What'd I miss?

After four days at the San Francisco Pen Show – incredible experience, can't wait to go again, fountain pen and stationary nerds rule – let me tell you one thing: the Westin San Francisco Airport has some of the worst cell phone coverage I have ever experienced in my life.

I say that to soften things up for what's about to happen.

Friends and countrymen, I did my best to stay in the tennis loop. Every evening, I sat at the hotel bar to watch the night session unfold in New York and, well, that wasn't very successful!

On Friday, after a very long and overwhelming Day 1 – imagine every child whose favorite day of the year was the day they got to go shopping for back to schools supplies, and those incredibly perfect children survived the intense bullying of being absolute nerds and dorks, and then 30 years later they all convened at a convention and attempted to socialize – I went to the Westin bar and sat down next to two people who had no idea that they were landing in the middle of a pen convention when they booked their rooms.

I love hotel bars unironically because you can have fun conversations knowing you're never going to see each other again. Like, that's the implicit contract when you strike up a conversation. Hotel bars are great for this. Also airport lounges. Or airport bars, I guess.

Or you can just sit there by yourself because, duh, it's a hotel so there's no stigma to being there alone. And given that context, people are pretty nice and leave you alone. Bartenders and staff can read the room. It's always felt like a safe place. At least for me.

Also...I typically stay at business hotels – MARRIOT4LYFE – so, really, it's very staid and boring. Which is my speed.

BUT ANYWAY.

I strike up a conversation with these two very nice and very different people and by the end of it, they've demanded to see all my pens, I've made them try each of them out, and one of them was so excited he said he was going to get a ticket and go the next day. He eventually excused himself because his wife and daughter are back from their day in Napa and his daughter may have fractured her toe while riding horseback. Meanwhile, the other lady has become my life mentor because she retired from the Park Service two years ago and now splits her time in Hawaii and San Francisco. "Can I afford it? No. But this is a treat to myself and I deserve it."

Yes you do, Cindy. Yes you do.

Also she casually dropped the sentence "My friend, he was Leonardo Di Caprio's stand in on Titanic...." which was so rad. All I could offer in return was an explanation of the Tomoe River Paper Scandal or 2024. Wasn't a fair trade, to be honest. And, boy, did Cindy let me KNOW.

So combined with my lively forays to the hotel bar and zero cell data when I was in the convention hall, imagine my reaction throughout the last four days whenever I emerged from the hotel every few hours and received like 80 push notifications, and tried to piece it all together.

I've been pretty exhausted since I got home – it was fun but it was also a lot of social interaction, which drained all my life force – so I confess, I haven't really caught up on eeeeeeverything. But from what I've been able to glean, here's my current understanding:

• Someone threw Iga's cap to a kid and it was stolen by a squirrel who might be the President of Poland. And he's cancelled now? Wild.
• Carlos and Jannik won super crazy quick matches and no one in the commentary booth belittled their opponents or used it proof of the weakness of the men's game and also didn't commentate the match as if delivering a eulogy? Crazy!
• Naomi Osaka got cancelled because she didn't make a Arthur Ashe Labubu. Leave Naomi alone!
• Jasmine lost to Maky and got a tattoo of a racquet on her face? I hope she's ok!
• ANDREY RUBLEV IS DATING PINK?!?!?
• Barbora Krejcikova routined Taylor Townsend in the Round of 16.
• There are three Czechs in the quarterfinals and none of them is named Petra Kvitova? You're a liar!
• Venus Williams????
• Venus Williams!!!!
• Novak Djokovic made the quarterfinals while playing on just one leg and with one arm? Truly the GOAT!
• There's been crazy chaos in both draws and definitely neither still has the World No.1s and No.2s and also the women's quarterfinal draw is absolutely not made up of eight Grand Slam champions or finalists. That super sucks!
• Sascha Bublik hit an underarm serve and won the point and Jannik Sinner DID NOT make it all awkward at the handshake? Who knew that could be done!
• Everyone's bracket is totally intact and fine. Congratulations!

What a wild tournament. I hope you've all had fun.

Here are some things I enjoyed. I will do a proper Bagel in the morning, I promise!

I went to three sporting events in two days

The ultimate New York City sports trip.

Adam's Sports StuffAdam Gretz

Pegula credits escape room trip for US Open run

American Jessica Pegula says completing an escape room with friends helped her rediscover her form and embark on a run to the US Open quarter-finals.

Yahoo SportsAlex Brotherton - BBC Sport journalist