Were in

This past weekend we had two games...We played Bamburg in Friday night and then on Sunday.

We knew that if we won one of teh game we would basically be in the league for next year. (As we havent done that well and were close to the bottom of the table - the last two teams drop down to the league below). Friday night we played Bamburg and they are lose to the top of the league and we knew it was going to be a tough game.

We ended up beating them though. We came out tough right away and built ourselves an early lead. They made it close at half time but then in the second half we pulled away again and ended up winning by a lot. It was an awesome win and felt great.

Sunday was a little different story, we ended up losing but after the game (our last home game) the 46ers had a little party outside the gym and a lot of the fans stayed around. They brought us up in front of the Mic and asked us questions and we passed out autographs and took pictures if people wanted them. It was fun.

The best part of the day was knowing that we had made it in for next year.

Sunday

Yesterday we had a busy but fun day. At 11:30 in the morning the sponsors cup started. Over at where we play our games the sponsors who put a team together had their own baskteball tournament. It was quite big. There were 17 teams there and each team had way more than 5 people. Some teams were a little smaller, but there were also teams there that had 13-15 people. A fast food place that serves salads - Tom and Sallys - has been the reigning champ for a number of years and they won it again this year. Katy and I went over for about an hour and watched some of the games. Some of the teams were pretty serious while others looked like they were there more so to have a good time. Katy's coach, for the team she played on here, in Krofdorf, was playing. Some of the guys and girls on his team were wearing big afro wigs, or funny hair wigs, when they were warming. We got a laugh out of seeing them warm up with their big hair flopping everywhere. We were hoping they would wear them in the game, but I think that might have been illegal. The tourney reminded us of the alumni tournament back home. One of these years we'll make it back.

After the Sponsors tourney we went over a family's (that we meet here around Giessen) house and had a barbeque. The weather was great and as soon as we stepped out our car at their place we could smell and it was fantastic. Even though its been a while for us it reminded us of summer and grilling out. So we sat with them and had a great lunch. Here the lunch tends to be the big meal and dinner is just something a little bit lighter.

One of the families relatives was over and he took us out for a drive. I had mentioned before that I thought it would be fun to drive on the autobahn fast, as the car we have doesnt really go that quick. Well the relative is part of a drving school and had his car, the driving school car with him. He let me drive it on the autobahn over to his place and it was cool to have gone quite fast, as it was a nice car. Then he pulled his convertible out of the garage and we took it for a ride. We drove around the state we live in here in Germany, Hessen, and got to see places that we didnt know about and see some new castles that were pretty cool. It was a gorgeous day for it and we had a good time. One place we stopped at was on top of a hill and you could see so far in every direction. He said it was his special spot, but we know where it is now :)

When we got back we sat down and had some dinner together and tossed the football/baseball/volleyball around the yard, all in turn with the kids. Katy even bounced on the trampoline a little and might have even got a flip in there.

Bad 3rd Quarter in Ulm

This weekend we played Ulm at their place, about 4 hours or so away. We didnt play all that well and it was a good chance for us to pick up an important win, but we just couldnt take advantage of it. We played okay the first half. At times we were quite good but at other times we let the defence slide a little. At halftime I think we were down 2 points. In the third quarter though they pulled away. Our defence struggled and we let them get ahead of us by double digits. We tried to fight back but it ended up being to much to overcome. The last three games that we have will be tough games but if we can play tough defence I we should be able to do well.

Go Karting

Two weeks ago on Sunday for a promotion/team event we went out to the go-kart place in town and had a race. Go-karting here i a little bit different than it is back home. Here the ccourse is a little bit longer, and you dotn have people on the course watching you. Here there are no tires on either side of the track/road, so if you take a corner too sharply or go too wide on a turn you would end up in the grass. Before we had our chance to go the professional were out on the track tuning their cars up for the season. The day that we were there was the first day that the track was open. The professionals basically fly on the straight aways. We asked the owner of the place how fast their karts can get up to and he said some of them go 150 kph on the straight aways. He said that they are geared more for acceleration so they can speed up fast in the curves, but they can gear them for top speed where they can go 200 kph. Fast!!!!
We had a lot of fun and I theres a chance we might be able to go again in the next weeks. It was fun as carts didnt go as fast as the professionals but our got up to about 60 kphs and we had a blast. There were some photographers there from the newspaper but I havent seen any pictures. If I can find some I will put them on here for you to see.

Sarah and Joey Part II

After we got back on Monday I wasnt able to go with them the rest of the week, but they had a great time.
On Tuesday they went to the Buchenwald concentration camp. They said it was very moving and poweful when they were there on the grounds. They spent the day there and got to see the ruins of the camp and learn about its history. From there they went to Point Alpha and got to see part of the old border of East and West Germany. They said someone was shot trying to cross the border there and got to see what a checkpoint was like.
The rest of the week they went shopping around Giessen and went to the awesome ice cream place that Giessen has here in town.
Since I had to leave for my Saturday game on Friday we werent able to go out to eat on Friday night and opted to go on Thrusday night instead. We went up to Burg-Gleiburg for dinner, the castle that is only 15 minutes away from Giessen and where we live. After we got done eating we walked around the old castle ruins and took a ccouple pictures. It was really cool to see the ruins and the city of Giessen in the night lights.

