long road trip

I just got back yesterday from a week long road trip while we played horrible and lost all three games I did get to see my family and Ben and his family so the road trip was not all bad. Our first stop was Seattle and Megs, mom and dad all came in early to shop and visit with me so the night before the game we went out to eat on the water. I really do love the Northwest Seattle is so beautiful! Dad parked about 30 minutes away from the restaurant loving the new health kick the family is on! We had to find me a Barnes and Noble so that I could buy some more books for the long plane rides ahead. At the game there was a lot of people to visit with... Michelle and Erin made it down and I didn't really get any chance to chat with them but it was so good to see them again, Midnight Viper was calling. My old college teammate Julie, Dave and their adorable baby Brooklyn. She was asleep by the time the game ended but she did wake up to wave goodbye. My old university manager was there with a really cool pair of shoes as a present. My aunt and uncle and cousins were all there as well as the Heritage girls bball team that sold 50/50 tickets.
The next stop was Chicago where I caught up with my old college SID Hope it was great to talk with her again catch up.
Connecticut was the last stop I got to see Ben again and his family they had about 20 people there so it was a large group of purple shirts in the arena. We grabbed a drink after the game and tried to forget the basketball play on this 3 game road swing!

I didn't play well on the road pretty disappointing I felt like I had my shot this year and I know I am a better player than what I am showing. I guess just keep working to get better and hopefully I will get another chance.

We are in Sac for the next week and a half or so and today it was back to the basics at practice complete with some running to finish it all off. We even had someone collapse! Fun stuff coach put 24 on the clock and we went down and back 2x we did this numerous times I was feeling it at the end but it is always after a practice like that I feel good.

I can finally buy groceries

Well I made the team today so we have our home opener tomorrow night should be exciting! I will be in Seattle Monday night!!! I have to go start putting together my list for mom and dad!

Waiting game...

So I find out tomorrow if I make the team it has been interesting. I have had a pretty good training camp but we have a lot of guards in camp and not so many bigs. This is a rough part of the the profession never knowing where you stand living life on the bubble, always being prepared for the worst!
We had a meet the monarchs appearance at the mall today and we actually had to do a shooting contest. The guards had to shoot 3 pointers in the middle of the mall with a sport court set up. We were shooting for these cute little kids to win them prizes so of course the pressure was on. I am happy to say I won though although I was for real nervous. Then we signed a bunch of autographs and don't even want to count the number of people who make comments about how I didn't play last year and how much does that suck, will I play this year... I always wonder if they think before they ask. How does one reply to that question besides smiling and laughing. There was also one lady who kept trying to get the shirts off our backs, like we should just walk out in bras! This one lady was really adamant and did not think this request was weird or off the wall.
Hopefully all goes well and I will be in Seattle on Tuesday and Connecticut at the end of next week!

Media day

Sunday was a day off and it was really good except that I was quite bored during the day so I took a trip to Target to kill some time and buy some more books, I really need a library card. At night we got a suite to the Alicia Keys concert, only my second concert ever! She was with Ne yo and Jordin Sparks but I skipped the opening acts to eat dinner and rest and then went for Alicia. The concert wasn't great, her voice is amazing and I love when she plays the piano but for a concert it was a huge arena and I feel it would be best suited for like a bar. She only sang like 5 of her songs and the other songs were like Usher, Prince, so it was weird she wasn't singing her own stuff. She does have an amazing voice though and now I can say I have been to two concerts!

Media day was today which meant an early practice... never good! Media day is always a big production they have someone come in and do our makeup and the locker room is out of control. There are 4 hair dryers going, straightners are plugged in at every outlet. The temperature is about 10 degrees warmer it feels like and our media lady is counting down the minutes until we have to be done. Media day itself is a lot of saying the same thing over and over again, too much smiling and cheesy commercials!

Tanning the other day was an experience I have some streaks obviously I need some practice. I guess I rubbed too hard on some spots I am going to have to ask more questions next time... whenever that will be!

Officially tanned!

