I went to the Queen Mary Scottish Festival yesterday and they were the worst-run Games I have ever attended.

I've been going to Games for nearly 40 years. I've been to nearly all the California Games, several Games in the Eastern US, and a few different Games in Scotland, but The Queen Mary yesterday took the cake.

The first crazy thing was right after I got there. I bought my ticket (my band isn't playing there this year) and walked through the main Games area towards the boat where the solo piping competition is always held.

There was a security guy there on the stairs leading onto the boat telling people that if they passed by him, they couldn't return that way, but would have to leave by another route and go all the way around the village to re-enter the Games there. Trouble is, once you left the Games you couldn't re-enter without buying a new ticket! Yes it would cost $22 to go listen to the solo piping and return to the main Games area!

The weather got warm and I was going to go out to my car to put my jacket away, but no! If you left the Games through the main gate you had to buy a new ticket to re-enter! $22 per visit to your car!

The ridiculous thing is, is that they had handstamps, but would only stamp the hands of people with "participant" tickets (vendors, performers, competitiors). Us poor people who had paid full price to enter couldn't get their hands stamped!

I heard that these issues didn't have anything to do with the people running the Games, but were solely the fault of the management of the boat.

I happened to see the guy who is the manager of the boat (they made him honorary Chieftan!) and complained about having to buy a new ticket to move about the Games or to re-enter the Games. He claimed that he knew nothing about this issue. But the security people were enforcing the no-re-enter thing.