LAUNCHING LSK KVINNER IN NORWAY    11th March 2010

Photographs by Stieg Mortenson

It has now been six days since D and I landed back in Oslo, Norway and we have pretty much settled back into the ole soccer routine here. D and I are staying with friends at the moment because we have to wait for final visa documents and official transfer papers to go through before the Club can find us a place. Our friends have been great in putting us up, but I think all of us are looking forward to D and I moving out into our own space. We need room to dump all our bags and stinky soccer clothes.

I guess that I have just kind of let the cat out of the bag in regards to D being back with LSK Kvinner in Norway. In the politest terms I can manage, the United States based WPS League dropped the ball big time in allowing one of Canada’s top players to get away from them. No matter, their loss will almost certainly be LSK Kvinner’s gain. The WPS may be one of the top women's leagues in the world when you take into account average salaries and owners' investments, but what I have seen of their player management relations so far through friends, has been far from excellent, or even professional! OK. that's the diatribe over with.

There is still a TON of snow here in Norway. I think I had managed to convince myself in Cyprus, that spring would have arrived in Oslo, but it has not even started. All I can say is that even though the temperature is cool, the sun is shining, and has been every day we have been here. In the end, I don't have much to complain about. Also, any further complaints from me would ring rather hollow, as we leave with the team on Saturday for a pre season camp in sunny Turkey - yeah! The pictures of the facilities look great!

I think that in the past, I have mentioned some of the strange marketing and promotional stunts that my Norwegian teams have dabbled in. There was the time I had to walk down the main street of Oslo “singing” the Norwegian National anthem. Then there was the time D and I had to hold hands with two American players on our squad, and run down a hill while it was pouring with rain. There was also the TV show starring D and I in a duel to see who had the best balance, who could crawl faster … you get the idea. Now we have a few new ones.

Last Friday 5th March, D and I showed up at the LSK Club for team photographs and thoroughly enjoyed a unique photo session. The first few shots were pretty standard - headshots and action shots, - but then we went to work on our "intimidation look." I am not sure what the photographers and marketers were expecting from D and I, but I don't think we do intimidation very well. Eventually, they tried to make us look tougher by putting some war paint on us … turns out though that the war paint looks a heck of a lot like cat’s whiskers (perhaps tiger whiskers ?) rather than anything else. The final few frames of the whole photo shoot were dedicated to one of our sponsors, a banana import company.

Tonight, 10th March, we had the official kick-off for the Lillestrøm Soccer Klub (LSK) Even though the women's Club is not part of Lillestrøm itself, we are part of the LSK club called LSK Kvinner (LSK Women). So, we were invited to the launch ceremony.

This recognition is apparently a big step in Norway. Everyone was taking our involvement very seriously and we were an integral part of the show. To give you some idea of how seriously our involvement in the launch was taken, we had to take lessons on how to walk and turn properly for when we were going to be introduced. We walked out to “Bad Romance” by Lady Gaga and then had to pace ourselves to the beat. This is hard to do when you can’t even clap to a rhythm or beat at the best of times. We had to leave the stage balanced on our right foot, then count out the beats "1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 " and "1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8." stand, pose "1,2,3,4," step back with the left foot, take one step backwards, spin, then move to your mark on the floor.

I think I may have been even more nervous than I have ever been before the start of a major soccer game. We were all wearing black, and sporting a yellow sash with "Miss Defender", "Miss Midfield" or "Miss Forward" embroidered on it. This probably sounds very fancy, but unfortunately the yellow sashes were made out of something resembling an old yellow bed sheet and bits of frayed yellow string were everywhere. From a distance, they served well though, and the night was generally a great success and we were very pleased to have been a part of it.

I especially enjoyed getting to finally meet Olivier Ocean, a Canadian who plays for the men’s team. It turns out that his brother is married to a friend of mine. Hi Erin! The soccer world is very small.