After a couple of days of being a tourist, today it was back to work with a media day at the Audi Field. But that isn’t until the afternoon and I have a very small window to buy gifts for the family. I am looking for gifts for my nieces and my daughter, girls aged between four and 12 but there is absolutely nothing within a good ten miles of my hotel that caters for those age groups in any way, shape or form.
However, there is a Sephora and my wife wants make-up. Needless to say, this is not a product I am used to buying. I am dyspraxic and I find shopping of any kind difficult and stressful, I become very scatty and find it really difficult to find things unless I have bought them several times before.
Thankfully my wife knows this very well and literally just sends me screenshots of the exact products she would like. Spontaneity in gift giving is just not possible with my neurology so I need it spelling out! Even then, the first couple of items are not available and I make a couple of calls to Debs for Plans B, C and D.
With that section of the trip covered off, I have some good shrimp tacos before setting off for Audi Field for a joint media day between Arsenal, Chelsea and Washington Spirit. Jonas Eidevall, Jonatan Giraldez and Sonia Bompastor do a joint press conference. I ask Eidevall whether he thinks Alessia Russo can push her goal tally towards the perennial Golden Boot botherers like Sam Kerr and Bunny Shaw.
‘That is such a jinx question,’ Eidevall jokes, ‘I cannot believe an Arsenal fan would ask that.’ The oppressive heat usually felt in DC at this time of year has been largely absent during my stay with nice, bright sunshine but a pleasant breeze to take the heat off a little. Today that is beginning to change, with the afternoon sun slowly cooking a bronze tinge to my pale London skin.
Once the press conference is done, we move to the mixed zone and I am able to grab a word with Leah Williamson, which is always one of the great pleasures of the this gig. After which, i talk to Emily Fox and, clearly, she is in demand with the loca media having grown up just a few miles away.
I was supposed to go to the Mystics game this evening and was gutted to miss it. I was hoping to make the Fox and Williamson interviews into a podcast but the interviews were not held in an intimate enough environment to support audio release, so I had to transcribe instead.
Tomorrow there is an Arsenal America watch party for the men’s game at Aston Villa which I am looking forward to going along to to watch the match with some fellow Gooners.
I am not dyspraxia, but my wife still sends me screenshots of what she wants;)