Today started early this morning... we had an appearance at the Sacramento race for the cure. There were so many people there it was cool. The monarchs do an appearance there every year but this year we were actually in town so all the players could attend as well. We hung out in one of the expo rooms and had a basket for people to shoot at, arts and crafts, the hip hop crew performed every 20 minutes and we wandered around, mingled, and signed autographs. It was cool to be there... it made the early morning bearable!
After that it was straight to practice where we watched film of our scrimmage against Atlanta from yesterday. Practice wasn't too hard it was a lot of five on five against the guys and since we have so many guards there was a lot of subs.
The most exciting news of the day came when I went to the tanning salon today for my first spray tan... I was really really nervous why I am not sure. I tried to do everything I read about online exfoliate, put on lotion etc. There were a lot of instructions, the placement of hands, elbows in, neck up and top it all off the machine was talking. I thought I was prepared until it started spraying and I felt to clasterphobic I had to calm myself down a little. Apparently you have to wait 4-6 hours for the results so I am hoping that there are no streaks! I will let you all know how it turns out. I am not sure if this will be a forever thing but we do have media day on Monday and people are still making fun of how "white" I am so I thought I would try this out.
As far as the team goes I am really nervous about cuts, people keep telling me I look better than I have ever looked before but it is quite competitive. Nature of this job I guess is you never get to feel too secure.

updates

I had my birthday the other day so after practice there was quite the rendition of happy birthday and some cupcakes to eat... kind of reminded me of elementary school when mom would make cupcakes to bring to school on your birthday. After practice I got all the phone calls from the family... thanks everyone. Although Megs I never knew you got up so early (840) wow working girl. I went out to dinner last night with my old strength coach and wife and baby boy it was really good to see them. They had just had their baby last summer so it was crazy seeing how big he is now such a cutie! Then it was home to bed to get ready for another day.
Todays practice was a lot of fun mostly just 5 on 5 stuff not very much breakdowns which is great. We are scrimmaging Atlanta tomorrow, not a game just in the practice facility but it should be fun. Haynie is back in town with Atlanta so it will be good to see her again.
The ankle is doing good swollen still but don't notice it too much when I play.
A new Office is on tonight so I am about to go cook dinner and have a nap so I can stay up for it!

travel days

The last 3 days really feel like a blur. We left for Florida Sunday morning at 430am we had an hour layover in Salt Lake if only it was a little longer and I could have visited with people. We got into Florida around 5pm and it was so hot and humid I don't know if I can live in a humid place I absolutely hate the feeling of being sticky. It was my first time in Florida and my first impressions beside the heat was that it looked great long stretches of highway running through the ocean so both ways you looked you saw people swimming and boating. We stayed at the Innisbrook it is a golf resort and the owner of the Mystics (team we played) just bought the golf course thus the game in Florida (by the way she bought it for 35 million dollars) the resort was massive. We pulled in and had to get out and check in and then board the bus again to be dropped off at our places. The rooms were all time shares so they all had a different flair most of them not so pretty on the inside. A great set up but with full length mirrors as a wall, plaid and flower couches in the same room and some tacky wall paper we were very happy ot hear that the new owner plans to renovate immediately!

That night I walked to one of the club houses to eat and my first impression of Florida didn't last long. I was eaten alive by bugs, saw about 10 geckos, heard of alligators in the lake areas around our housing, possums and armadillos all roaming around I decided maybe it wasn't for me.

The game was the next day we lost in OT we probably should have won I played okay not great still need to do better. I actually rolled my ankle in the first half I thought I would never really roll it again because I had done it so many times but it went all the way over and I somehow managed to strain the ligaments on the top I don't know why I can't make it through a training camp healthy. We left the next morning after the game at 4am. Since it is a 3 hour difference and it was right after the game most of us only slept about an hour so we were not looking pretty at the airport! The bag rule went into effect for Delta on Monday I am mad that the airlines are doing that. Your second bag will not cost $25. I did find out that since I am a medallion member that I can check 3 bags free though which is good to know since it appears as though all the airlines are turning to this.

We got back to Sac and got in a quick pool workout came home and passed out!

short visit

Ben just left today so I am back to sitting alone in my apt every night... kind of sucks. Ben actually cooked dinner for me every night after practice it was so great coming home so a cooked meal I was very impressed.
We had our first exhibition game at Arco last night I didn't play well, I didn't play horrible either but I still played scared and didn't really settle down. Something to work on for the next game! We leave at 430 am and actually have an hour layover in Salt Lake if only it was a little longer and I could see people. We are headed to Tampa to play Washington in our last pre season game, quite a few of the players won't be traveling with us because of injuries so it will be another chance to get some minutes and keep working on things. People keep asking how I feel this year and I don't really know some days I feel good other days I have no idea so final cuts have to be made by the 17th of May and I guess until then it is a waiting game.
After Ben left today I went to buy some books so that I have something to do on our long flight back East, if anybody has any good recommendations for books to read I am always looking!
I need to head to bed so I can wake up tomorrow morning.