Week with Joey and Sarah - Part I

Two weeks ago Katy's brother Joey and sister Sarah came for the week. They flew in on Saturday and got to see us win against Trier. That night they enjoyed the food and drinks of the VIP room and had a good time sitting and talking to everyone.
Then the next day after a workout in the morning we decided to take a little trip. We drove down the romantic road until Augsburg where we stayed the night in the Ubernacht hostel. We didnt have a room when we got there becuasse we didnt know where we would be staying. It was fun to drive around and check out the prices of different places as we made Katy's brother run into all the places and ask. We got a little laugh at this as one of the places was not well lit and something out of a scary movie - kind of.
During that day on our drive down we stopped at a couple places but the place we liked the best was a big wall from a castle that surrounded an old city. We were able to climb the wall and walk around it. We got some cool pictures and had fun imaging we were archers back in the day protecting the city from the little windows along the top of the wall.
From Augsburg it was off to Fussen and Castle Nueshwanstein. The castle was awesome and we loved getting to see what the Walt Disney Catle was modeled after. To see the inside you had to take a guided tour so we did that. It was interesting to findd out that only 17 out of the planned 100 rooms were finished as the King Ludwig died an early mysteriuos death (all casltes and things that were being built were then stopped when he died). The castle was beautiful and very picturesce as it was located in the German alps and near to another castle only a couple 100 meters away. We have never seen the alps before and loved getting to see the white mountains and how they rose out of the ground really high and really fast, even though the area leading up to the alps was relativley flat.

2 Points

This weekend we played Tubingen. We had a slow first quarter where we let them score quite a few points. But luckily we were able to stay only a couple points behind. At half time we fell back even more more and I think we were down by 11 or 13 or something like that. In the second half, especially in the 4th quarter when we picked up the D. At the end of the game it was tied and with 16 seconds to go we fouled a guy and he went to the line for 2 free throws. Luckily for us he missed them both, and we grabbed the rebound. With a couple seconds to go our point guard drove the ball and hit a little floater as the time ran out. We ended up winning by 2 points. It was a great feeling, especially as we have been on the opposite side of some close games earlier in the year. We only have 4 games left and are hoping to rack up some more wins.

Mistake

In one of my posts I said that there is no speed limit on the bacck roads through the country, but I was wrong. One of our friends here told us that the speed limit is 100 kph. Probably a good thing to know. :)

Grocery Store Part II

This post will continue on what I was saying about the grocery stores from the last post.

Milk - Here the majority of the milk is the long-life milk that comes in boxes. It is not kept in the refrigerator, rather just on the shelf in one of the aisles. It doesnt need to be refrigerated until you open it. They do have some milk in the cooler but basically it just the long-life boxes taken off the shelf and kept refrigerated. I really havent seen any milk in a plastic or glass container in the cooler. The taste is a little different than the great milk back home, but Katy and I have gotten used to it and we love our milk.

Drinks - When we in Australia they had something a little different than back home, which was new to us. It was hard alcohol, like jack daniels, jim beam,vodka, or something else, mixed with cola. It was very common to see someone drinking a can of these two things mixed. Here they have something like that, which is new to us but yet a little different. Instead of doing hard alcohol mixed with cola or something flavored, here they have beer mixed with flavors. So they have beer mixed with bannana, beer mixed with blood orange, lime, apple and ginger, energy drink, cola, dragon fruit. Pretty much any common flavor is mixed with beer...and contrary to what you might think they are not that bad. They do have less alcohol in them and I think somebody one time even called them ladies drinks. But if you want something that isnt quite as bitter as beer it might be something to try.

People - This can be quite interesting. When you are in the grocery store it seems at times the people can be a little rude. Back home if someone is looking at something in aisle and you need to cut in front of them more than likely you would say excuse me or pardon me or something like that. Here it doesnt happen, in the 7 months we have been here I dont think I have heard it once. Sometimes we get a kick out of it. As we will be almost touching the food, choosing what we would like, and someone will cut right in front of you. I wonder maybe if we are ghosts sometimes and people cant see us. There have been a couple times where I thought someone was going to tackle me into the dairy case. We get a laugh out of it and try to have fun with it. This past week I was walking into the store...and here at the store we go to there is a big revolving door where there is plenty or room for you and your shopping cart to pass through. I was walking in and about to take my place in between the glass panels of the spinning door when I looked to the side and saw a lady take 3 almost running steps to push her cart in front of me and cut me off. For a moment I thought I was going to get lit up and looked around to see if anyone else had seen. Maybe I exaggerate a little but it made me chuckle a little after the fact. Sometimes people just go about there business and dont worry too much about the rest.
We asked some German people here if it is just us, or what is going on. They said that it is just the way people are. That in general something that we would consider to be polite, like saying pardon me, just doesnt happen. That if you say excuse me (in german of course) they might look at you funny as it isnt said that often in the grocery store. Its not that it is good or bad, it is just a different way. Just the way things are and interesting to see.

Check out - Here when you check out they dont have baggers to bag your groceries for you. They also dont have paper or plastic bags for you to use. You either need to bring your own or purchase the ones they have at the checkout counters. The people here at the checkouts can also fly when they check you out. We have a hard time keeping up with them when they check us out. We will have only part of of our food bagged when they give us our total and we have to pay. Then we are stuck scrambling to try and finish bagging while they are ringing up the next person. We should make a game out of seeing if we can get it all bagged before we have to pay....next time.

Thats all for now...If I can think of anything else I will post it in another post.