What we did last night

As you can imagine, we all had a bit of steam to blow off last night after the tournament. A bit of steam and a lot of duty-free alcohol. The resident extrovert on our team, Bill, choose to do so by crashing this poor drag performer's show at a soccer event. She took it all in stride and they ended up having a charming duet - I think the only thing she said about it was "honey, you're on my cord".
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Tournament wrap-up

We are done with the soccer tournament now-played our last matches on Thursday. Our team qualified for the playoff rounds, which felt good, and although we didn't win that many games, all of them were extremely close. We went against two very good teams for our last games (Denmark and the very hot Czech team) and both times held our own and dominated the ball a good part of the game.

The Czechs were one of the top seeds in our division and I think we were all surprised at how well we did against them. Even though it was a loss, it was the best game of soccer we've ever played and we came out of it on quite a high. We didn't have a single blowout against us in the entire tournament, which was a big improvement from our seasons in Seattle.

Had Wednesday off and did some sightseeing in London: Tate Modern (they had a great Cy Twombly exhibit), Hyde Park, and the Serpentine Gallery, which is sporting a new Frank Gehry pavilion in front of it. Also went to Billy Elliot (the musical) which was a treat from Mark and Lee. It was fantastic - I'm not a huge musical fan but loved this one.
Today we have another free day and then will probably go watch the finals tomorrow. I think I need to go find a beard trimmer. Some guy at a bar the other night said I looked like Moses - not really the look I'm going for!
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London games begin

My team and I started playing in our IGLFA gay soccer tournament in the heart of London today. This is a pic of the opening ceremony/party last night. There are about 32 men's teams and 5 women's, so that's a ton of gay soccer players! About half of them seem to be Brits and they've been pretty friendly to us Americans so far. As long as we don't use the word "soccer" instead of "football" - that seems to drive them crazy.

We tried to be good and get to bed at a decent hour but ended up having a little adventure trying to get home. Picadilly Circus isn't the easiest place to grab a cab at night after the Underground closes, though we did manage to find some great gyros.

First game today was a ton of fun - we tied 1-1 but also really gelled as a team and dominated the second half.
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The march on Paris

Our time in Paris is coming to an end - everyone's either flying or taking the train to London tomorrow to start the soccer tournament. We've walked miles and miles through the neighborhoods around Le Marais and alternated between totally lazy, hang-out-at-cafe days and turbo tourist days (Tuesday we were the anti-tourists, Wednesday we went to Musee de l'Orangerie, the Catacombs and the Rodin Museum).



Nights were pretty hit or miss for us. We weren't sure if everyone was really gone for August or if we had the uncanny knack for hitting exactly the wrong night at each bar we'd try. I had become the default night time navigator and took us on a few wild goose chases throughout the city. Though on one of these death marches we did stumble on an amazing black French rapper at this closed cafe in the middle of nowhere rapping to a couple of his friends. Pretty magical and for me I think that was the highlight of the entire week. Thursday night we finally found a dance club that had people in it (CUD) and stayed out late dancing. That was our 3rd time trying to find the place, so it was a victory of sorts.

Other things I'll remember on this segment: our foie gras fest escaping the rain at a restaurant off Place des Voges, Centre Georges Pompidou, the nights we spent eating, drinking and talking at our apartment, the Catacombs and that apple bread pudding tarlet at our local bakery.

Landed in Paris

After months of planning, I finally took off on my first leg to Paris on Aug. 14th! Staying in a sweet apt in Le Marais with a few players from my soccer team. Paris seems quiet and empty this time of year - nice and relaxing so far. A bit of a jet-lagged zombie right now so more later.
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