Apple pie, "Swags", and my first tournament

Another random and unorganized blog… Sorry this post isn’t very exciting…it’s 12:45am and I’m exhausted. I’ll write more about my non-volleyball adventures tmrw.

Apple Pie

I forgot to include this in last week’s blog…When I was at my teammate’s boyfriend’s house she gave me a lesson in French cooking. I asked what we were going to make and she told me we would make apple pie from scratch. BOMB! I <3 Pie.

She started pulling out ingredients that included chicken, sour cream, and tuna…and I was more than a little confused. When I questioned that maybe those flavors didn’t go well with apple pie she explained to me that there are 2 types of pies- sweet or salty. While we continued to prep the food and I asked her where the apples were. She said that there wouldn’t be any apples…and at this point I became completely lost. We’re making a salty apple pie with tuna, but no apples? If any of you watch the TV show friends, I was picturing a dessert similar to the English trifle that Rachel made. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCCHwN0pUx4 ).  I later realized that what we were making was a quiche. She didn’t think I would recognize the word so she tried to describe it to me as “apple pie”. It ended up being delicious!! My cooking skills are improving!

 Coaching

In addition to playing for the club, I will also be coaching a junior’s team. I have been assigned to coach “Benjamines”, which is the youngest age group (12-under) of the club. The first week not a single girl showed up for practice! I was told that because it was also the first week of school, it wasn’t surprising that no one came. The other coaches assured me that next week I would have a team.

On Tuesday I had two girls show up for practice- Calypso and Matilda. Neither of them spoke any English or had played volleyball before. I have never coached this young of a group before, so I was already apprehensive, but the language barrier was really the cherry on top. Luckily there were two other coaches in the gym who could help translate and give me ideas for 2-person drills!

On Thursday I again had nobody show up for practice, so at this point I’m unsure as to whether or not I have a team?

"Swags"

This past week I got the opportunity to meet the American who played for my club the past two years. Christy Swagerty-Vilas, “swags”, facebooked me to introduce herself and asked if I wanted to meet up for lunch. She currently plays for another club that is also about half an hour from Paris, but still takes French lessons in Melun with her same teacher from previous years.

Christy was incredibly friendly and shared stories about her experiences from the past two years. Since we both have a ton of free time during the day, we decided to try to meet up this next week in downtown Paris so she can show me around.

One of the experiences that Christy told me about involved the “demon” stove in the apartment that I live in. Apparently when Christy and her husband were living here the stove burner would randomly turn itself on when they weren’t home. They ended up having to switch the stove on and off using the circuit breaker in the closet. She asked if I had used the front right burner, and I laughed and then told her the story about me holding the pan out of the skylight. Apparently that burner is a little crazy, so I’m going to go ahead and say the burnt food wasn’t entirely my fault!!

The story about the circuit breaker actually came in handy this morning! I turned on the stove and had started cooking breakfast when I heard a strange humming sound. A few moments later I heard a “pop” and all the power in my apartment went out. This wouldn’t have been a huge deal except I was getting ready to leave for our first tournament, the apartment was pitch black, and I was nowhere near packed or ready to go! After a few minutes I managed to find a candle and lighter so I could see what I was doing when I reset the circuit breaker. Luckily I had talked to Christy this week, or I wouldn’t have had a clue what to do!!

Volleyball talk…

We had our first tournament today (Sunday). After winning our pool in the morning, we ended up losing two afternoon matches to take third overall. It wasn’t a formal tournament that counted for anything though…just 2/3 game scrimmages.


My pro career started off with a bang haha I went for a tool and missed and ended up hitting the back bleachers. I know somewhere in Florida Steve Hendricks would be proud of that shot! The team we played first is in the division beneath us, so we were able to beat them in two even though we didn’t play all that great. I rode the struggle bus during that match then got dropped off by the struggle bus so I could catch the struggle plane in the next match. I started off hitting VERY negative.  The only reason why I’m not calling myself captain of the struggle plane is because I managed to turn it around in the third game by the end. I finished hitting better and had an ace to win the match.

We had about an hour or so break for lunch before starting bracket play. The first team we played had a Spaniard on it that could hammer the ball. She was incredibly feisty and created an interesting dynamic on their side of the court. She would randomly yell “arriba, arriba, arriba!!” but spoke English to her teammates. We lost the first game, won the second, and lost the third one closely (I think we had 12 or 13).

Our last match of the day everyone was exhausted, and it showed. We struggled in pretty much every area. I hopped back on the struggle plane and finished the day with probably one of the worst hitting matches of my career. This isn’t a pity party…this is the truth.

And as my last volleyball related note, my knee started bothering me during the first match of the day. I had it looked at by the osteopathic provider onsite and they thought it might be a meniscus injury but weren’t sure. I was still able to play, so I finished the day and the club is scheduling me a doctor’s appointment tmrw. My range of motion is pretty limited at this point and there are disgusting popping noises L Think happy thoughts for my knee please!