
Today was my 16 year dance game anniversary! I figured I'd save the dance game celebrations for the weekend though and enjoy Orlando with family in the meantime!
I was awake again around 8am somehow. Must've been the excitement?
Once I finally managed to get everyone vertical and headed out for the day, our first stop was Aldi! I figured trying to survive on cheese balls was a bad idea so we needed some groceries. :p
Next up was Dunkin Donuts. Liz and I used our T-Mobile Tuesdays deals and got free, much needed, iced coffees!
At a Speedway gas station, which we also have zero of out west, we all used coupons we had for a free Red Bull each. Gotta get those deals! :p
Then we stopped in a CVS we spotted and I used a $2 credit they'd given me for who knows what reason and got a lipstick and a Lindt chocolate for like $0.41. I swear, my life is like one big ass bargain hunt! XD
Finally, we were ready to do some real exploration! We got into Orlando and drove up and down International Dr and nearby areas, where lots of the major sights were. Sean and I had seen it all plenty before but it'd been a good while and Liz still needed to sightsee there. We saw baby alligators, visited a random Hulk Hogan store, and looked around the huge McDonald's at 6875 Sand Lake Rd (no dance games but they DID have Grand Piano Keys) before stopping for food.
Liz had a $50 for a restaurant called Saltgrass Steak House so we went in and ate WAY too much delicious food! Nice atmosphere there!
We were back at it then, window shopping near the ICON Orlando Observation Wheel. There was an arcade called Arcade City there so we checked that out too but no music games.
Behind a Walmart, we caught a cute lizard! Just for a moment, of course, before I turned him loose slightly further from the road.
We picked up some booze at Walmart and then headed back to the hotel to get festive while relaxing in the huge, warm, and very busy pool! So nice. The cats were hanging around near there too. Haha
I caught a toad back outside our hotel room. So many cute animals here!! I turned him loose in a slightly safer spot after a min.
Lots of drinks and TV later, we made it back to sleep.
Day 3 - 6/28/19 (Storm qualifiers):
We did a bad job of checking out of and leaving the hotel in a timely fashion today but we got there.
Liz had to fly back to Atlanta this afternoon but we had some time to kill before then so we found a place called Kissimmee Lakefront Park and went for a walk around. Though it was crazy hot and humid out, it was a really nice day! We spotted lots of wildlife in and near the water there including gators, various birds, giant snails, lizards..
Food time next! We grabbed more $1 burgers from Racetrac and used T-Mobile Tuesdays deals to get some free tacos at Taco Bell.
Sean and I had to drop Liz off at the airport then. :'( His and my adventures were only just beginning though.
It was time to drive to Daytona for the main reason we'd flown out here: DDR Storm! We had to get checked into our second hotel, about 20 mins north of Storm, first though and it was a good 1.5 - 2 hour drive from where we were at the time. We were hungry again too so, after getting settled into the hotel and starting back out again, we got food at Checkers on the way to Storm. We then found free parking about a 9 minute walk away from the Ocean Center convention center, where Storm was being held.
FINALLY, a little before 8pm, we were at Storm! We picked up our badges and some cool commemorative coins they gave out with the badges and went in search of the dance game room. (As DDR Storm is currently sort of a side thing at CEO, it took place in one of the large side rooms.) We immediately started seeing lots of familiar faces as well as countless new ones! We didn't have a lot of time to spend on socializing just yet though. Today was the only day to get qualifiers done for PIU Prime 2 tech, DDR Extreme Pro, ITG tech/FA, PIU XX, DDR Ace (so all dance game tournaments aside from women's PIU XX, which didn't have qualifiers) and we only had til 10pm! We got them knocked out fairly quickly, playing all of our qualifiers together except XX, which we decided to attempt separately. Speaking of which, I think this was our first time playing PIU XX, if I'm not mistaken! We dont have access to Prime 2 or XX. Actually, Prime 2 might be somewhere in Vegas? We don't have it at home though and don't go to arcades. Also, no XX anywhere in Vegas. We've also only played a handful of DDR Ace songs ever before because the nearest machine is a fairly far drive from us at an arcade we've never been to before. Not sure I know of anywhere that has Extreme Pro in Vegas either, though maybe we'll start running it on our machine at home soon?
