Another High Energy Practice

Thursday, 7 February, 2019

Based on an interesting story that Giorgio Nardi related to me on our drive home from practice Tuesday night, I boarded the Z line bus for the short drive to Bregazzana to see their famous . . .

. . . Magnani Family Mausoleum

ELEPHANT!

As I understand the story, Angelo Magnani was the patriarch of the family owned Poretti Beer empire. This fine beer is still brewed locally to this day.

When Angelo was a young man in the later part of the 19th-century, he spent some time in India and fell in love with elephants.

Thus, when a family of his station realized the need for an impressive crypt in the local cemetery, what better choice than including a life-sized sculpture of one of his beloved pachyderms to support the mausoleum's structure?

The Bregazzana cemetery is at one end of the Z line route and Bregazzana is an extremely small village. I had asked the bus driver how long before he left for his return run and he said, "Eight minutes."

I asked him when the next bus would depart after his left and he responded, "One hour."

Since only a few houses and no businesses were visible from the cemetery, I opted to make this a quick visit to the elephant and not miss the first bus in eight minutes.

Madonna and child by the bus stop

Also near the bus stop,
Casapound Italia is an Italian

neo-fascist political party

Old habits die hard.

Meanwhile, back in Varese . . .

. . . a classic Renault Cv2 sighting

What a perfectly preserved beauty!

Because Skorpion Field was still in the process of thawing out, we returned to our new alternate practice field in Castiglione Olona for the second time.

As always, this last minute move left us at the mercy of the already established, rigorous soccer practice schedules.

Thus, we hit the pitch at 9:00 p.m. for two more hours of much needed practice.

I was highly concerned about possible attendance issues with such a late start and an 11:00 p.m. finish time.

The 2019 season starts on

Sunday, March 3rd at 3:00 p.m.

at the Busto Arsizio Blue Storms

home field

Our players never cease to amaze me.

  

We had another excellent turnout!

Again, the energy level was high for both hours and the players responded positively to all of our coaches' input.

Who knows how many of our eight regular season games we will or will not win? There is really no way of telling until we are able to evaluate our opponents and actually play some games.

All that I can say is that if our players continue to show this level of dedication and positive energy at our practices nightly, then we will win our fair share of 2019 contests. 

Zoo Blitz!

We end every practice with two

Hail Mary plays, one for each QB

We believe that if we get into one of these desperation situations at the end of a game that our odds of success either offensively or defensively have been somewhat increased.

After practices like tonight's, all I can say is that . . .

IT'S GREAT TO BE A SKORPION!