MN Freeze,
     Good'ay MN Freeze! How ya goin? I hope everybody is enjoying their summer back in the states! Everything here in Western Australia is going great and as I am beginning to near the end of my trip and time is absolutely flying. We only have one round of games left before finals start. Our team secured our spot in the finals with a solid win over Mergen's team, the Denmark Magpies. With only four games left it's time to start locking stuff in and preparing for the first round of finals. Our footy games have been going okay as we're currently in fourth place in our five team comp, and we've beaten the third place team the last couple times we've played them. Our team has a lot of talent on it but throughout the season our fitness has let us down when we play the top two sides and we've only been able to put two or three quarters together against the top sides. Things are finally starting to come around fitness wise across the roster and we've been playing some good footy lately. I've been getting in a few 5K's a week down here so you guys whould be able to put in at least one during the week outside of training. We need to be ready for nationals this year. Speaking of nationals, I'm really excited about getting back and playing with you guys in Ohio! I'll be getting back to the cities on Tuesday, October 6th and I'll be looking to have a couple of kicks with you guys before heading of to Ohio.

Since my last entry I have since switched from working with the local brick paver to working out at one of the vineyards just outside of town. The first couple of weeks they had me pruning grape vines and recently I have been working in and around the shop helping clean up and organize the equipment. I was supposed to have been working at the vineyard the entire time I was down here, but I enjoyed (as much as one can) my time brick paving and I am happy to now be working out at the vineyard. When it's cold and rainy it's not very fun but most days it's pretty nice and it's quite beautiful to be working in and amongst the vines for the whole day. I still catch myself still having a hard time believing that I'm actually in Australia doing what I'm doing.
     A few weeks ago Mergen and I took a trip up to Perth for Country Week. Country week is a week where all of the country league's throughout the state of WA send representative teams up to Perth for sort of an all-star weekend. One of the league's was suffering a little bit for numbers and Dale Ballantyne organized it for the US players to go up and play for the Ravensthorpe footy association team. It ended up being just Mergo and I for the US players and we met up with the boys on Wednesday night. We had one game on Thursday and one game on Friday. We ended up getting beat by about 16 goals in each game, but we ended up having quite the fun weekend. I guess the team we played for hasn't won a game in their 17 years of going up there, but it didn't bother them one bit and they were just happy to be up in Perth for a little bit of footy and a lot of bit of fun. Mergen and I played well since Mergen was in the backling so he had the ball at his end for most of the two games. I ended up kicking four goals in the first game and one in the second helping the team kick the higest total of goals they've ever kicked in the carnival. It was a great atmosphere of footy for the weekend and the comaraderie was awesome. On the Sunday of the weekend we were also able to make it the the West Coast Eagles game vs. the St. Kilda Saints, who are currently in first place. It was a pretty fun game to go to as the Eagles stayed with them for three quarters before the Saints dustec them in the fourth.
     Well, have fun in the upcoming weeks and keep trying to get as many as you can to all of the training sessions each week. If you haven't already it's time to start thinking about nationals and getting the fitness up and the skills sharp. Let me know how everybody is and how the team is doing whenever you get a chance and good luck in your upcoming games!
Cheers,
 - Tiger