On Sunday of this week, I went with Enes to one of his friends house and we grilled out all afternoon. It was fun and relaxing as we had 3 rotations in the sauna and made hamburgers. Then on Monday, we worked out as usual then in the afternoon we went to run at the track. While we were running Marlon pulled his hamstring which was a bad sign for the upcoming game since they were suppose to have the best running backs in the league. Our other linebacker was banged up from last week as well.

Friday, as you know, was July 4th, but there was no fireworks display anywhere to be found. We were telling everyone about it though. I don't think they really cared. This week I went to the movie BASIC and I really liked it. I know it was probably playing at home like 5 months ago or something, but nevertheless if you haven't seen it I recommend you watch it. This week I also finished the book that my preacher gave me at home called "The Spirt Driven Life" by Rick Warren. You all know me and how much I like to read so for me to read a book it must have been pretty interesting...and it was. It only took 40 days and was about 5 to 6 pages a day. The book makes you look at things differently and gives you a different perspective. I also recommend that you check this book out. I ate some different foods this week over here too. I ate some lamb pasta and reindeer pasta.

Saturday evening Marlon and I went to get some food and on the way we saw a woman die. She was an old woman that collapsed right across from the restaurant where we were eating. She just fell to the ground and the paremedics came and did chest compressions, but in the end they just covered her with the blue sheet and that was it. That was the first time that I've have ever witnessed the last seconds of a person's life. Needless to say my apetite was shot. Then when we finally got our food there was a drunk guy who came in the store and was ordering food. When he heard us talking in English it caught his ears. He came and sat down at our table and asked us where we were from and all so we told him. He then proceeded to tell us that he "hated Americans" and that we had no business in Iraq. We realized he was drunk and so we just let him speak his peace. He also told us that "we weren't the war machine in our country and that he had no problem with us, but that he still hated Americans". He shook our hands got his food and left. I really don't think that this guy wanted to do anything because he was a skinny white guy, who was drunk and also just the sight of Marlon is a pretty good deterrent. Needless to say I was glad that Marlon was there.

Our game this week was on Sunday at 6 in the evening in Helsinki, the capital of Finland. We played against the Helsinki Roosters, who are the defending champions. They had a turf field. This game was on TV, I believe on the finnish sports channel or something. Some of the guys are suppose to be recording the game for me so hopefully I'll have a copy to bring home. This was my first time playing a game on Sunday and let me start off by saying "thank God for rib pads". I have never taken so many shots in one game in my life. It was raining before the game so the turf was wet and the balls were a little slick, which is always great for the qbs you know. The other team won the toss and elected to receive. They set the pace when they scored from the first play from scrimmage on a 60 to 70 yard run. I knew at this point that it could be a long day. So then we had offense and started on the 20. On our first play I got flushed right and threw a bomb for a Td, only to get it called back because one of our recievers was on the line and he wasn't suppose to be. The guys were really excited about the play and it would have been a big momentum shifter, but as you can see we had to move backwards 5 yards. This is when they started pounding on me. As I am writing to you right now I feel like a train ran over me. It seemed like our offense was on the field forever, but we kept inching away at them. They were getting a lot of penetration early in the game and I don't think I had my feet set but about for 5 throws the whole day. Every time I released the ball I was getting whacked and I may have gotten up slowly, but I did get up. When we went in for half time it was like 14 - 7 or something. Though we were playing bad we were still in the game and had just missed 2 opportunities at scoring. This was our first actual game with some competition of the year. We played yesterday without 7 players that will be here in a few weeks due to work, vacation, or a hamstring. In the 2nd half my feet really began to hurt me. Since the guy at the post office in America didn't read my address correctly or he didn't know that Finland was in Europe and didn't put it on the package my turf shoes didn't make it here for the game. So I had to wear the size 11 1/2's again....and I wear a 13 just in case you forgot. Having to scramble so much my feet had to work a lot and my toe nails are starting to turn black. One good thing was that they started to get tired in the 2nd half and I got a little more time....say instead of 1 second I got 2. However, I was proud of our guys and especially the lineman because we never gave up and sometimes the defense didn't put us in situations that looked to promising. I thought that was a good sign of our character. We had a lot of lineman going both ways so I know that they were tired and since the rain had now stopped and the sun was back out it was pretty humid.

The offense played better in the second half, but its still a bad sign when your most successful plays are the broken ones, but we kept fighting. By the end of the game I could hardly walk and I was just waiting for the clock to hit :00 so that I could take those shoes off. The final score was 35-28, as we took our first loss of the year. I had my fourth of July celebration over here on their field though dropping bombs everywhere. I was 25 for 50 for 420 yards passing. I threw 4 td passes officially. I threw 3 more that got called back due to penalties ( 2 of which were over 50 yards ) and I had one pass dropped in the end zone. In Finland you can get away with some throws that you normally wouldn't get away with in America so it makes it interesting. Thats 7 td's that they saw and one that they should have seen so they know the writing is on the wall. During the game they had one guy break his arm and another guy tear his achilles tendon. We also had our free safety get hurt in the first half and was out for the rest of the game and our other linebacker got hurt in the second half and was out for the rest of the game. So as you can see our troops were not in full force, but we still made it a game.

As for their running back that gets all the hype... he may be the best running back that we've faced over here, but he would be 3rd string at home. He only has one move and decent speed and runs high. I think Marlon will be dreaming about him now. You could tell they respected our defense cause when he scored he acted like he scored against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers or something. I wasn't that impressed with him overall, but he will be the one we have to stop to win the championship. Nobody layed any wood to him, but I think that will change if Marlon's hamstring gets better. The turf did burn me up some and I got some bruises, but I will make it. The game was a 3 hour 15 tv broadcast which I will try to get a copy of and send home. I think we may have a game in the championship.

No pics to post from this game as my camera man is in Washington and New York, but I will have more soon hopefully.