Last One

So I guess this will be my last post from Denmark. I don't like thinking it's over but I guess its a good time to reflect how lucky I am to have had this opportunity.

This was truly an experience I will never forget. From the moment I got in front of the team, they accepted me, even though I was wearing some Truman Purple. I tucked that stuff away and got to work with the guys with the goal of winning the Mermaid Bowl. We made a great run through the EFAF, winning our first international game, then traveling to Coventry to put a hurting on those guys. I'll never forget traveling to London to play the Blitz, and just the stunning looks on everyone face when walking the field. Glass, rocks, and other miscellaneous chunks were all over the place. Watching those guys pick it up was great, but its a same it came down to that. I thought that was a tough loss, but I know as a DL we gained a lot of experience playing them. I know as a team we did, because we saw how big and fast they were. The EFAF was a great gauge on where we stand on a European level.

Finishing 9-0 in DAFF play was special. I have never had an undefeated regular season in anything, and these guys deserved it. I absolutely loved working with my DL. They came to work every day and soaked in everything I was giving them. They asked their questions and I would do my best to answer, and they never complained about anything. I don't know if I was the greatest coach ever, but they sure made me feel that way. I loved being on the field with those guys and could trust everyone around me. This team was extraordinary, and I am thankful to have been a part of that regular season. Obviously the Mermaid Bowl didn't go our way, but in the big picture, the season was a success. I still can't shake those moments out of my head, but I know I can over time.

As for the U19 boys, I had a blast with those guys. It was a drama filled season at points, but I feel coach Nick did a great job keeping them focused with their eyes on the prize. I learned a lot from coaching those guys, basically due to attendance and figuring out the best way to coach 3 people as opposed to 10 people. I don't know how it is with other teams, but I doubt they have the ability to do the things we are doing at practice, and I hope our guys realize that. Because we do what we do, they are getting better at their trade.

Of the field, I clearly had some great experiences. My favorite part was clearly Audrey visiting in the summer break and our quest around Europe. I will never get tired of telling our Rome to Munich story, ever. When it comes to nights out in Denmark, I think I had my share of good ones. From the first "night" with the coaches, to this weekend with the DL and players, I cannot say enough how thankful I am for everything those guys have done for me. From buying drinks to walking me to the nearest Metro station that is our of their way, to grabbing a cab with me back to Amager, these guys have been great. I have never been denied a ride from practice, and had a blast riding back home with Sunshine and Nickelsen after practices. It's stupid little things like that that I will miss. These guys are just great at making you feel at home and one of the guys. I'll also miss the few Sunday night NFL parties I've been a part of. I enjoyed watching the games with everyone. I'm glad they let me flip to the baseball game to check on my Redbirds, and hopefully I got some hooked, haha!

I am excited to get home an see everyone, and sleep in my huge bed, but the athlete in me is frustrated I have to leave. After not winning the Mermaid Bowl, the journey almost feels incomplete, like my time was wasted since I couldn't get it done. I know that's not true at all, but I will always feel like the trip was missing a little something. I would love to be able to come back and work with these guys for another chance. I know the Razorbacks' Americans and the Towers' American are coming back. The hardest part of the loss was just knowing that was my last game, and I can do nothing to help get the trophy back. Now I know what Brett Favre felt like. I would have been a lot easier to leave if we sucked, but since we are a great team with a clear chance to win next year, I feel like I should be there. I know these guys are going to work like crazy, because that's their character and how much they care for this team.

As for the weekend, it's get as much time in with these guys as possible. I hate the unknown, and not knowing when I will see these guys again kills me. I am pretty packed up, and think I'll be fine, but I need to grab some last minute souvenirs one of these days. It's a tough feeling leaving as I said. Everyone has been so great, but there is always this awesome feeling of being home and seeing the people I haven't seen in so long. Also, as a lot of the guys have pointed out, just the cheap prices of everything will be nice. I always love eating with the players because it ends up with us talking about how cheap all the food is in the US. Well, I don't have much more to say, and hopefully everyone knows how great they have been to me and how thankful I am to all of them!

No I am not in this picture. It was halftime during the Mermaid Bowl, and I hate that I am not with them!

One Week

So, the Mermaid Bowl didn't go as we wanted to. We had some stupid penalties at times, and at times some calls that made us scratch our heads and think "really?". The Razorbacks played well like they needed to, and made their plays, even though it seemed most of their drives started around midfield. It's a stupid feeling and I don't feel like going through every detail. I'm proud of our guys for stepping up and taking some swings in this fight. These dudes are winners, and I loved playing with them. Razors scored on a 4th down play, with the QB under pressure and running around slung a ball to a receiver, our DB played the ball and missed, and the dude ran in. I'm not sure, but I felt like I was being held. You can watch the play here and gather your own thoughts. It sucks to lose, especially feeling so confident going into the game, but I am glad we could give Denmark a great game to end the year on. I know these guys will use it as motivation and work hard this off season to become the best in Europe. I know individual awards may not mean much to guys, especially after a team loss, but I'm pretty sure and even bigger upset took place when the league MVP was given to an American receiver instead of our great reciever, Jonas Bo Hansen, who had over 100 receptions for some 1400 yards and like 20 TDs. Don't know what the Razor guy did, but don't think it was anything like that, maybe I'm wrong. All I know is that he will be my first pick in my DAFF NL fantasy league next year.

It was tough after the loss, but I went out with all the guys and we had a blast of a night. Leaving the Metro, I heard a girl talking to her friends say she is from Missouri, so I broke my rule of not talking to strangers just to ask where, and she is from Columbia, so not quite as cool as someone from STL. The team had a fun, but empty night out, and I enjoyed my time spent out with those guys. All of them that came up and talked to me for maybe the last time, and those crazies who apologized like they lost the game and ruined my experience or something. Couldn't have been farther from the truth, I enjoyed every minute (except maybe 2 minutes in the Mermaid Bowl) this year.

The weekend was not a total loss though, as I coached the U19 guys to a 9-0 win in the Junior Bowl. It felt great to see those guys out there, and the excitement of winning. I'm truly proud of those guys and how great they played. We scored a TD early, but it was called back because of a hold, and settled for a FG, which turned out to be all we need. We added a rushing TD later, and our defense played lights out. I loved those guys and am glad we won. I've been told no teams have ever won both a Junior Bowl and Mermaid Bowl, so I guess the U19 guys ruined it for us (just kidding). I was really hoping to break the trend and get two golds, but its a cruel world we live in right.

Yesterday, I laid in bed all day basically and watched How I Met Your Mother, which was on TV all day. I went over and hung out with some guys and watched the football games. He has ESPN America, so I got to flip around to the Cardinals game, which started out great, but ended miserably. I love the look on the guys' faces when I try to explain what's happening. They have very little knowledge of the game, so I am explaining balls and strikes, foul balls, and stuff like that. It makes me feel like some sort of genius.

As for my last week, nothing special planned. Going to try to get most of my packing done early, which will be broken up Tuesday for an after school thing, but I would just like it out of the way. I got some souvenir shopping to do, and some last football related stuff, but it's crazy it's over. I can't believe football is done, and I won't be able to help these guys on their quest to get the trophy back.

Time to pack I guess, see all you Americans soon!

Almost Here

So, in almost 24 hours, the U19 game will be kicking off. I am super excited for these games. After a solid week of practice on both levels, we are a confident group of guys heading into Saturday. The juniors have been working together as a unit more than ever this year, and it's evident they believe in each other and buy into what it will take to win the game.