Once done with qualifiers, we checked out Jebailyland Arcade in another of the rooms there at CEO and found lots of other video games, arcade and otherwise! In addition to all the fighting games, there were lots of arcade music games there too - even Dance Rush, which I've still never played before.
After leaving Storm for the night, we stopped by another Racetrac right by our hotel for drinks and more $1 burgers. It was late when we finally got to sleep.
Day 4 - 6/29/19 (Storm, crazy afterparty, and skinny dipping!):
We woke up at 7:30am today. I think we got 4 or 5 hours of sleep and omfg I was feeling so dead. No rest for the wicked though so we got ready, inhaled some free continental breakfast at the hotel, and drove back to Storm to knock out our 5 (for Sean)/6 (for me) tournaments.
First up was the women's XX PIU tourney at 9:30am. Bleh... Only like 7 of us ladies entered though so the whole thing was over within like 1.5 to 2 hours! Also cool, I wound up placing 2nd (after Nayla <3) and won a nifty, pink "Stomp" pendant thing for my efforts. (I was given a red, plastic replica of an ITG bracket for participating too. So nerdy but awesome!!) Not bad, I guess, for an ITG player! :p I'm sure a lot of it was just down to Pump scoring or w/e but I'll take it. Also, so proud of the other ladies who got out of bed to come and haul with me! Top 4 results:
1. Nayla Arshad
2. Aleta Lucretia Ewing
3. Sara Ezgi Akgül
4. Katie Huang
One funny thing I remember from today was my last match on PIU XX: I got eliminated by ChadThaChillest on some song called Obliteration (S17). So appropriate! Hahaha
I sold some arrow and token necklaces I had with me to friends and Sean and I bought a couple of sexy arrow wristbands and were given car decals while there. We were given some PIU AM pass stickers, I think for participating in PIU Prime 2 tech, too! I LOVE my souvenirs from this event and I love all the dance game-inspired merch the community has been coming up with lately. <3
At some point during the night tonight, I started my period. :/ I was ready for it though.
I'm hurriedly typing this up more than a week after the event and things were already a whirlwind at the time so I don't even know where Sean and I placed in any other events. There were SO MANY talented players there as well as tons of new, eager, excited faces. We won some, lost maybe about as many in each of our other tournament matches, but we made so many new friends and caught up with so many old ones in the process! By the end of the tournament day, we'd JUST finished getting eliminated from all tournaments we were in. Our legs were so sore, my shoulders were in knots, and we were just overall physically and mentally drained. It couldn't have been more worth it though and damn, what a great workout!
Don't ask me how I managed to type more about airplane amenities than a huge, 3 day tournament. I don't know. X'D Maybe I was just too in the moment at the tournament and feel words don't quite do it justice. I guess that's what all the pics and vids I took are for though!
Done at the tournament, Sean and I started back to the hotel to shower. We got a soda and booze at Racetrac and got super cheap food at Burger King using an app coupon and a gift card we got discounted on Raise through Ebates. We tried to freshen up quickly and then headed back out to Daytona Beach.
