Like this:

Division 2 in Sweden has a Christmas break (Julovet).  Our last game in 2009 was on December 16th and we didn’t play until two days ago (January 8th).  Of course we practiced, but Coach Higgins gave the team off until Dec. 28th.  In that time, I was luckily enough to join the Mckenna’s for a Christmas Eurotrip.  Jamie’s whole family made the trip to Sweden for our last game of 2009 on the 16th and by the morning of 17th we were on our way to Copenhagen for the first leg of our trip.  We only spent one day in Hopenhagen and then made our way (by plane) to Berlin for 3 days (18-20th), then via ze German autobahn to Dresden (just south of Berlin) for an afternoon, then farther south to Prague, Czech Republic for another 3 days (21-23), and then finally southwest to Zurich, Switerland for Christmas (24-27).  The trip was my first little taste of Europe and I really enjoyed it.  Special thanks to the Mckenna’s for allowing me to tag along! (I did serve as the family’s personal cameraman so I wasn’t completely dead weight).

After a great vacation, I am excited to get back to playing again.  James and I returned to Osby by the night of the 27th and were back for practice on the 28th.  We had 7 or 8 good practices heading into our first game back against Tyringe (TIR-ing-ga) who is currently 1st in our league.  Unfortunately, we lost 7-3 but it was arguably the best we’ve played as a unit.  You may recall, the last time we played Tyringe in Tyringe we lost 12-zip.  But this time we had Tyringe on their heels as much or more than they had us on ours.  It was a great back and forth game.  Unfortunately, after a very even first period we were down 4-0, a deficit we couldn’t overcome despite 5 or 6 breakaways.  Things were very upbeat in our locker room, though, so I think it’s a game we can build off of.

And during the time it’s taken me to write this post, we’ve actually played another game against Linhamn who is the 3rd place team and won 5-3 in another good match (this time at home).  Tied 3-3 half way through the 3rd, James made a great pass to the front of the net for his 3rd assist of the night to put us up 4-3.  Then, to make things exciting, we took a penalty at 17:59, but we were able to fight it off (but not before a mad scramble) and tack on an empty netter for the final of 5-3.

Alright, more later.

Advertisement