Part 1: A Less Than Fluent Start

 (*picture taken before the following proceedings...)

So at last we have arrived at the train station, ready for our Glasgow 2014 spectator debut at the track and field finals after weeks and weeks of waiting. Needless to say, The Oor Games team is more than a little excited - I mean, we're going to see Bolt, for crying out loud! And, amazingly, all is well at the moment and it remains this way as we board the train to Glasgow Queen Street along with a lot of other Games bound travellers and I begin tweeting quite happily from my seat while everyone else enjoys the start of the journey.
Perhaps the acrid smell of an engine burning or the train being delayed by random signal problems in the middle of nowhere should have both been omens for the first of a series of little 'hurdles' the day was about to throw at us.
Having what I'm sure a few would describe as an OCD about being organised, I was typically noting down the names and start times of all our Scottish competitors due to compete in the evening's events when Julie, holder of the sacred Commonwealth tickets, came back from the train's loo. I didn't notice her sit down and peer worriedly into her bag, pulling out her phone and a stack of now strangely coloured tickets. Two teenage boys were sitting nearby, also on their way to the Games, and so Julie, with a hint of trepidation in her voice, asked to see their tickets while holding onto our bunch of six. At this point, my attention was caught and my brain was quickly catching up with what was going on.
A dismayed look on her face, Julie compared the boys' pure white tickets to our own, now scorched, bunch. Yes, that's right I did say scorched. It turns out it's not advisable to have your handbag, or indeed any item or part of your body near the 9.52 Dundee to Glasgow hand drier if you value it at all.
So, what do you do when your much sought after Commonwealth Games tickets are suddenly set on fire by a train hand drier? Well, several phone calls later (mainly because trains tend to go through quite a few tunnels, and tunnels don't actually have very good signal, funnily enough) plus some much needed reassurance from concerned passengers, we were half confident we might be able to get the tickets reissued once we reached Glasgow. Only half confident mind you because we still had to a. find the ticket office, b. brave the queues, and c. find someone called Jane who seemed to be the only official person who could help us.

Part 2: Smiling Despite The Rain