The seniors put together a tremendous week of practice. So many of the guys sacrificed a lot, and moved their schedules around to be able to make it. It shows how much it means to them. I cannot be more excited for these guys to get out to the field and play fast, ferocious football and get after the Razorbacks. Last night was my last football practice ever, and it was a bit sad, but there is no time to dwell on that with the huge game this weekend. And just like after my first practice, I went to Kosk with some of the guys, except this time, I am able to order for myself! It's crazy to think it's almost over, but there is one more business day tomorrow.

For those in the US that want to follow the game,you can pay for the stream here, or I'm assuming you can follow twitter or USfootball.dk to get some updates. It will be a huge day for the team.

Tonight I am missing my 5 year high school reunion, and tomorrow is the homecoming game at Truman, but there is not a place I would rather be this weekend than here with these guys, playing in the biggest football game I've ever been a part of.

The Beginning of the End

So today marks the beginning of the last work week in Denmark. Kind of crazy to think about how fast it's gone and all that stuff, but I'll reflect on that another time. I still got some business to take care of!

Last week, the U19 team had a spirited week of practice. They are all so focused, it's crazy to see their attitude this time around against the Towers compared to the last. We have a confidence, but are putting our work in to make sure it's sound confidence.

As for the seniors, Tuesday we had our picture day. It wasn't anything crazy, but its not like college, where all the guys are behind the cameraman trying to make you laugh and look stupid in your picture. I also had to give my height in centimeters and my weight in kilos, which surprised some people that I knew, but only due to my exercise science classes at Truman. Guess college did teach me something! On Thursday evening, the defense met up for some scout on the Razorbacks and some conditioning. We know what they want to do, and we will be prepared for that, and any other thing they may try to throw at us. Heading into this game, we will be a confident bunch of guys, and rightfully so! Everyone is eager to get to Farum Park and get rolling.

The weather has been gorgeous, and it was no different Friday and Saturday. Friday, I went to the beach for a couple of hours and finished reading The Junction Boys. Reminded me of a slightly more difficult freshman and sophomore fall camp at Camp Clark. We knew what we were getting into, we got water, and we had some grass to practice on. It was an interesting book. It was so nice, that I even dipped my legs in the water and cooled off. It was pretty cold, but it felt a bit refreshing on the hotter day. Saturday, I went into Copenhagen on another beautiful day and took the Jerry Glanville book Esben had with me. I sat out at a harbor by Amalienborg Palace and did some reading. I went to the Strøget to look at some souvenirs, and I grabbed one of those cheap take out boxes of Chinese food, just to see what it was like. Turns on Chinese food is internationally the same. It's not like the Mexican food that varies by location, the Chinese food is just oiled and greases up stuff, and fried shrimp and chicken. They really got the consistency down. I ate that at the harbor and on my way back, grabbed some ice cream. It just felt right on such a gorgeous day.

Sunday, I joined AG at the FC København soccer game. He scored some tickets from work, and they were awesome. We we like 20 rows up from the pitch, about even with one of the goal lines. It was a total blast of a game and since soccer is a lot of dudes running and not much action, we spent a lot of time just talking. We got to talking about baseball, and just compared it to watching soccer. It pained me since I enjoy baseball, but it's kind of true, you watch a lot of guys stand around and not much happening. One of the coolest things at the game is the 5 beer holder thing. You buy like 5 beers, and they have this like carrying thing that holds the beers by the top and the bottom pokes through. It's like a cooler version of the 4 drink carrying thing that's awkward to hold. The game was a lot of fun to be at, but it ended in a tie. FCK scored on a pretty awesome header in the second half to go up 1-0, but Aarhus equalized with a PK in the 90th minute. The atmosphere of the game is crazy, as the opposing fans have their own section just surrounded my security, and they get a security escort in and out of the stadium, and their buses got a police escort out of the city. They basically got the same treatment that the president of the US gets when he goes anywhere. The game is filled with chants, which make the game exciting I guess, since not much really happens on the field. After the game, I bought one of those soccer scarfs that says the team name, and I got the one that says the name of the player who scored, N'Doye, just because. I really didn't have a preference, and thought it would be cool to have one with a players name.

After the game, we went to another player's apartment and joined some guys watching football. Frederik, our RB and my taxi driver, is a Rams fan, and he had the Rams game on his computer. I watched the last about 6 minutes of the disaster, and we were both disappointed. I wish I could have taken a picture of the room, because it was a bunch of guys sitting around a table, with their computers on watching their teams games if they were on, or checking their fantasy guys. Every 5 minutes, AG would violently shake his phone to refresh the page. It was like a big meeting room and serious business was taking place. There were some commercials and talk about the Mermaid Bowl, which was interesting to see. I clearly had no idea what they were saying, but I can hear when the say "Mermaid Bowl", "Triangle Razorbacks" and "Søllerød Gold Diggers". I left around midnight and got home and crashed.

So now, it's game week, and I cannot be more excited to play in this game. I hear the stadium is great and the atmosphere is wonderful for a football game. I look forward to a great last week of practice and enjoying every minute of it. Hopefully, we can pull out the W!

Two More Weeks of Football

So the Gold Diggers U19 and Senior team advanced to the Junior Bowl and Mermaid Bowl. A fantastic Saturday for the Gold Diggers to say the least. I'll get more into the details of all that after I talk about all the neat stuff I did leading up to those games.

On Wednesday I went into Copenhagen to watch the time trials for the 2011 UCI Road Race World Championships. The time trials took place in Copenhagen, and the actual race took place out where the Gold Diggers practice. The time trails were not the most interesting thing ever, as it was just a dude riding by every 5 minutes, but I pretty much expected that. It was a gorgeous day, and I doubt I would ever have the opportunity to see that again.

Thursday, I worked another after school football thing, and this time they came to the field. They were older kids, maybe 14ish I would say. It was just funny to see how many of them are just horrified to hit someone or get hit. I remember in high school as a freshman, the first day we got all our pads, after a practice, we all put them on and organized our own game, just because we wanted to hit each other. The coaches weren't to happy about it, but I just think it's funny how excited we all were, and most of the kids here are like screw this. I also haven't commented, but the kids just cannot seem to figure out how the crazy football equipment works. Putting on the equipment takes a solid 15-20 minutes for us to make sure the kids have the shoulder pads on the right way, how to strap them up (is it really hard to figure out that the thing that looks like a belt needs to go through the thing that looks like a buckle?). I understand the difficulty with the helmet, as it is awkward to put on, and we don't have an abundance of extra equipment, and I feel bad helping the kids adjust the chinstrap, because I don't know how tight or lose it is, and I think they expect that since I play, I know exactly how to adjust everyone else's equipment. I just realized how much would go into being a youth coach. After all that, I had my practices with the U19 and Senior team, and went home to sleep.

Friday was an off day and I don't recall doing anything too exciting. I went to the gym and cleaned and that was the highlight of my day I guess. I was busy getting pumped for a football filled Saturday.

The day finally came, and it would be the last game of the season for some teams. Luckily, it was the Gold Diggers day. The seniors came out blazing and diced up the Rebels defense putting up 52 points with some great offensive plays. The Rebels lone score came midway through the 4th quarter after some questionable calls against the defense kept a drive going and gave them valuable yards. I was out of my pads at the beginning of the 4th quarter, so it was hard to watch them go down the field and score. All in all though, I feel, without seeing the film, that our DL played a solid game. The Rebels came with a good game plan to slow me down, and I'd say our ends picked up the slack and played some good football. Hopefully the film agrees with me because it's always hard to get a real feel for how others are doing when you are playing.

