Texas Bear Round-up 30, Day 4 of 4
SUNDAY
I got up about five to use the bathroom, noticing Gary had been sitting up in bed surfing the web and then shutting off the light and going back to sleep. I ended up resetting the alarm for 7:30 just minutes before it was to go off. When we got up, there was a bit of back and forth regarding the bathroom, as Gary needed to use it rather urgently as soon as I was done. As a result, he showered first. We packed up our toiletries and remaining dirty laundry from the previous day, then hurried downstairs to meet Chuck and Robert for breakfast at nine. About halfway through the meal, a nice youngish bear named Paul from outside St. Louis sat at the adjacent table and chatted with us. After breakfast, at ten, we returned to the room to complete packing and prepare the room for checkout.
We were checked out by 10:30 and stowed our bags in a roped-off area outside the Pegasus ballroom. There wasn't a place to hang coats, so we brought our heavy leather jackets with us. We waited for the buses to the barbecue and closing ceremony at the Round-up Saloon at a high table in the café area opposite the front desk. Quite a few people stopped by on their way out, including Ben/Bardic.
At 11:30, we boarded the buses, and I overheard that one of the drivers turned the wrong way onto Reunion Boulevard. Oops. The lines for food were run much more efficiently than last time: as the buses let us out on the corner by Hunky's Hamburgers, we walked through the parking lot behind the bar and were served Sonny Bryan's barbecue in multiple lines under tents before going inside the bar to eat. There was almost too much food: coleslaw, potato salad, mac and cheese, baked beans, and a choice of any or all of pulled pork, smoked sausage, and brisket (I had all three), with a roll to sop up the sauce and a cookie.
Many tables and chairs were set up, but there weren't two seats together anymore so we stood at a counter by the square bar on the left side of the room when entering by the front door. I grabbed a Coke for Gary and a Crackberry cider for myself from the bar. When we finished eating, I saw that no one else was arriving with food and there were a few open seats, so we moved to the table and watched the closing ceremony from there. After the ceremony, the staff were clearing out the tables and chairs, so we spent the last half hour or so before we left at the wood rail overlooking the dance floor.
Around two, we boarded the bus to return to the hotel by way of the Hidden Door and the Eagle (the latter bar had relocated to a much larger venue on the Trinity River flats near the hotel). When we arrived at the hotel, we stopped by the restroom and retrieved our bags, then returned to Union Station to board the train to the airport. The shorter leg of the trip was quick (one stop to West End) and a couple other TBRU participants were on board. On the longer leg, first an older fellow with a rolling walker was flirting with the ladies and consequently was slow in boarding the train, and then a couple dudes with bicycles boarded and took up so much space that Gary strongly suggested I move to the seat opposite him at the first opportunity. In doing so, I banged my head on the wheel of the bike suspended from the hook in front of me, so I fumed for maybe 30 seconds or so and then laughed at the absurdity of the situation. The rest of the train trip went pretty much without further incident.
We went through security in Terminal A so we could take the Skytrain to our gate in Terminal E instead of using the shuttle van outside security. The Skytrain was more crowded than usual. We found seats over by the main aisle at our gate, and waited there until the Portland flight ahead of us departed. I made a couple of bathroom and drinks runs, and attempted to call Sheila, but the calls failed because the ambient noise made it impossible to hear Sheila answer the call. Once the Portland flight was gone, we moved seats closer to the podium, which relieved Gary of having to hear any more of a conversation he found annoying (and which went completely over my head, thankfully). The flight from Seattle arrived soon after that, and we boarded on a slightly revised schedule, departing about ten minutes later than originally planned after a brief mix-up at the rear of the aircraft.
We both got the Tillamook cheeseburger for dinner, which came with a bowl of veggies in hummus. After dinner and some snacks, I caught up on journaling and felt like nodding off. I actually snoozed for about two hours, the latter half of the flight. As we approached the gate, the flight attendant requested us who were headed to Seattle to wait for a group of people who had tight connections to exit the plane.
When we reached the terminal, I needed to answer the call of nature on line 2 before we made our way to the inter-terminal train. We skipped an overcrowded train and overheard the flight crew escorting some of the connecting passengers partway to their gate, since they needed to go all the way from N10 to S10 on 3 trains. From there we proceeded to the light rail station, arriving about ten minutes to eleven. It appears we caught the third to last train to Lynnwood, as noted at Brooklyn Station. (Yo!) Gary called us an Uber from Lynnwood Station home, and we arrived about 12:30 AM and were in bed a little after one.
