Viennese Ball 2015

Wow, VBall was =awesome= this year!  Probably the best time I've ever had at a VBall, it was just good times all around.

I had dinner with Isabelle and Jeremy--the initial plan was to eat at Gochi's but we forgot to make a reservation and the wait was going to be too long so we tried out a mediterranean place on Castro instead.  I had an entree that was....essentially a plate of beef and lamb slices, with some cubed bread and yogurt.  Haha, meat and carbs...if I went again I would order something else with more variety probably.

VBall wasn't in SF this year!!!  It was at the Hyatt in Santa Clara which meant it's only 15 minutes away, hooray!  The new venue was a bit interesting...the layout was a bit strange but I didn't really have many complaints with it.  It did feel a bit smaller than the usual place, but VBall never really has enough space as a general rule anyways (until later in the night).

Opening was great!  JJ and Lewis, you guys did such a good job...and of course I was fangirling all the time at the pretty dresses and cuteness.  Ahhh, everyone was so pretty~  Mad props to everyone for doing so well!  And, I even liked the ballet performance this year!  I don't know if I just didn't like the previous choreographies or something, but I actually enjoyed it quite a lot, which was a pleasant surprise.

The viennese waltz contest was soon after...much sooner than I had anticipated.  I joined because...they were playing great music and I wanted to dance to it!  For this one instead of tapping people out they just picked 3 people to be the finalists, which was interesting.  I think either way is fine...but I didn't like how this year for all the competitions they had the 3 finalists dance at the same time.  It does save time, I guess, and makes sure that theres no first/last bias or music differences, but I think it's just too hard to watch 3 different couples at once, too much going on.  I'd rather have a chance to get to watch everyone individually, you know?

It was so nice getting to see everybody!  That's really the great part about VBall, is that everyone goes!  Just get to go around and say hi to everyone, see all their pretty clothes and outfits...it's really just a party with some dancing as an excuse to dress up (as opposed to Jammix or Big Dance where dancing is really the main event).

Deca premiered their new choreo, Say Something (starting off awkwardly because the music was too soft and had no good lead-in...), and then Danse Libre had a new choreo by Jason and...Julie I think?  It was great, lots of cute moments and personality coming through and matching with the music, so props to Jason & Julie for that!  And then Deca performed Carmen, which I was actually really impressed by!  They made some mistakes I think, but the energy was there, and I really liked it!  Props to Diana for making the choreo in the first place, it's a great one and it was a good choice!  Really reminded me of what Deca is all about...it was awesome!

Me and Rachel got 3rd place in the Cross Step competition despite fully expecting to get tapped out before then...whoops.  It was kinda cool how we had full couple gender representation for both the cross step and swing contests (boy-girl, boy-boy, girl-girl)! (counting me as a girl I mean)  Speaking of the swing contest, it was pretty much the same as always...pretty dang great, but nothing compared to that year back then with the legendary performance of Paul & Chris.  Don't think that will ever be topped...

Apparently I never danced a single dance in the Swing room, haha...oh well.  Lindy is super hard to dance with my outfit anyways--sleeves and arm mobility and everything.  I got some dances in the contemporary room though--not that many just because it was pretty empty in general.  I danced with some people I didn't know in the waltz room!  One lady who had a gorgeous blue dress, and then another older woman who didn't really know how to dance that well, but it was still fun!  I think her husband was taking a video of us as we danced....

I got to catch up with Christina, who was there!  She asked me to give her advice on her following, so I explained to her things like pushback pressure, how to maintain connection, powering through her spins so that she's not behind, and tracking your partner...she actually understood pretty quickly, I was impressed!  And, I met Winnie!  Yet another friend made b/c of common interests of pretty dresses and cute things...xD

Overall just a great night in general, I didn't get to dance with many people but that's...just kind of how it goes at VBall nowadays since I'm too busy just going around watching performances and saying hi to people.  Such a great time...I'm really happy.  Great job everyone for putting it together, putting on great shows, dancing great, and just being awesome.

Next up, Boston Tea Party...