Nothing too new, but still exciting!

Hello again.... as the title so clearly declares I don't have much new and or exciting to say, but I thought I'd say hello anyway. We have now been in Daxing for almost a week and our time here is coming to an end, which means.... (long pause for a drum role and to increase the suspense)...... WE ARE MOVING INTO THE VILLAGE TOMORROW!!!!! (and yes, the all caps means I am very excited about it, hahahaha) While we were here we accomplished a few things, first and most importantly we met our chef William, who has provided us with some VERY tasty meals. Second, we put in some good hours at the pool and in the weight room (aka sauna based on the way we look when we are finished because boy is it hot and humid here). Third, we trained with the Netherlands a few times, which included a scrimmage on Friday evening where we played amazingly well! It felt good to be here and to play so well together. We have another chance to play them this evening, so we'll see how that goes. As I sit here and ponder the last week (and talk to Petie, my lovely roommate about it) I realize that this trip so much resembles all the other trips I've been on with the team.... always a little strange and at some point or another you find yourself asking "where am I?", but still hilarious. The trip began in this particular fashion..... on the base bright and early in the morning watching our poor bus driver load ALL our huge and heavy bags onto the underside of the bus, refusing our help and insisting upon sitting in the undercarriage of the bus with only his legs swinging and wheezing as he did so. I couldn't contain my laughter as I looked around and received the same look from my teammates.... "here we go again." Once we made it to San Jose, we got word that somehow the goals and shot clocks mysteriously went missing from the pool where we were supposed to train in Daxing. Fortunately we have a wonderful governing body (the good old USOC) who had already sent goals and shot clocks over ahead of time just in case, so Zach and April (again USOC staff) were wonderful enough to drive them from Beijing to Daxing and build them for us before we arrived. So while we were here and playing "official" scrimmages we used running time (due to the lack of game clocks--again mysterious). It is also quite hilarious that the pool complex where we are training includes a bowling alley (you can almost see it from in the pool) that is quite literally connected to the weight room (yeah I'm not sure why either and am just as perplexed as you)..... just not the glorious and glamorous life one would assume, but it's our team and it's the way it's always been so honestly it makes this trip feel just like all the others...... a crazy adventure! Well that's enough out of me for today! Hope all is well back home in the good old US of A!!!