I rushed to the showers immediately after our game, with no time to celebrate in order to make it to the U19 game on time. I rode with Carlos and we arrived just as the team was beginning their stretching, great timing. The kids were amped up and ready to rock. The game started tightly, but once the Gold Diggers scored, it was just the opening of the can of whoop ass that would be broken out the rest of the night. The defense shut down their triple option offense, and our ground game was rocking, as the youngsters followed up the seniors with an equally impressive 47-6 victory. The story of the game came with about 4 minutes left in the 4th quarter. The start time of our game was 5:30, and the sun goes down around 7:30. The Tomahawks agreed to this game time, and their beautiful turf field is equipped with lights. However, I guess someone wasn't prepared for the inevitable nightfall, and the lights were never turned on. We took a very-convenient-for-the-opposition 45 minute break while the lights were figured out. The officials didn't know how to handle it, as there is no rule for handling a situation where the home team doesn't realize the lights need to be on. Now I really have no idea what was going on, or if it was strategic operation by a team with less players, and tons of which were getting fatigued and going down with injuries. My favorite thing about the situation, was that when the game finally started, we scored on a good run the very first play of the game. It was a stupid situation that should have been avoided, but our guys stayed positive and ready to go.

After that game, I got some food with the Senior coaches and called it a night since I had to be up early to work the Cycling World Championships. I arrived at Holte around 8, and got to working the VIP tent. It was pretty easy stuff, we just had to check to make sure people were wearing the correct wristband. The thing I found odd is that while it was all fenced off and looked fancy, there were no signs or anything at the entrance saying what it is, or that today was blue bracelets, so a lot of people were just trying to walk in, and we had to explain it was a VIP thing. If there was any big skirmish, we just sent them to a table right by, and they would handle it. Nothing too big. I watched them go by a few times, and left at 1, and took a quick nap before heading out to Sanne's for a big eel dinner. Yep, I ate some eel. Joined by Johan and his wife, and Kim after the Razorbacks-Towers game, we feasted on the ell, potatoes and some cauliflower. It was pretty good, different for sure, but I ate it, and ate a lot. We had cookies and cakes, and just a great time.

Now, its time to prepare for the Razorbacks with the older guys, and the Towers with the younger. We are both familiar with the opponents, but it will come down to who prepares themselves better. I think we have a distinct advantage there. Hopefully, we get 100% commitment from out guys these last weeks and we can come out on top!

Game Week!

The bye week time passed as usual. I am spending quite a bit of time at after school programs right now playing football with kids that understand very third word I say. I still think it's pretty amazing they are 10 years old and grasping the basics of what I am saying and formulating a response. They neat thing is that the longer the players are around me, the more comfortable using English they are. Yesterday was one of the more fun ones I would say. We had about 15 kids, and they all had a blast. It started off with me signing an "autograph" for a little girl. I had no idea what to say, but I wrote a nice message in the pink marker I was handed and made her day. Then her and her friends joined us on the field. It was funny because the girls would go against each other in WR-DB one on one, and they were more fierce in grabbing and trying to get the ball, and then more consistently catching the ball. A couple of the kids left early so they could go home before coming out and trying out a Gold Diggers practice, so that is awesome they are enjoying it. At the end, there are always 3 or 4 kids that are just loving it so much and get sad when it ends. They generally are the really athletic ones, so hopefully they come out. It's just rough timing with the season ending soon and all. So I've been to 3 different schools so far about 5 times.

Thursday was a big day as it was the election here. From what I have read an gathered, a new party has taken over in what was a really tight vote. That's all I feel qualified to talk about.

Stall from Pusher Street in Christiania

As far as last weekend---Friday was an absolute gorgeous day. I started off by going to the National Museum and spending 3 hours there. It was so huge and I was wandering everywhere.
It's really neat as it takes you through time and different regions of the world. I really like all the old Asian stuff, they seemed to have some really lavish stuff. There were also some crazy old bodies that were found that are on display. I really enjoyed the modern history stuff as well. Crazy to see a Playstation 2 and computer in a museum. It was pretty neat, even though I am not a big museum person; I prefer to interact with things rather than read.

From there, I went to the City Hall to go inside and take a look around and snap a few pictures. It was awkward as there were other tourists in there, but no one that looked like security or anything, so I just wandered around a bit. Pretty neato place.

Rosenborg Castle from the Round Tower

After that, I walked to the Round Tower- an old observatory built by Christian IV in the 1600s. Wikipedia does a good job explaining it. It's cool in that its a spiral ramp up to the top and not a crazy big staircase. The top offers up some good views of the city. It's awesome being up there and recognizing the building knowing what they are. I guess I really should by now, but still, good feeling. It was a perfect day for that as it was sunny and not raining. When I came down from the tower, I walked into a bookstore for the hell of it. As usual, they are wildly expensive. I had no desire to buy a book, but I was curious as to how much they cost.

Saturday the battle took place. The U19 team went on a paintball excursion. I can sum up my abilities in one word-horrible. I couldn't hit the water if I fell out of a boat. It was a bit of just no experience, mixed with unluckiness, and just plain being bad. I tried all strategies---charging swiftly, planning where I will run, or just improvising. Nothing seemed to work. One of the guys that was never on my team played in like leagues before so he was a badass. I think I may have shot 5 guys guys, and got shot a good 7 times.
The worst fail ever took place in a close quarter shootout. As I steathily snuck into an occupied house, I saw the enemy. I opened fire 3 times from say 4 feet away. I aimed for the legs, and I hit him, however the stupid paintballs didn't explode, so no kill. We chased each other and I guess someone else got him, but that was pretty much the story of my day. How do the paintballs not explode from 4 feet away--I was so frustrated. From there, we went to watch the Tomahawks play their final regular season game. It was super cold and kind of rainy, but I made it. They didn't play well at all, losing the game by a score I'm not aware of. It wasn't a good predictor of what we will see, as they were using some of their players on the senior team, who was playing in a game to move up to the National League. I think out guys will be hungry, and we win the numbers game as they have about 15 guys. Hopefully we can wear them out

Sunday was time to take down the election posters. That was so much easier than putting them up. It took about 2 hours to take down compared to the 5 to put up. I really wanted to keep one, but felt a little weird carrying a poster of the former Prime Minister around on the Metro. The used posters get sent to Africa to build huts. Funny to think that cow poop will be smeared all over pictures of these people's face. Good to hear all of them go to good use though.

Monday and Tuesday were school and practice days for me. On Monday, the senior guys were low on numbers so we did some scout stuff and special teams, and some conditioning. Tuesday was a regular day. It's a bit difficult getting to the stadium now because the World Cycling Championship is taking place, even more specifically, in the municipality of our stadium. Therefore, our earned home game in the semifinals has to be played at Herlev, the home of our opponent the Rebels. Should be an exciting game, but I am confident in our team and our preparation. Hopefully we can secure the win and earn a spot in the Mermaid Bowl. Immediately following our game, I will be scooting down to the U19 game, arriving probably right about kickoff. Sunday morning, I have to work security with some guys for the cycling. Shouldn't be anything too excruciating.

So, there is a chance this could be my last football game ever. Hopefully it won't be, and I have the opportunity to play with these guys one more time. The way we've been practicing, I think we'll be okay!

Playoff Time

So, much has happened since my last update. I guess I'll just start typing, who knows how random this may be.

The biggest catch

I went to southern Zealand with Alex, one of our OL, to his parents cabin. It really reminded me of a Goose Creek type place. It was about a 50 minute drive south of Copenhagen. It took us a while to get down there Friday due to Friday traffic and a couple of accidents on the freeway. We arrived around 6 and fired up the BBQ and got to work grilling some hamburgers and corn, just a regular BBQ.  After that we walked to the inlet which has a dock (that is covered in bird poop) to "fish" and drink a couple of beers. I was really hoping to sit down, but it was too poopy. The only thing we brought up was a bunch of seaweed, but that was pretty expected. After that, we just hung out in the beautiful cabin and watched some movies, including Speed.

