in the groove

grant started school today, and i'm gearing up towards the start of the school year and the youth group calendar. i've got quite a bit to get done, but i'm at a bit of an impasse... wanting to get students' opinions on activities, waiting for dates to be confirmed for events, etc. we're also hiring an intern this year which should be exciting - and nervewracking! sometimes, i barely know what i'm doing, and now i'll have to help someone else do stuff too! i'm really glad to have an extra head to bounce ideas off. that might be the biggest asset to me personally, though she'll be helping with other (much-needed) areas in the church.

singapore open was last weekend. it was hot, tiring, and lots of ultimate (imagine that!). we had an awesome group of women, including 3 students from the US, a solid, if short, group of men, including a notre dame pickup. we went in seeded pretty low, and finished there (16th) which is really unfortunate. we lost a lot of games we shouldn't have, and that's always frustrating. overall, i think i played pretty well considering i haven't seriously played since june. i even got to be a cutter since we had solid guy handlers and the women had better mismatches in the downfield. that took some getting used to, but it was fun, and i played pretty well in most of our games. my fitness level was definitely lower than usual, so that's high on my priority list to work on. in our last game which was a bit less serious, i put up some decent long passes and ok pulls - gotta work on those for the women's team. grant played well too. he was on the d-line a lot, and they played a lot of zone, which is his LEAST favorite thing, but he still played really well...especially given our recent absence from disc. in quarters though, he went up for a d over a girl in the endzone and came down really wrong and hurt his knee. he's going in to the doctor today, and we'll see what happens. the good thing: she dropped the disc. the ridiculous thing... after laying on the field for a good 3 minutes trying to move over to the shade, eventually getting some ice and moving to our sideline, one of the other players came out with a cramp or some small injury. the captain says, "grant, go in!!" grant replied with, "are you RETARDED?!" i've gotta say, this kind of move defined much of our weekend.

anyways, beach ultimate continues which is lowkey and fun for awhile longer. i'm ready for that - fitness, throws, but non competitive. league will start soon enough, and then the hk tourney will roll around. decisions to be made.

we're past the jetlag which is a good feeling, our house is almost cleaned up from arriving and traveling, but we have no food in our fridge. must work on that!

we're totally open to any and all visitors! come see us in asia :-D

welcome home

we landed in hong kong yesterday where it was 95 degrees out, and the haze was incredible. we made it safely to our flat where we discovered that the air conditioner in our main room isn't working. luckily our landlady is on top of this for once and is sending someone today. it's bordering on emergency.
i woke up at 2 last night, lay in bed til 3, gave up til 4, and slept til 7. so far, i'm doing ok, but it's only 9:30 AM.
the smells of hong kong are making my stomach churn while i'm jetlagged. i forgot about that sensation.

but, we're mostly unpacked and glad to be back... now back to work