We ran into Charles Vigus and other dance game friends while walking around and followed them to the Hilton where there was a huge dance gamer party going on in and outside of Charles' oceanfront room! It was SO packed with friends and got even more packed as the night went on. We got to talk to so many people we never get the chance to. Hotel personnel started coming by so a lot of us made our way onto the grass just outside the room, overlooking the ocean. Lots of horseplay! A few of us did crappy flips and cartwheels on the grass. Sometime after Flash arrived with friends, Sean and I played a ridiculous game of frisbee with them. Sean and I went skinny sipping in the Atlantic with a handful of people a couple of times. Most people hung out on dry land not too far away but didn't come down onto the beach or into the water. I dont recall even realizing I was the only female out there in the buff til Matthew Staniecki (Big Matt) told me how brave I was the next night. Haha I didn't feel very brave. I was just in the moment, goofing off with friends. <3 Back on dry land, where most people still were, we spent most of the rest of the night just hanging out, only broken up by the occasional pee break and visit with friends inside the hotel room. It was 4:30am by the time cops finally came to clear us off.
We were, again, soooo tired when we got back to our hotel room and finally got to sleep.
Day 5 - 6/30/19 (Storm final day and afterparty):
We tried to get up at like 9:30am today but we were just too damn dead and hit snooze repeatedly til like 11:45am. Since we weren't in any tournaments anymore, it didn't matter too much but I still wanted to spend the final day of Storm with friends! Finally, we got up, got ready, and headed back to Storm.
We stopped in Dunkin Donuts by Ocean Center and used Sean's T-Mobile Tuesdays deal to get me a free iced coffee.
Today was mostly for hanging with friends and seeing things we hadn't had the time to earlier in the weekend. We cheered on a couple of friends in their matches and looked around the fighting game areas, the arena, Jebailyland again.. We met some fighting gamers we didn't know before, pet a cute corgi names Yoshi, and played a fair amount of easier to moderate (17s and under) stamina charts on ITG when it was free.
Around 6:30pm, as the dance game tournaments came to a close, it was time for the almost ceremonial Storm group photo at the Daytona Beach Coquina Clock Tower behind the Hilton. It's a shame that the weather had been so terrible the day prior because many people had already gone home and missed the photo. Still, there was a procession of a huge group of walking to the clock tower together and just about turning the photo into an event all it's own. It was great!
Machines started making their way out of the event as the last tournaments were resumed and then wrapped up. Without competition for play time, Sean and I got some last songs in on Flash's machine. Things wound down and people started their return journeys. A lot of us stayed in the area another night or two though and a good number of us even came out for one last party!
Sean and I had our first mini look around the shops and places near Storm before cashing in more points for an entire free pizza and fountain drink at 7 Eleven! :O (We still have points for tons more free pizzas or w/e there despite rarely spending or even going there. LOL) We took our whole pizza out onto the boardwalk and enjoyed the night views of Daytona Beach while munching.
Stomachs happy, we went back to the car to get freshened up.
When we made it back to the middle of everything, we realized then that we had no booze for the night so we walked back to 7 Eleven and picked up a couple of Four Lokos. Ibotta and credit card cash back got us big discounts.
So it turn out we didn't actually have a clue where anything was happening tonight afterparty-wise. We figured we could wander around and run into other dance gamers to figure it out though. We started at the Hilton but were surprised by how many people had cleared out. We did run into Nayla and Adam Styles walking around and we spotted a few other friends but no one who knew where the party was at. We went back across the street to the event center to see if anyone was still there who might know where stuff was happening. While there, we chatted with Steven Lo and a couple of others. It was really nice. ^_^ They suggested checking out a sort of nightclub called Razzle's. We walked down to Razzle's for a look. The place was really cool but almost no one we knew was there when we arrived so we gave up and started back towards Hilton. After spotting a handful of dance game friends through their oceanfront room window and saying goodbye to them during a final walk through at the Hilton, we admitted defeat. We gave up on locating any major get-togethers and had started through the hotel lobby on the way to the car when we ran into Flash and a few other friends. They told us they were headed to room 720 to party with dance game friends there so we joined them!