Saturday, we had to go into the beach to try out his water scooter. It was by far the coldest day I have ever got into any water, but I couldn't not do it. Once fully submerging, it became bearable, slightly enjoyable. I don't think the scooter was made for us larger guys for carrying us around, but if we were in deep water diving down, it would kick ass. Also, with it being so damn cold, I was a bit timid to go under and really try to enjoy it. We spent about an hour and a half around the beach. We then went into the closest town area to get some eats for later. From there we just enjoyed the nice day and rested watching the Hangover. We did some more BBQing and later, Speed 2 just happened to be on, so naturally we had to watch.

Beautiful home

Sunday was beautiful, but we had to get back to Copenhagen. While the day was gorgeous, it started to rain in the evening, and I'm like 90% sure it has rained in some way every single day since. I just expect it now. But with the weekend over, it was time to focus on preparing the young guys for a victory over the Towers and get the older guys focused on beating the Razorbacks.

Practice was great for the Seniors all week, as we felt we were extraordinarily prepared as a defensive line for their scheme and what they would do to us. We had a feeling they may scale down their playbook a bit as they also secured a semi-final spot and are a favorite to reach the Mermaid Bowl.

I wish I could have said the same for the young guys. It was a lackadaisical week with little focus. By far the most frustrating week of DL play, at the worst possible time because we needed to beat the Towers to be the number 1 seed and get a home game. Thursday was an abysmal practice when it came to executing plays. It is baffling to me that they can't remember the 6 twists we do. I even take time in practice from doing other drills to walk through the plays, but I guess they don't realize how terrible they are at it, until they mess it up. Now of course its not everyone, but the fair majority had poor execution on Thursday. I also think the play has some to do with having to use what we have on the scout team, which means receivers on the offensive line. The DL are just getting pumped beating up on a receiver instead of playing their technique and reading their keys. I had to let Thursday go and hope they came prepared Sunday

Saturday, I met up with AG, and our two Danish QBs, to watch the Herlev Rebels take on the Copenhagen Towers in the battle for second place. In what most assumed would be a fierce battle between two quality teams, the Towers prevailed like 47-7 I think. It was a disastrous game for the Rebels as anytime they got any momentum going, they killed it themselves with penalties or turnovers. Teams won't be successful with the amount of 1st and 20s and 3rd and 15s the Rebels had. Their ground game was tearing it up and the Towers couldn't answer, but its hard to stick with a constant ground attack when you are down 30. The "turning point" in my opinion came when the game was 14-7 in favor of the Towers early on. The Rebels D just came up with a huge fumble recovery in Towers territory. The very first play, the QB throws a pick, then the Towers drive and score, taking what could have been a tying score by the Rebels, and making it a TD of their own. Some more heartbreak came when the Towers got the ball around their 40 with 10 seconds left. The Towers QB LAUNCHED this ball to a streaking receiver who caught it for the score to go up 27-7 at the half. A score like that knocks the wind out of a team.  That being said, the Towers will host the Arhus Tigers, and the Rebels will travel to Aalborg, home of defensive end extraordinaire Stephan "Steve" Nickelsen, to play the 89ers.

After that, we met up with one of the OL who has ESPN America, to watch some college football. We grabbed some chicken and pasta for dinner and watched Wisconsin roll Oregon State. I left early to get home to get a good night of sleep before my long Sunday.

Sunday morning rolled around and I headed out to Gentofte for our youngster's game. Our practice was still on my mind, but I let it go, hoping they would come out fired up. We were missing some of our key lineman on the day, so it was a bit scary. It's just funny how we still had 7 DL, but we were freaking out about our rotation, when most teams would KILL to have that many guys. Just a fun thought. But the weather toyed with us, pouring down rain before the game, then doing it again as we were in pregame. It cleared up and became a beautiful day for kickoff.

The game did not go as planned, and I suffered my first lost in Denmark as the Towers went on to a 22-8 victory. They threw some stuff at us we didn't expect to see, and didn't do some things we were really expecting. They also made plays when it counted, and we were a bit unsound. Fatigue seemed to set in for some of the guys as well, but that will happen when you are playing offense and defense and special teams. I remember those times in high school, and the great nights of sleep that followed. We clearly didn't play out best, and didn't execute when we had the chance too. However, with a playoff spot secured, its not the time for me to become worried or scared. The guys should come out hungry, waiting for the unbeaten Copenhagen Tomahawks in the semis. I'm hoping they have that attitude, because they are a great group of players, and it would be scary to think we could be finished after one more game. That said, I had to erase this from my mind and scurry over to Rundforbi for our game against the Razorbacks from Vejle.

I got there about an hour before kickoff and hurried up to get ready and my mind right. The guys were focused going through their pregame as if I am not even needed! The game started out magnificently, as we received the ball, marched down the field, and scored to go up 7-0. It was a lead we would never lose as we went on to a 31-13 victory. Both teams had already secured a spot in the semifinals, but the winner would have an "easier" road to the Mermaid Bowl, as the loser would be more than likely facing the Towers.

As far as the game, the offense was clicking, and the D was rolling. The Razors had some solid players and played with a passion that most other teams do not display. While I feel their offense was scaled down a bit, our preparation led to us having a good idea of what to expect, as far as go to plays, and offensive line weaknesses. I was pleased with OUR execution of twists. I felt like I was getting blocked from every angle, and one of the guys would come up huge. That's what awesome about our defense, we are a team. If you send 3 guys at one of us, there's another dude you need to worry about. We got some good hits on their QB and the sat him towards the end of the game to protect him for the finals. Their American WR/DB played a great game. He had an amazing interception on defense, and some great catches on offense. A really tough dude. Along with their WR, their import DL is from UConn. Our OL did a good job against him. He's so freaking tall, that it always seemed his hands were in a passing lane, but it's tough for one guy to make a huge impact consistently, and out OL did a good job neutralizing him.

On our ride home, we had a celebrity sighting, as we spotted Danish pop sensation Medina riding in her BMW in the streets of Copenhagen. All the guys went crazy of course, but I had to get a lesson on who she was. This here is the song I was told to check out, because I HAD to know it. She definitely noticed us staring, as she avoided passing us, until the car swooped over to make a turn and lose us paparazzi. Pretty cool I guess.

So, that leads to a prefect 9-0 Danish season, and 10-0 on Danish soil including our win over the French. We have a bye this week for the wild card games. Since we are the #1 overall seed, we will get the lowest seeded remaining winner, which will more than likely be the Rebels or 89ers. Both teams would be fun to play. So, for another bye week, time to keep myself busy. Today I am going to another after school thing for kids. Basically they bash into each other, laugh, and catch some footballs. They really seem to like it. I also have some weekend plans to check out an FC Copenhagen game with some of the guys, so hopefully all that works out.

DL at my last game at Rundforbi Stadium

Bye Weeks

It's been a long two weeks with no football. However, the U19 team has had some practices, and a couple of the guys have joined me in doing some running. I can't wait to get back into the swing of things this week.

My time off hasn't been anything too extraordinary. I did a lot of walking on the Strøget and grabbed some souvenirs, and did some outdoor reading on days that didn't rain. I would just go into the city and either find a bench or walk until there looked like a good place to sit.  The weather is getting colder and the nights are coming sooner. I found myself wearing pants and a hoodie, in August, for the first time in my life.

