HWN #2

It has been a very cold trip so far. Took off from SB on Wend morning. Went through Phoenix on my way to Minneapolis on US Airways. Trip went well and we arrived on time at 5pm. A couple of us hustled to the hotel to check in and drop our bags off. Jen Boss and I had to do an appearance at the local Hard Rock Cafe where we signed a handful of autographs and had dinner. We went over to the Target Center as the Minnesota Timberwolves had a game vs. Detroit that night. Everyone was there watching and it was a good game to watch. Went down on the floor and threw out some T-shirts for the fans and gave away some tickets. Detroit ended up winning by about 8 after being behind for pretty much the entire game.

The next day I had a ton of media stuff to do. TV thing and a bunch of phone calls. Got through all that and even managed to get a workout in before heading over to the Target Center to get ready to play. On the guys side we had Stein Metzger, Anthony Medel, and Matt Olson with myself. On the women's side there was Jen Boss, Tyra Turner, Jenny Kropp, and Nicole Branagh. The women started first and Jenny Kropp won for the women. We jumped in next and we had some really good fun games. I started off with Matt and it was back and forth against Stein and Anthony. We ended up winning when I hit a ball angle for a sideout that went off the top of the block. Score was 15-13. Next I played with Stein and we jumped out to a 5-1 lead before Anthony blasted a couple of jumpers to get them back into the game. We were actually down 13-12 but sided out and scored 2 points to win the match 15-13. The last game I played with Anthony. We were pretty steady the whole match and ended up winning 15-11. So I ended up being the winner in Minneapolis.

The last game we played the co-ed 4's game. Jenny's team was Stein, Tyra and Matt. My team was Nicole, Jen and Anthony. It was a blast just like last week when we played. The women were hitting and blocking and the men were digging and setting. My team won 21-16. It is pretty funny as all the fans are really into the 4 person game.

After the match we all jumped on the bus and headed for Omaha, Nebraska. It was about a 5 1/2 hour ride. Most people watched a movie and then went to bed. We got in at 5am and I went directly to my room and crashed on the bed.

As for the cold, well, Minneapolis had a high of 14 while we were there but the wind chill was brutal. Not sure exact temp. but it was colder than last week when temps were in the single digits. The wind chill is the killer in this cold weather. Just cuts through everything you have on and freezes you. Today in Omaha it is scheduled to get all the way up to 32 degrees. Relatively balmy really. Low is in the low teens. Fortunately we are inside the whole time.