It was pretty chill in room 720! Not nearly as many people as we'd hung out with at the previous night's party but likely as many people as would fit in the room and some of the coolest people from the weekend too! Flash, Fabo, and their friend Jordan, who I'd met that weekend and played matches against on a couple of dance games, were all drinking Four Lokos too. Lol Peer pong was the main event there at the time. Sean and Flash teamed up for a game or two, Nayla and I battled it out against them later but got pretty annihilated X'D.. At some point during the night, thanks to Nayla's encouragement, I took a sec to clear the air with Adam Styles. I was drunk but I think I told him that he's not allowed to hate me. He said he never did. I apologized for thinking that he did. Lol (Long story but I'm really glad we got to sort that out and be friends again, especially bc I <3 Nayla so much. :p) Then he, Nayla, and I joked around briefly and took ultra-cute pics. I talked nerdy, stamina and general dance game stuff with some people there. I remember we got a good massage train going with Nayla, Sean, Evil Dave, Flash, and Jordan (am I forgetting anyone?) for a good several minutes. That was pretty awesome. A bunch of us shared a few hits of festive smokes and I think my brain broke temporarily. Haha Flash invited me for a talk near the bathroom towards the end of the night but we couldn't get much privacy so we just hung out there for a bit instead and did some general catching up and goofing off.
I didn't realize how late it was getting by the time the room started emptying out a bit and people started wanting to get to sleep. So sorry if we kept anyone up longer than they might've liked but thank you SO MUCH for the great night and I can't wait to see you guys again!
Sean, Jordan, Flash, I think a couple of others, and I were apparently really trying to get value out of our night because even after we said goodbye to those staying in room 720 we still lingered in the hotel lobby just chatting and not wanting to leave! We finally had to head out and call it a night though.
The sun was up and it was after 6am by the time Sean and I reached our motel. Free breakfast time! X'D We knew we wouldn't wake up before breakfast was over so we decided to just get it before bed instead.
Day 6 - 7/1/19 (Daytona Beach and a good talk):
I woke up at noon and started getting ready for the day but it was sometime after 1pm before I was able to wake Sean. We were both exhausted but wanted to seize our last full day there. Before heading out for that, however, there was one last thing I needed to take care of...
It'd been YEARS since Flash and I had had a proper conversation and we had just gotten back in touch recently. Accordingly, we had a few old things to discuss so we decided to try again. He and Fabo were starting their drive home to Georgia and I think the hotel Sean and I were at was practically adjacent to the freeway entrance they had to hop on anyway so they swung by briefly in Flash's fancy ass 370Z (custom plates and all! :p). Sean waited for me in our room and Fabo went for a walk around and hung out nearby while Flash and I had a nice, overdue talk in his car. I feel compelled to admit that, after keeping the things I had pent up for about 9 years, this was an extremely important part of the weekend for me and really helped me mentally. I got a bit worked up and might've lost a tear or two but in the end found it really healing. Such a good feeling. Huge thanks to Sean for understanding why I needed this conversation, to Flash for stopping by to talk things out, and to Fabo for being such an amazing friend. <3 Can't wait til we can hang out again sometime!
SOO! Finally time to take it easy this trip. Haha Sean and I wrapped things up and got outta there.
Before getting back to Daytona, we had a little look around Florida Citrus World, which was a unique place selling fruit, souvenirs, fireworks and more and serving as the convenience store part of a Sunoco gas station right by our motel. They had a few pickled things there too and Sean loves his vinegar so we got him a pickled sausage for $1.
We went to Racetrac for a fountain drink for the last time this trip and saw a dead snake, semi-squished in one of the parking spaces there. It was brown, red, and orange.
Back at Daytona Beach (also for the last time this trip), we found some free parking, walked along the beach and pier, checked out some souvenir shops, looked around the two arcades we spotted there:
Mardi Gras Fun Center
12 Ocean Ave
Daytona Beach, FL 32118
Joyland Amusement Center
49 Boardwalk
Daytona Beach, FL 32118
Neither arcade had any music games but neat to see some beach-adjacent amusement places still going anyway.