I did have some fun over the break though. Last week, I joined the Running Backs, QBs, and Offensive Line for their annual all you can eat rib meal. We went to one of the RBs places and he cooked up 50-60 KILOS of ribs. There were maybe 14 guys. It was the most amount of ribs I have ever seen at a single place. I ate 3 racks of ribs, which was incredibly difficult, but I couldn't have some leftovers on my plate, so I cleaned everything. After the eating, and letting everything digest, we played some Rock Band, as well as Dance Central on the Kinect. There is nothing better than watching some O-Lineman dance to a Lady GaGa song. I participated a couple times, and even won a battle once, but it was far from anything glamorous. It was a ton of fun and a lot of laughs. From there, we headed into the city to some bar. A couple of other guys were there and we all just kind of sat around and talked, played some foosball,  and had a few drinks. I didn't engage in too much of that, but I'll go into why later. I had a couple of shots of the Danish snapps which is absolutely miserable. It was pretty fun.

The weirdest part came when some girls that were talking to a couple of the guys asked why I was always speaking English. My natural answer is well that's the only language I speak. They said I had a Danish accent which I, and everyone else, felt was strange. I showed them my Missouri license as proof, but I guess they still thought it was some elaborate prank. It was weird to say the least, but hey, at least I sound like a Dane, even though I can't do more than count to ten in the language.

From there, we went next door to Heidi's, because "they don't care if you dance on the tables." We arrived, and I see one of the big OL clearing off a table and next thing I know, he's on top dancing. One of our QBs join him, and next thing I see, tons of people throughout the place are on top of tables. It was so funny. I headed home around 4 with some of the guys. I got home and went to sleep around 5, only to wake up at 6 with what had to be the worst stomach ache ever---from the large amount of ribs I digested. My body was just confused. I looked outside, and it was a yellowish-green color, and just pouring down rain. A bit scary. I know that The Office is on from 6-7am on Saturdays, so I popped on the tube, and watched for about 20 minutes before I fell back asleep until 11.

Now Saturday was quite a day. I ate a quick breakfast and headed out to Holte, which is a bit by our field, to help out the team hang up some poster's for the upcoming election. I'll first dive into my understanding of the electoral system, then tell you about the poster hanging process.

So the Danish Prime Minister can call for an election whenever he wants. Apparently he recently did that, but before he can do it, he must get the Queen's approval, which is more just tradition--she's not going to say no. So then that happens, and people within the part run in different areas. The parties that get the most votes then get to elect the Prime Minister or something like that. That's where I get confused. I just know that people aren't directly voting for the Prime Minister. So the parties select who will run where. I guess to make an example is say that a party has Tom, Dick and Harry running. Tom will run in New York, and ONLY people in New York can vote for him, Dick runs in St. Louis, and ONLY St. Louis people can vote for him, and Harry runs in Denver, and ONLY Denverians can vote for him. That explains why there are signs for like 50 different people are up everywhere throughout the city. Also, smaller parties just put up signs with their party names. I don't know too much from there, but that's all I gathered and really understood from all the people I talked to.

Now to the signs. There are signs about the size of a medium poster, that we tie up to phone poles using like zip ties I guess. I went around with on of the DBs, JC, to hang up around 150 of these. We spent a solid 5 hours doing this in the rain. It was not the most exciting thing I have ever done, and the first time in my life I have supported any kind of political action. It's just funny, because these posters are EVERYWHERE. Basically any place you can hang them, there are 6 there. It's just nuts. Everyone agrees that the poster's don't do too much to sway an opinion, but it's just a custom. The elections are in a couple weeks, so I'll keep you guys updated with the winner. I think it would be really funny to somehow bring home a poster of the winner, just to have one. A bit weird maybe.

The rest of the time was nothing special. I saw the movie Horrible Bosses a couple days ago with AG. It was a great evening--getting out of the apartment and all, and a really funny movie. AG, like everyone else, works during the day, and I'd seen him at practice from work and know he's a sharp dresser. I really wanted to bum it up at the movies, but knew I would be with the most stylin man in town that evening, so I had to appear presentable. All in all, it was a good evening. Last night/ this morning for me, the Bulldogs opened their season against Northwest for the Hickory Stick, the last meeting until 2014 I believe. I woke up at 2 am here to listen with high hopes for all the guys. It was weird listening to it, and hearing the names of all my buddies and not playing. I guess it's something I'll have to get used to. It started off close, but Northwest pulled away in the 2nd quarter for a 65-3 victory. The offense seems shaky and Northwest won the rushing and turnover game, as well as convert 9 of 13 3rd downs. It's hard to beat a good team like that when they are able to convert on 3rd downs. I went to sleep at halftime, with an unpleasant feeling, but I know that Northwest rolling is incredible. I truly believe the guys will bounce back and have a good season. I'll be doing my best to listen to as many games as I can.

This weekend, I am meeting up with one of the OL, and going to his parents cabin. We are just hanging out, and doing a hell of a lot of BBqing. I look forward to it very much.

Lastly, I am missing another one of my grandma's birthday parties. It's been 6 years of football keeping me away, especially from the pool which I miss like crazy. This should be my last year away, and I wanted to wish her a happy birthday. I will never forget begging for grilled cheese sandwiches as a youngster, and usually eating my cousin Alex's leftovers. I like to think that's how I became a big guy, and why Alex remained an average sized human. Hope the weather is nice and everyone has fun!

Back in Business

Sorry for the long delay in keeping you guys updated with my spectacular life. Computer stopped working about a week ago, and with the help of some of the guys, I resuscitated it and it's now working, although every time I turn it off, I pray it turns back on, but that's not interesting at all.

So lots to talk about, but I'll be brief. I'll start with the Knights weekend. The U19 won 56-6 in the 3rd quarter I think. The fields don't have scoreboards, so I use my iPod to punch in the score as it happens, otherwise I go nuts trying to remember everything. The next day, the seniors did the same thing and won like 55-0. Pretty awesome to throw a shut out at them. Defensive line wise, it wasn't our best game which was disappointing, but at the same time, its a bit comforting to know we have a good enough team around us to pick us up when we aren't playing the best.

Most of last week was spent trying to revive my computer. I only really need it to watch film and get notes out for the guys, and I guess to keep in touch with everyone back home, but that's really it. Due to it not functioning and TV getting boring, I ended up reading a nutrition book I brought with me in like 3 days, which is unreal with how slow I generally read and how my mind wanders around. I was pretty proud of myself. The sad thing I guess is that it was a book I "read" in my nutrition class at Truman when I was a sophomore. It was nice to finally read it though, some good stuff in there.

We put in two pretty solid practices leading up to our game against the Rebels, who came into the game second in our conference with a 6-2 record to our unblemished 7-0 record. They have quite possibly the fastest player in Denmark as their QB/WR and is very dangerous when he gets the ball in his hands. They also  would feature a few key players who didn't participate in the 48-20 Gold Diggers win the first time around. Their defense played tough and kept them in the game with a touchdown early in the game to make it a 14-7 halftime score for the Gold Diggers. Both offenses couldn't seem to muster much, as defense seemed to be the theme for the day. At the end of the day, we prevailed with a 28-13 victory. The Rebels had roughly 180 yards of total offense, with 85 of those coming on one scramble by their American QB. No one here believed a white guy could run that fast until they saw him. It gave a lot of the Danish guys hope to think they could one day speed like that. After watching the film of this game, I was much more pleased with the pressure we were putting on their Danish QB. He was constantly had like 2 seconds to throw before one of us was in his face, chucking the ball off his back foot and completed like 5 passes if I had to guess. I don't think he's too big a fan of me......

