THE opening ceremony was a spectacular start to the Games and generally well received but one man who snubbed the Queen and Rod Stewart was Welsh medal hope Dai Greene.

The 400m hurdles hero is training hard ahead of his first race on Tuesday and told me that he’d already sat through enough opening ceremonies to last a lifetime.

“I’m giving it a miss,” said Greene beforehand. “They can be pretty long sessions for athletes, particularly if you’re training or competing the next day.

“I’ve done enough of them so I’ll be watching Rod and Subo on TV.”

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I did make it to Celtic Park to see the dancing Tunnock’s teacakes and the stars of the show – the little Scottie dogs leading the athletes around the stadium.

A grumpy old reporter from The Herald gave me his unwanted ticket and a good night was had by all, especially the security staff I imagine as they confiscated a lot of whisky from the journalists attending – me included.

You can imagine how much of a blow that was. We had been given the complimentary Famous Grouse miniature as a welcome gift at the media centre but never got the chance to have even a wee dram.

Glasgow 2014 – the Games that give with one hand and take away with the other.

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A few teething problems aside, the levels of organisation have generally been very good so far but there was almost a mutiny on a media bus heading for the velodrome.

Our bus driver took us to the athlete’s village rather than the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome and then refused to budge.

Some irate New Zealand cameramen were on the verge of forcing their way into the driver’s seat before common sense prevailed and we were redirected to the cycling.

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Talking of cycling, my favourite story from the Games so far was the one about four members of the Sri Lankan team being stopped by police when they were spotted cycling down the M74 near Glasgow.

They were seen on one of Scotland's busiest stretches of road at the exit for Motherwell and Hamilton before being told they were breaking the law.

A similar incident happened during the 2002 Games in Manchester when two Kenya cyclists travelled 17 miles down the M61 before being pulled over by police near Bolton.

I won’t feel so bad about getting lost now!