Once we were done at the beach, we drove by Daytona International Speedway just for a quick look!
Panda Expresss was necessary then. We used gift card I'd purchased through Ebates from Raise at a well-discounted rate as well as coupons for a free entree each and got us a 3 entree plate each.
We went back to hotel with our food, ate while watching Talladega Nights (for like the billionth time! Haha), and tried to sleep at 11pm but I tossed and turned til nearly 3am.
Day 7 - 7/2/19 (Back to Vegas):
We woke up at 7:30am, got our last free hotel breakfast, packed up, checked out of hotel. It was about a 1.5 hour drive to Orlando Airport from where we were so we had to get a move on.
We put in ~$19 worth of gas at a Shell station approx 20 mins from the airport. We saved $0.13/gallon on the fuel cost using my Fuel Rewards account and a T-Mobile Tuesdays promo code.
We got to the car rental return at 11:30am and hopped on the shuttle from there back to Orlando Airport (MCO)'s terminal B, from which we'd both be flying out again. As Sean's Spirit Airlines flight would be flying out from a gate in a different part of the terminal from my Delta flight's gate, we had to say goodbye pre-security. Still, worth it for my free flight (which would've been nearly $300 on Spirit otherwise) and we wouldn't be apart too long.
We both got on our flights issue-free. I was on standby again, of course, but there were enough free seats. I wound up in window seat 29F, in the middle of the plane. I got more free Cheez-Its and orange juice during my flight but missed the coffee when it came around. x.x
Sometimes, amenities vary a bit between flights, even with the same airline, because the planes used vary. Both my return flights had outlets/USB chargers, a digital in-flight entertainment selection, and 1 hour of T-Mobile texting and data as well as Delta's limited wifi after that again though. Cool to keep in mind in the future!
My layover was at Minneapolis Airport (MSP) this time. The flight ended up being totally full though and I was sure I wouldn't get on. Luckily for me, a few people didn't show up in the end and two other standby passengers and I juuuuust made it on, claiming a row together of the last available seats on the plane. Yet more Cheez-Its and orange juice! :p
Flight on time, I got my checked bag (free, thanks to the flight perks Liz gets me! :O <3 ) and walked to passenger pick up where Sean was ready to pick me up!
We used a coupon we had to get a free Grand McExtreme Bacon Burger (apparently from Spain) from McDonald's Worldwide Favorites menu. We took it home and added some eggs, ramen, extremely essential booze, and leftover Panda Express (hey, I'd kept it in the hotel's fridge over night!) on the side for an admittedly odd but well-deserved dinner!
In the mailbox waiting for me then was a Valkyrie Unity tournament DDR arrow pin! Valkyrie Dimension is a women's DDR tournament which, I believe, primarily takes place online a couple of times annually and Valkyrie Unity was the most recent installment in the series. I'd never participated in any Valkyrie event before but entering was easy when I did so this time; there were just a handful of songs that needed to be played and I just had to submit screenshots of my scores afterward. I wasn't interested in entering in the past because I really only play ITG but I saw online this time that every chick who enters and completes some challenge of passing 3 particular additional songs in a row, in addition to the maybe 6 tourney songs that were required to be considered a participant, receives a pin in the mail so I just sightread the songs, submitted some shit scores, and here we are! There were 3 divisions with a total of 112 participants this time around. I was placed in the highest division, called Ladymion, and apparently placed 12th. It didn't actually occur to me that I'd be ranked at the time, as I was just after the free pin, so I didn't bother playing the songs more than just during that one set and I was entirely unfamiliar with DDR Ace prior to this attempt so I can't really be mad at that. :p Pretty cool ending to a 16th year dance game anniversary, nerdy, friend-filled, dance game trip!
*Please excuse the poor grammar, long-windedness, limited vocab, etc. I've been out of school a long time and am kinda just letting my brain purge thoughts as they come so a lot of crap here, mostly just for my own reference and memory years down the road!