Early in the game, I hit him as he was throwing and he mumbled God knows what to me. In the 3rd quarter, after his like 2nd interception of the day, I blocked him, and knocked him over as the play was ending, and again he said something. Now this fella doubles as their kicker/ punter and is very good at that. Being that I am on the punt return team, I guess that was his time to get some revenge. I as trail back to get to the punt and see it bouncing backwards and hearing the "peter" calls to get away, I throttle down and start to take it to our sideline. Next thing I know I get slightly brushed from behind and its the bozo punter "getting me back for hitting him" after he threw a pick. He said something like "thats for hitting me" or something stupid that a football player shouldn't say, I just said don't throw us the ball and you won't get hit and walked away. I like to think I made his day by letting him hit me, so I felt good by making him feel good about his performance.

So with that win, we clinched the first round by in the playoffs. Our next game is a couple weeks away when we play the Razorbacks, which could be a preview of this year's Mermaid Bowl. We also have the honor of playing against two UConn guys, a DL/OL and a do it everything WR/DB. Should be an exciting matchup of two unbeaten teams to round out the season before the playoffs. What should be an equally exciting matchup the day before our game is the Rebels-Towers game, which decides the 2nd and 3rd seed in our division.

I now have a couple weeks off due to the U19 National Team participating in the European Championships. They will get to face Germany and Austria, and the Gold Diggers have 16 players going, which is freaking great. We have a bunch of senior coaches going as well, so we do not have the senior practice, but the U19 practices will continue, which will be interesting to see what kind of turn out we get at that. I play on seeing some things I haven't seen, castles and such, and praying for some SUN. We have had a couple of nice days, but as a couple of the guys said a couple of weeks ago, the summer went south for the summer this year, as there really hasn't been any solid string of warm, sunny days. It has been nice recently, but it will be sunny and great when I go to the gym around 10, then at noon, it will get cloudy and breezy, then I head out to practice and its sunny and humid, it's so crazy. The worst thing for me is that the beach is so close, and it's never really been "beach weather" while I've been there. I hate it because I will probably never live this close to the beach again in my life. So that's all I really have to complain about, life is rough right?

Post Summer Break

Summer break ended and we played our first game. We got together and had 4 practices the week before so we knew we would be beyond prepared for this next game against the Towers. Our last game was touted as one of the best football games ever played in Denmark when we came out on top with a 41-40 victory, scoring withing the final minute. With all the hype from the last game, and the opening of our new stands, this game would surely not disappoint!

The spectators game out to support, and the atmosphere was great for a game of football. The weather was a bit warm by Danish standards, but a beautiful day it was. After a very solid week of practice for the DL, I was super excited to play this game. I knew we would be prepared more than the guys would know, and I truly felt we would win by 2-3 scores, but did not really want to seem so positive.

The game started out with the Towers receiving the opening kickoff. The very first offensive play of the game went for a 70 yard passing TD, 6-0 Towers. While it was a blazing start and not the way we wanted to start, a lot of the guys had the same feeling--it's just one play. They ended up rolling out on the PAT for an easy 2 to go up 8-0. The high powered Gold Diggers offense took the offense and put together a beautiful 8 play, 85 yard drive highlighted by a 40 yard reception that led to an easy running score for our QB on a keep from the 2 yard line.  We kicked the PAT and the defense readied itself. Surely they would not score right off the bat again.

They came out and ran on first down and we stuffed it. The next play was a pass down the sideline picked  off by our DB. The offense couldn't put another beauty together and punted back to the Towers, who were stymied by the Gold Digger defense and forced to punt. A major frustration on my day was again how close, but so far I was from blocking punts. I was a step away from all of them, but I'll get that back soon enough, since I could still feel the traveling during the summer really holding me back. My favorite part of punt return, is that I am usually lined up on a DB or WR, so that's kind of fun, and they seem to freak out, when all they really need to do is just get in my way for .5 seconds. I digress though. After receiving the punt, the offense put together a 7 play drive with a failed PAT to put us up 13-8. We would never lose that lead throughout the day, as the Towers could not move the ball with any consistency on offense, and really couldn't figure out how to stop out offense.

The first play of the Towers next drive, the RB coughed up the ball after getting destroyed by our LBs, including one of our U19 guys stepping up. I loved watching this play on HUDL, because you see him going one speed all the way to the play. Our DB scooped, and was  practically one on one with the QB at about the 20 going in, but instead of cutting to the field to get behind blockers, he decided to try to truck the QB and was knocked out at the 2. I told him about the blockers, but with a smile, as usual, he says come on if you're one on one with the QB, what are you going to try to do. Good answer I thought. The Towers defense came up tough and held us to a FG, making it still a one score game at 16-8.

To sum up the rest of the half without using too many words, the Towers offense didn't record 1 first down, and our offense was rolling, putting up 33 points, and the defense allowed 8, however a kickoff return for a TD for the towers made the halftime score 33-14 in favor of the Gold Diggers I believe.

We received the ball after the half, and as expected at this point, marched down the field and scored, going up 40-14. The Towers then seemed to have something going, moved the ball to the Gold Diggers 30, before an huge interception by our LB, killing any momentum they may have been trying to swing in their favor. The offense put together some crazy long drive before a blocked FG ended it at the Towers 5 yard line. They may have been down, but they showed some pride in their team by fighting to keep points off the board any way possible.


After forcing a 3 and out again, our offense went on a 3 play drive to score their last TD of the day to put us ahead 47-14. The Towers answered their next drive connecting on a 40 yard TD pass for the last score of the day to make it 47-20. The rest of the game was back and forth, as our offense ate up clock, and they couldn't piece much together.

When all was said and done, the Gold Diggers defense was on the field for 40 plays, while the offense had an astounding 90 offensive plays. That is a huge number and definitely played a major role in our ability to blow them away.

After the game I met up with some of the guys and had a pretty wonderful night out. We played this game which required like flicking (although some cheaters would push it) a wooden circular car piece around a made up race track. It's extraordinarily difficult to play, but I was absolutely miserable at it. Despite being so terrible, it was a blast hanging out with the guys.

This week, we had a family day type event at our practice, as the whole club practiced together. The U13, U16, U19 and Senior team shared the field and did some work together. It was kind of an odd practice for me to plan, but I did it based on thinking, what would I think is cool if I were 13 playing with older guys. I figured they would really enjoy working in with the older guys so I tried to get them as many reps with the Seniors as possible. Also, the Senior guys did a really good job coaching up the youngins. Afterwards was a BBQ, and it was a truly fun evening of football.

The weekend both the U19 and Senior Teams travel to Helsingor to take on the Kronborg Knights. It will be a weekend packed with football, which is what I love!

European Journey Part 4- Germany

So we get to Munich around 8am a bit sleepy, but much better rested than if we had to sit in a chair all night. We spend some time in the train station and got some coffee and breakfast. We then checked our luggage and got a map and went into Munich. We were meeting the Brinks around 11 at the Glockenspiel, so we headed out there around 10. It was about a 10 minute walk in the rain. It was about 60 degrees and rainy in Munich after seeing 90 degrees and sunny for a week, so we were pretty unprepared for that. Audrey bought a sweatshirt and we had to buy a new umbrella since we couldn't find ours (turns out it was just in the bottom of Audrey's bag). I don't know much about this Glockenspiel things except that it wasn't destroyed in WWII and it's extraordinary underwhelming. Twice a day it does this little dance thing that's hard to explain, but it drags on for like 5 minutes and it's not very cool. I wonder how cool people thought it was like 60 years ago.

