TRAVEL

You are as comfortable as sitting in economy can be. You gotta window seat, shoes and seat belt are off, your seat is tilted back that extra 6 inches and you remembered the neck pillow this time. Noise cancelling head phones are playing peaceful Jack Jackson, deep sleep has miraculously come. All of a sudden my stomach gets the ‘I’m riding on Splash Mountain at Disney Land’ feeling. I quickly wake up to realize I wasn’t dreaming I was on a roller coaster, this is real life. Our plane had lost control to say the least. You know the feeling when you’re taking a peaceful nap then someone scares you? You quickly wake up- EYES WIDE OPEN not knowing where you are for a brief second…the second I woke up startled… pulled off my headphones, probably should have fastened my seat belt but instead for some reason grabbed Hypes wrist. I heard dozens of people screaming for their lives. J El was praying out loud, like really loud. The man in front of me was yelling for his life in some foreign language...maybe Greek. John Turek instead of yelling, remembered he forgot to sign his life insurance papers for Suzanne and Kaleb. The right and left wings of the plane were moving back and forth like a teeter tater. The turbulence didn't stop quickly, it seemed to last longer than the entire 15 weeks I've been here. Our plane had dropped 300 meters. Normally the flight attendant can calm down the passengers, but her voice on the intercom had fear in it like I've never heard, "EVERYONE neeeeeeds to remaaaaain seeeaaaated!" After things died down, a man made a run for the bathroom and the stewardess yelled at him, "SIR YOU NEED TO REMAAAAAIN SEATED!" The entire plane felt the tension. The man looked at her, rolled his eyes and vomited with the entire plane observing. 50 is the Vegas over/under line for how many people sharted during the near crash on this flight. It's no coincidence there were 40 people waiting to use the bathroom after the scare was over. The older flight attendant told us after working for 35 years this was the worst flight she ever had! I just wish the KLM Airlines had the picture service option you have after riding Splash Mountain...

Normally when we go on trips, we get to do a little sightseeing. When you Google image "Greece photos" you get gorgeous views of the country. This picture below couldn't be FURTHER from the truth. I think I can speak for the team when I say this was the worst trip we've ever been on. Monday morning began at 4am with a long bus ride to Amsterdam, then waiting there until the 3.5 hour "memorable flight" to Athens, Greece. After arriving in one piece, we grabbed our bags and got onto a bus for another 2 hour in route of a small town in Greece where we would be playing. 12 hours and 5 mins it took from door to door, we ate some soup and then had practice that evening. After practice we had a light meal and it was lights out. Tuesday morning we woke up grabbed a bite to eat and then headed to shoot around. After that it was lunch, nap time and pre-game meal. I wish I could say we came in and took care of business but instead we played the worst game of the season. We shot 0-17 from three point range and yours truly couldn't throw a ball into the ocean. After the game heads were down, we played some cards at the hotel- slept a few hours. Some got up early to see the city, "was it worth it" I asked? Within seconds, "NO. You guys didn't miss anything, kind of reminds me of Mexico." You know it's real bad when you don't even have pictures that you can put on Facebook. We got on the bus for Athens and fortunately had a normal flight back to Amsterdam. We arrived back in Groningen at about 10:30 PM Wednesday night. Quick 66 hour trip.

Thanksgiving is my second favorite Holiday of the year, only behind Christmas. It's a time where we spend with family and are grateful for everything we have in life. This year I was lucky enough to have my cousin Brandon and Liz visit me in Groningen. Thursday night the three of us cooked up a pretty big feast and spent some quality time together. Even though we weren't able to get an American style turkey, we made due with what we had to work with. Unfortunately Friday night I would end up getting a real bad virus that still hasn't gone away completely- it's now been 5 days. They came last year as well, so they know Groningen quite well by now. Sunday the whole team had a special Thanksgiving party and the two sick boys Steve Ross and myself were unable to attend. Some girls would be jealous I've lost 8 pounds but I can't wait to gain it back.

Our Dutch league games have been going very well, we are off to even a better start than last season. Instead of 11-2 at this time last year, we are a perfect 13-0 with a tough road game tomorrow night in Den Bosch. We played Saturday, Tuesday (euro-cup), on the road (tmrw) Thursday, Saturday and leave for Italy Monday morning. Our Dutch game last Saturday we had 4 main players out (me playing on fumes) but still managed to win. Last night we hosted Cantu Italy in our third Euro-Cup game. In 2002 I was playing for Vallivue High School in Caldwell, Idaho. We hosted a tournament and in the championship game we played a team from Redmond, Oregon. On that team was a guy by the name of Maarty Leunen. He went on to play at University of Oregon and Boise State of course for me. 8 years later we meet up in Groningen, Netherlands for a Euro-Cup game...crazy how coincidences happen. After playing hundreds of games you often forget, but both of us remembered that tournament years ago, he is a great player who was huge for them last night but so far I'm up 2-0 in the win column haha.

The next three weeks are going to be pretty hectic. We have four Dutch games remaining and 3 Euro-Cup games. We fly to Milan, Italy next week and then Istanbul, Turkey the following week. On December 22nd I'm flying back to Boise for Christmas, but the next 20 days of hoops should be exciting. Let's just hope with all this flying I'm about to do- I DON'T get stuck with a middle seat!