I got up about five to use the bathroom, noticing Gary had been sitting up in bed surfing the web and then shutting off the light and going back to sleep. I ended up resetting the alarm for 7:30 just minutes before it was to go off. When we got up, there was a bit of back and forth regarding the bathroom, as Gary needed to use it rather urgently as soon as I was done. As a result, he showered first. We packed up our toiletries and remaining dirty laundry from the previous day, then hurried downstairs to meet Chuck and Robert for breakfast at nine. About halfway through the meal, a nice youngish bear named Paul from outside St. Louis sat at the adjacent table and chatted with us. After breakfast, at ten, we returned to the room to complete packing and prepare the room for checkout.
We were checked out by 10:30 and stowed our bags in a roped-off area outside the Pegasus ballroom. There wasn't a place to hang coats, so we brought our heavy leather jackets with us. We waited for the buses to the barbecue and closing ceremony at the Round-up Saloon at a high table in the café area opposite the front desk. Quite a few people stopped by on their way out, including Ben/Bardic.
At 11:30, we boarded the buses, and I overheard that one of the drivers turned the wrong way onto Reunion Boulevard. Oops. The lines for food were run much more efficiently than last time: as the buses let us out on the corner by Hunky's Hamburgers, we walked through the parking lot behind the bar and were served Sonny Bryan's barbecue in multiple lines under tents before going inside the bar to eat. There was almost too much food: coleslaw, potato salad, mac and cheese, baked beans, and a choice of any or all of pulled pork, smoked sausage, and brisket (I had all three), with a roll to sop up the sauce and a cookie.
Many tables and chairs were set up, but there weren't two seats together anymore so we stood at a counter by the square bar on the left side of the room when entering by the front door. I grabbed a Coke for Gary and a Crackberry cider for myself from the bar. When we finished eating, I saw that no one else was arriving with food and there were a few open seats, so we moved to the table and watched the closing ceremony from there. After the ceremony, the staff were clearing out the tables and chairs, so we spent the last half hour or so before we left at the wood rail overlooking the dance floor.
Around two, we boarded the bus to return to the hotel by way of the Hidden Door and the Eagle (the latter bar had relocated to a much larger venue on the Trinity River flats near the hotel). When we arrived at the hotel, we stopped by the restroom and retrieved our bags, then returned to Union Station to board the train to the airport. The shorter leg of the trip was quick (one stop to West End) and a couple other TBRU participants were on board. On the longer leg, first an older fellow with a rolling walker was flirting with the ladies and consequently was slow in boarding the train, and then a couple dudes with bicycles boarded and took up so much space that Gary strongly suggested I move to the seat opposite him at the first opportunity. In doing so, I banged my head on the wheel of the bike suspended from the hook in front of me, so I fumed for maybe 30 seconds or so and then laughed at the absurdity of the situation. The rest of the train trip went pretty much without further incident.
We went through security in Terminal A so we could take the Skytrain to our gate in Terminal E instead of using the shuttle van outside security. The Skytrain was more crowded than usual. We found seats over by the main aisle at our gate, and waited there until the Portland flight ahead of us departed. I made a couple of bathroom and drinks runs, and attempted to call Sheila, but the calls failed because the ambient noise made it impossible to hear Sheila answer the call. Once the Portland flight was gone, we moved seats closer to the podium, which relieved Gary of having to hear any more of a conversation he found annoying (and which went completely over my head, thankfully). The flight from Seattle arrived soon after that, and we boarded on a slightly revised schedule, departing about ten minutes later than originally planned after a brief mix-up at the rear of the aircraft.
We both got the Tillamook cheeseburger for dinner, which came with a bowl of veggies in hummus. After dinner and some snacks, I caught up on journaling and felt like nodding off. I actually snoozed for about two hours, the latter half of the flight. As we approached the gate, the flight attendant requested us who were headed to Seattle to wait for a group of people who had tight connections to exit the plane.
When we reached the terminal, I needed to answer the call of nature on line 2 before we made our way to the inter-terminal train. We skipped an overcrowded train and overheard the flight crew escorting some of the connecting passengers partway to their gate, since they needed to go all the way from N10 to S10 on 3 trains. From there we proceeded to the light rail station, arriving about ten minutes to eleven. It appears we caught the third to last train to Lynnwood, as noted at Brooklyn Station. (Yo!) Gary called us an Uber from Lynnwood Station home, and we arrived about 12:30 AM and were in bed a little after one.