We walked around Munich for a little bit and had a couple beers before catching the train back to Bamberg. I did a pretty good job of sleeping all the way back, and I'm not really sure when we got back. In the evening, we met up with some of David's buddies and got some food. It was so good. I got pork shoulder that came with some weird potato dumpling thing and some like mashed broccoli I think. It was all very filling and super good. It was a pretty low key night as we headed home from there.

Sunday morning we slept in which felt wonderful. Lizzi cooked some breakfast and while that was going on we took a ride with David to where they do some rock climbing. We took a pathway up to a big rock that overlooked the area with some great views. We got back and ate some breakfast then we started the our real day by going out and seeing a castle which provided another wonderful view.
It was pretty cool to see hills and mountains, since that landscape is nonexistent here in Denmark. From there, we started a brewery tour around 1 in the afternoon on a Sunday. We went out to all the little breweries in Bamberg and some of his friends from last night met us along the way, even one in full lederhosen. We went to 6ish places and saw some neat churches along the way.  After a wonderful day of beers, brats, and playing BS, we headed back to start packing up and ready ourselves for our adventures Monday morning. We got up nice and early Monday morning and got a ride to the train station. Monday was an uneventful day of traveling which was nice. Basically 5 hours of train rides then an hour of flying and we were back. It felt pretty good to be back, but we were getting sad since we knew it meant Audrey's time here was coming to a close.

Tuesday, Audrey packed and we went to get her some souvenirs before practice. There was some kind of scout convention or something since kids in uniform were running around everywhere. Audrey watched out practice and got to meet some of the guys before getting a post-practice meal at Kosk with the coaches. Wednesday unfortunately came and we parted ways at the airport. It was clearly sad to see her go, but we were so lucky to have been able to see and do what we did. It seemed so long ago that we were in Copenhagen doing a canal tour, almost like a different time. Audrey left, Esben was at the National Team camp, so I had the place all to myself. Audrey made it home safely and is now prepping for her first year of school, and I am in the middle of our game week with the Towers. I haven't done too much in my week since. The biggest highlight was going to a Running Sushi place with some of the guys Friday night. I had zero clue what I was doing and was pretty horrible with the chopsticks. For the first about 5 minutes I was holding them backwards, but turning them around didn't help much at all. It was pretty good food and a good evening.

Football is back and we are in the end swing of our season. Life goes on!

European Journey Part 3- Terracina to Munich

So Thursday morning rolls around and we want to get an early start to make sure we get to our next destination, Terracina, nice and early so we can spend as much time on the beach as possible. While looking for train tickets, we found our two choices were either a train at like 5am or 3pm. Lourdes looked into the bus schedule for us as found the bus leaves at 10 and we would arrive around noon. Perfect. We made sure to take the metro to the station nice and early as we had to find an ATM to get some money for the bus ticket. We arrived to the station at like 9 and found an ATM and bought our bus tickets. We sat and waited and next thing we notice its really close to 10 and no buses are here. There are a few people, but not buses. Then, a lady comes up to Audrey and says "shopporo" (I don't know how to spell it in Italian and the internet and google translate have been no help) and shows her some signs that are in Italian. Turns out no buses were running that day from 8:30am until 5pm. Unbelievably unreliable transportation we think. Can't really trusts the buses to get to our destination. So we head back to termini to get some train tickets and book the train arriving at like 5pm and then we book the return train for 5pm the next night, which is scheduled to get in at 6:30 to Termini, giving us 30 minutes to get to our night train. Surely we can trust the trains.

We arrive to Terracina and find our little B&B as scheduled and went to spend some time at the beach since there was still daylight and it was pretty warm still. We sat around for about 2 hours before heading back and getting ready for dinner. We went to this wonderful restaurant and had a fantastic meal. We got some wine

Temple of Jupiter from the beach

and it was one of those fancy places that pours a little in your glass and has you try it to make sure you like the bottle. Being that this was the 2nd time in my life I have ever had wine while out at dinner, I had no idea what was going on and why the waiter was standing there staring at me holding a bottle in my face after pouring a sip of wine in my glass. Audrey told me what to do, and I took a sip and amused him by saying it was fine, I really had no idea if it was good or bad or what, but it was wine and tasted okay by me. From there, we ordered fried mozzarella, which we were expecting to be like cheese sticks. Nope--they were these 4 hunks of fresh mozzarella that were battered in the light breading and fried. We ate 2 and a half and decided to save room for our main courses. We each ordered a pizza, Audrey got some kind with Salmon and some sauce, and I got the best pizza man has ever created. It's called the Lasagna, and had tomato sauce, mozzarella, skinny pieces of ham, and 4 huge spoonfuls of ricotta cheese on top. It was beyond amazing, words can not describe it. Needless to say, we did not finish off our pizzas. I tried so hard because it was so good. We were at dinner for about 2 hours and I was so determined to finish the pizza, but I just couldn't. Audrey is currently at home working on perfecting this pizza for my return. We got back and went to sleep to go spend another day at the beach on Friday.

We went back to the beach Friday, this time with all our stuff as we had to check out of or place. We also had no towels, so we were using dirty shirts to lay on and stuff. I'm 90% sure everyone thought we were homeless people. We (well, I) decided against going to the beaches you have to pay to use that come with chairs and umbrellas and go back to the free public beach. We laid there for about 3 hours and baked in the sun (and I am now peeling and look ridiculous since I put on no sunscreen). We got hassled by numerous people walking the beaches trying to sell all sorts of crap. I could careless about buying sunglasses, and I really doubt they were authentic Gucci, Prada, and Ray Ban sunglasses they were peddling on the beach. From there, we walked to one of the places you have to pay for and snuck in to use the showers. I changed my shorts on the beach and we went to get food where Audrey used a bathroom to change. We then got to the train station about an hour early since we had nothing else to do.

Around 4:30, 25 minutes before our train is supposed to arrive, a man comes over and starts blabbering in Italian about who knows what, but we hear the "shopporro" again. So we start freaking out, and Audrey asks some people who show up to the station and luckily one guy speaks English and informs us they were checking out to see if trains were running, since there would be an Italian rail strike that day. Wonderful. Instead of taking the 3pm bus out to Rome since the buses can't be trusted, the trains aren't running because of a strike. Magnificent. The man who told us the trains aren't running is going to Roma, and tells us to follow him. I'm pretty sure Audrey thought he was going to take us to a field and gut us and sell our organs on the black market, but I had faith in this stranger. And we really had no other choice. We got on a bus and I figured out he was taking us to another train station that is possibly running to Roma at 5. Well we get there and that on is not running. The next train to Rome is at 6 and we have to be there by 7 to leave. It's a 70 minute train ride. We sit and wait since we have nothing to do, and its all out of our hands. There were trains scheduled to come before ours and none show up. An announcement comes on and we find out the train is coming, but its 5 minutes late. We are silently freaking out and I think we both started planning how to spend our night in Rome and get home to Copenhagen. We got on the train and sat in silence for the whole ride. As we arrive to Termini at 7:20, I see a European train leave, so I'm trying to stay calm, but am really thinking great we're stuck. We get off and start running to the platform to see where our train is leaving from, and see just a ton of people hanging out at Termini. We look up and don't see a platform by our train. Next to it, in red it says 19:25---our train had also be delayed, we had made it!

So dirty, but happy we made it!

We both looked at each other and let out the biggest sigh of relief. Needless to say, our train would be delayed until about 9, so we had plenty of time. A train from Terracina even arrived before we departed. It was one of the most tense, suspenseful moments of my life. We sat around and got some McDonald's since it was right there.

