WEDNESDAY, APRIL 30
12:39 A.M. EST

We're here! After three planes, two trains, and one long day of travel, we made it. Everything went great on the flights and once we got into Stockholm we had to catch two trains to Carlstad - that was a bit interesting figuring out that system with people cruising around all over, not to mention the 7 bags we were lugging around. Jet lag definitely set in, and I finally slept for about an hour from Copenhagen (which has an awesome airport - beautiful people everywhere) to Stockholm. Once we got on the second train, it was a three hour ride, so I got another hour or so. By the time we got to Carlstad it was 3:45. Our GM picked us up from the train station. He is kind of who I expected... really nice guy and energetic, but I had figured he was a business man. WRONG! He's a teacher. That kind of through me for a loop, but getting there and finally meeting him brought Ced and I back to life a little.

So we officially had 2 hours and 15 minutes before practice, haha. He drove us through the downtown of Carlstad (which looks pretty sweet), and we headed to our apartment about 5 miles or so outside downtown. We will get pictures to you guys soon. We walked up the spiral staircase and came inside... Two bedroom, full kitchen, patio deck, and leather couches in the living room with tons of space for two people... Rikard had even bought us groceries! So we are definitely fired up about that. We unloaded our stuff, and he gave us a cell phone and told us he would be back in about an hour to pick us up for practice which started at 6:00, but the newspaper wanted to meet with us beforehand. Wow, so we were finally here and checking out the place trying to get somewhat situated before we had to practice. I gave Ced the master bedroom with the King size bed and I took the twin in the other room - showered to wake up and not feel so grimy. Interesting, no shower curtain, stand up shower with just a shower head on the wall - our bathroom is basically a locker room. Its kind of funny.

So we went to practice not knowing what to expect at all. Our practice field is at a local school about two minutes from here - not a bad set up - definitely not bermuda grass, but it will work. (We still haven't seen our stadium.) There were a couple of players waiting there. OL- one was nicknamed the Big Show, hilarious. As the guys began to show up, we met them one by one not knowing what they thought of us and just small talking with them... how was the flight? how old are you? etc etc. with them speaking Swedish mostly to each other, although they all know English as well. The newspaper showed up, and Cedric talked to him while I was introducing myself to other coaches and the equipment guy and his wife - nice people, funny. Finally, our HC shows up and the dude has cleats on! He is also our starting free safety this weekend... didn't know that coming in! haha. He is an American who moved here in 1999 to be with his wife. Nice guy, probably about mid 30's and is also the Defensive Coordinator.

So, the team is here now and we're ready to go. They take off to warm up while I am talking with the OL coach... It seems as though he as picked up for the most part what we are trying to do. As practice got going, it ran pretty smoothly. Far better than I had expected. We kept it simple, and I think it has worked... the guys have an understanding of what I want to do, which is good because we play on Saturday! We have some killers too - TE is yoked, OL is huge and our best guy is 6'6 at least and just got back from an NFL tryout/camp. He didn't practice, but we had a DL who was at the camp with him as well. Other than the TE we have 3 other solid guys who can play, two WR and a really solid RB. I think the guys were excited to have us there and Cedric didn’t even practice well... although, I don't how you could after the day we had. I really felt like an OC for the first time in my life running the show - it didn't take long for me to start coaching them up - I was jacked out there, not sure what they thought of that. We had fun and practice actually went pretty well. If we stay healthy, we've got a shot to be pretty good.

Got back to our place around 8:30. After some food, I crashed. That's probably why I woke up at 5:30 this AM. Overall, solid first day......

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