Des fromages sur le cerveau

We left last night from Le Pepiniere, our home gym and the place where we practice twice a week, to discover a snowstorm going on outside!!!!!! Ahhhhhhh. This quickly turned into my first adventure of driving a stick shift in the snow and thru all the windy roads back to our little chateaux in Saignelgier. (both meanings of windy fits here) It ended in a great success, although the faces of my two Southern Californian roommates might have proved otherwise. For some reason, I had a feeling it was going to be bone-chilling cold after practice and brought with me extremely warm attire. One of my roommates actually showed up to practice without sweatpants I think it would be safe to compare this to the first time I went snowboarding in Vermont up at Jay Peak……. I planned on boarding without goggles, but had brought a beanie “just in case.” It was January. haha. My time here, at the moment, might have been quite difficult had it not been for my experience with actual winters in Boston.

At the moment, I am not allowed to play volleyball. I ended up tearing a ligament in my ankle! It was found 9 days after the actual sprain in the MRI that was taken at a hospital in Bien. I was told the day I had the cast removed I will be allowed to fully participate in practice in 8 days!! That will be a total of 30 days since the injury, 30 days of not being able to run or jump!!! That sounds so crazy to me. Luckily, ever since I was taken out of the cast and put into the removeable brace I have been able to bike and weight lift. I am participating slightly in practice… mostly standing and serving, passing, and initiating drills. I have been the official assistant coach in our past two matches (injured players are not allowed to sit on the bench). I have written our lineups and taken stats on the bench. The last league match I will have to sit out of will be this coming weekend, hopefully. We are still undefeated and have been lucky to not have had tough competition these past few weeks.

However, the Swiss Cup starts Sunday!!!!! So this means we have two matches this weekend! Both at home! Both of which I can’t play. I did everything I could to try and get the doctor to clear me for this weekend, but I ended in failure. It must be for the best though. I am used to always playing thru injuries, but I have never torn or broken anything, so this must be different. The Swiss Cup is single elimination!!! It is the very first match that we will be entered in the Cup, so it is not expected to be hard. Remember, our goal is to WIN THE SWISS CUP!!!

Our schedule, as far as we know, is:
LNB
Nov 7th vs Therwil
Nov 14th vs Val de Travers
Nov 21st vs Muri Bern
Nov 28th vs Geneve
Dec 5th vs Ruswil
Dec 12th vs Cossonay
Dec 19th vs Fribourg
Jan 9th vs Therwil

SWISS CUP
Nov 8th vs Thurwil
Nov 22nd vs ???
Dec 6th vs ???(sweet 16)
Dec 20th vs ???(quarterfinals)
Jan 10th vs ???(semifinals)

So there it is……. it is up to us to make it happen.

In other news, our town hosted the Cheese Olympics recently!!! It is an anual European festival complete with a parade, a disco, bands, bars, booths, and tons of tents!! It was held in Germany last year! The first night my roommates and I attended the fondue party!!! It made more sense for me to eat cheese because I didn’t have a match to play in the next day. haha. So, I bought the fondue!!! We all shared it and it was delicious!! The next morning we walked around to all the booths tasting cheese before we left for our match. There were cheeses from Italy, France, Switzerland, Poland, Germany, Austria, Spain and a couple other flags I didn’t recognize. My Coach and I completed the full cheese olympics experience on Sunday by watching the parade and tasting, but this time buying cheese!!! We also bought these delicious sausages. I found this crazy cheese sandwhich making booth…. where I HAD to buy a cheese sandwhich. They had a grill set up particularly to make cheese sandwhiches, I swear!! That thing looked like it would stay hot for days. They would stick a slice of cheese and two slices of bread on these prongs then rotate them in the grill. Turned out perfect everytime!!!!

the flyer that kept me in anticipation…

all the adorable couples dancing to the band :)

soooooo crowded in our town barn for the Cheese!!!

fondue for one but fed three!!

annnnnnnnnd…. she loved it!

the beginning of the zip line for kids and that building marked the end of the parade

the end of the zip line and the CL in the background

that circus tent had a petting zoo inside!

close up of those cheese slices

cooking the cheese sandwhiches!!

morbier cheese made in les monts de jura and my delish sausage

homemade broccoli cheese and potato soup :)

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Tags: Boston, cheese olympics, fondue, fromage, Jay Peak, parades, sideways grilled cheese, sprained ankle, Swiss Cup