The night train was pretty smooth. The staff knew about our ticket issue and was great with it all. We were in a compartment with 6 beds, basically bunk style with 3 on one side, and 3 on another. Audrey and I were lucky to have the lowest ones. There was a younger girl on one of the second ones, and a nice, older guy one the other. He mainly stood outside and watched the scenery. There were various stops throughout, and our entertainment came sometime throughout the night as an older, out of shape (to be nice) Italian lady came into our compartment. Auds and I are sleeping and I'm pretty sure she woke up as I did listening to this lady. She climbed about 4 steps up the ladder and started panting and making some kind of noises and speaking Italian to herself for a solid 5-10 minutes. I tried to sleep, but it was extraordinarily difficult. I finally popped in my iPod and rolled over and slept as she was talking to one of the train people having someone translate the Italian to English. I guess nothing got resolved because this lady just slept on the floor in our compartment. It was so annoying because she moved for no one as they had to leave. She just laid right in the way. If she did move, it took her about 5 minutes to get up and she was pressing on our beds to get up, like grabbing my arm that's on my bed and using it to press herself up making the same noises as when she was on the ladder. I was just wondering what she was thinking when she booked the bed, that's all really.

We arrived to Munich at like 8am and had all sorts of time before meeting our friends from Truman, the Brinks. I'll get into that part next time to let you fully digest how lucky we felt to have made it to Munich!

Best delayed train ever!

European Journey Part 2- Rome

Audrey left yesterday afternoon and arrived home safely late last night (this morning Copenhagen time). I can only imagine how much sleeping she will do today. Esben is gone with the National Team, so I have the place to myself. I have a ton of laundry I need to do, as well as clean my dirty room. I'm slowly getting that done.
Now, on the the fun vacation part...........

We took an early flight out of Krakow to get to Rome nice and early. Esben has told me about the flights where people clap when the plain lands. I really thought he was joking, but when we touched down in Rome, the Wizz Air flight cheered as if the home team scored a touchdown. It was pretty weird. I'm pretty excited when we land safely too, but the pilot is doing his job. It kind of reminded me of the commercial where Peyton Manning went around and cheered random job people. It was like maybe 8am when we got to the airport and since we only had carry on luggage, we walked right out and waited for the shuttle bus to get us to a Metro Line. It took us about 2 hours from the time we landed to the time we got to our B&B near Vatican City. We did a much better job this time of finding our place and were greeted with a wonderful buongiorno from an elderly couple that was in the building. We made our way up to the 6th floor and met Lourdes, our keeper for the week.

After getting stuff dropped off, we headed in to Rome in order to check out the National Museum and the Baths of Diocletian before heading to Termini (the main train station) to maybe get some help on our Rome-Munich train tickets that had not arrived before our journey.

Discus Thrower Statue

The Museum is literally across the street and on a corner from the station, but of course we missed it. We ended up walking way up to a park near the Villa Borghese through a beautiful park. We stopped for a bit at a fountain and stuck our feet in as most of the people were doing to cool off on the incredibly hot day. From there, we got to the Modern Art Museum and realized that was not the National Museum. The whole time we were looking at the wrong place on our Rome map. Oh well, we got to see a nice park. From there we walked back through the Piazza del Popolo to the Spanish Steps and got on the Metro back to Termini. We located the Museum much easier this time and strolled around. It was a super neat place with a lot of cool statues and busts of the famous. From there, we went to Termini and waited in line to get help. We needed to book new tickets and then we would get a refund for them. Unfortunately, our train was booked, so we could not do that. We returned to our room, and I called the Bahn website I ordered from. This guy was very helpful telling me the could not resend them since they were sent by mail and they have a money value, all things I already knew. He put me in contact with the City Night Line, who operates the train, but I would have to call in the morning. Since I had a reservation and the confirmation with me, we should be okay.

Monday morning came and we ate our breakfast and had some coffee with Lourdes before I phones the City Night Line. I talked to Sandra who was beyond helpful and told me to forward the confirmation e-mail and she would get it to the hands of the staff on the train and if we are unable to get a new ticket printed, we should be fine with the confirmation. we immediately zipped to an internet point and did that. From there, we did what I was most excited about--the Ruins! We went to the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, and Palatine

Inside the Colosseum

Hill. It was so freaking cool. You walk right out of the Metro station to the entrance to the Colosseum. It was unbelievable to think you are standing in something people stood in and cheered in 2000 years ago. I truly loved it and thought it was the coolest thing ever. Right across the road is the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill.  The Roman Forum was basically the town center of ancient Rome, where the Senate used to be housed. It is basically just a ton of ruins and some cool arches from thousands of years ago. The stuff is all hard to describe and I cannot remember what each little thing was without looking it up, but I was just fascinated by it. From there we

walked up to Palatine Hill. There, we got to see the spot where the throne would have been, and the huts of Romulus, again, more just super old stuff. I loved that day so much. My camera died that day and I didn't bring my charger because I just assumed that since Audrey and I both had the same brand of cameras, her charger would work, but I was way wrong. I'm happy I was able to get some good pictures of all that stuff though.

Tuesday, we just kind of wandered Rome and saw all sorts of stuff, since we would use Wednesday in Vatican City. We got to see the Castel Saint Angelo, the Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon, as well as the Piazza Navona and the Spanish Steps again. The Pantheon is freaking awesome because its an architectural marvel from 2000 years ago, since the height of the dome and the diameter are

Outside the Panteon

equal, making it a huge sphere. The only light is from the huge hole in the top of the dome. It has lasted forever and it sits lower than street level, which shows how much the city streets have risen the past 2000 years. Tuesday night we went back into Rome and got a pretty nice dinner. I was wearing my Gold Diggers polo and was asked by our waiter if I played rugby and then asked if I was a professional American Football player. I felt so cool, but couldn't lie. From there, we walked across the street and got gelato, and I got "recognized" again, as I was asked if I am a professional. Audrey hated that so much, mainly because it made me feel like I'm important.

At Dinner

Wednesday we went to Vatican City and peeped the Vatican Museum and Saint Peter's Basilica. We got the museum around 1:30 I guess, and there was zero line. If you show up at like 9 am, it's SUPER packed because all the tour groups are there. It was a neat place to walk around, and you could spend so much time there, but the tour groups make it rather difficult and borderline unbearable. They all herd up and take pictures on the same thing at the same time and you have to weave around all of them. We basically zoomed through a really neat hallway, just so we could pass some groups to get to the Sistine Chapel before them. Before that, I made us take a detour to see Raphael's The School of Athens painting. It is fantastic. In our guide book, we read that Raphael was working on his

paintings at the Vatican the same time Michaelangelo was working on the Sistine Chapel. Raphael took a break to see what Michaelangelo was up to, and when we saw the Chapel, he was basically like damn, the stuff I'm doing looks like finger painting, so he beefed up his work and added Michaelangelo to his painting. We got to the Sistine Chapel and sat there for at least 30 minutes taking everything in. Wow, it was amazing. From there, we waited in line to climb the 550 step to the top of the dome of St. Peter's Basilica. It was a bit daunting as the path winded and got extremely skinny, and Audrey had a mini claustrophobia attack. We got up there and spent 5 minutes outside and immediately went back down. Inside, St. Peter's is HUGE, but it really doesn't feel like it. It was designed to minimize how large it felt. We caught an evening mass in Latin in the Basilica and headed home to pack for Thursday.

We got to see a lot of the cool stuff in Rome, and it was a really great time and cool city. I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but we took in so much. I'll get in to our last morning in Rome and our remaining day in Italy in my next post!