You’ll poke your eye out!

Both girls have classmates who have taken time away from school to attend Olympic events.  Which is cool for them.  I told the girls we soooo would have been there, but what with moving and all, we just didn’t get around to buying tickets.

Right.

I have been watching some of the Olympics on television, though, and I tell the girls that watching it on TV is better because there are no lines at the bathroom.

We have a DVR, which means I am spared having to sit through endless commercials and network promotion.  It also means that I have been spared most of the commentary, all of the background crap about the lovely country of Canada, all of the interviews with the winners and losers, and some (but not enough) of the discussions of how yet another athlete is overcoming adversity and great personal hardship to compete in these Olympic Games.  All of this means that I am probably not as well-informed as I might be about all things Olympic.  I have watched a little of everything, but know a lot about nothing.

That said, I do have a few non-expert thoughts.

Sportsmanship:

I am not naming any names (mostly because I don’t remember how to spell them and can’t be bothered to look them up), but the Russian figure skater who took home a silver and got all pissed off?  The guy who stepped up onto the gold medal platform during the awards ceremony claiming that he had “forgotten” that he hadn’t won the gold?  The guy who later gave endless interviews in which he claimed to be the true winner?  He should have his shiny silver medal taken away.  Period.

I know that you can’t be an Olympic athlete without being somewhat delusional about your own abilities and your own fabulousness.  Every single one of the athletes competing in the Olympics is competing with the goal of being named the best in the world in his or her sport.  That unrealistic and ridiculous vision of their own future has sustained them through sacrifices, training, and hardship.  But in the end, only one person gets that gold medal, and everyone else needs to be gracious and congratulatory.  So take his medal and his microphone away.  Idiot.

Stupid Events:

First . . . Curling. What the fuck?  This sport seems to bear some resemblance to shuffleboard and bowling, and neither of those activities can really be called “sports,” much less “Olympic Sports.”  Mark tells me I don’t understand the intricacies of curling, and that there is a lot more to it than I realize.  My answer?  There would have to be, because all I see is one idiot sliding a big rock and then two more idiots sweeping the rock a path on which to slide.

Second . . . Ski Cross. Where are these athletes’ mothers?  If ever there was a time for moms to be running out onto the snow, yelling for their children to stop what they are doing this instant before “someone gets an eye poked out,” this is it.  Have you seen this sport?  Four skiers at a time, armed with long pokey sticks and long pokey skis, go charging down something that resembles a moto-cross track on ice.  The skiers jump and crash and kick and jab at one another in an attempt to pull ahead, as only the first two skiers in each race move on to the next level of competition.  Olympic Sports should not be like car wrecks . . . the thought of seeing someone mangled and broken should not be why you are tuning in to watch.

Third . . . The Biathlon. Skiing and rifle shooting?  Someone explained to me once that this sport has its origins in Norway, and that Norwegian soldiers were trained to defend their snowy country by skiing around its perimeter with rifles.  An interesting bit of Scandinavian history, yes, but why is skiing and shooting at imaginary enemies an Olympic sport?  And again, speaking as a mother, someone is going to lose an eye.

Repeated televising of injuries and death:

Yes, there is a certain macabre fascination in seeing these world-class athletes occasionally fall on their asses and make fools of themselves.  But I don’t want to really see anyone get hurt, and if I inadvertently see someone get really hurt?  I don’t want to see it again.  Really.

Luger dies after being thrown from his sled and into a concrete beam?  I do not need to see that.  Ever.  And I certainly don’t want to see it over and over again as we sit with the girls to watch the opening ceremonies.  Whoever was in charge of that decision  . . . shame on you.

In the middle of yet another “overcoming adversity” story, we go to video of a speed skater who, in the middle of a pre-Olympics race, cut himself with his own skate blade.  The image is of a fallen skater on the ice, blood pooling bright red around him as paramedics rush frantically about.  The announcer lets us know that the injured skater was lucky not to have “bled out right there on the ice.”  I do not ever want to see someone nearly bleed out.  Not ever.

The skier who fell hard and clearly dislocated his shoulder?  Got it the first time.  The arm dangling uselessly at his side as he yells out in pain tells the story.  Nothing is added by watching the fall, the dangling arm, and the scream of anguish three more times.  Nothing except queasiness.

Insane apparel:

It almost seems like you can’t be an Olympic Athlete without agreeing that you are going to have to dress like a fool.  But even in this elite world of skin-tight aerodynamic clothing, some folks must be called out for special ridicule.

People like:

The ice dancers. Not the figure skaters, but the ice dancers . . . the skaters who are apparently trying to divert our attention from the fact that they don’t do any hard tricks or jumps with crazy clownish costumes.  I didn’t actually watch any of this sport, because it is stupid, but I did see the ice dancers as they flew over the ice in DVR fast-forward.  They all looked insane, but I especially noticed the two sets of American dancers, who both seemed to have gone with the “Cowboy and the Hooker” theme.  I know they were supposed to be doing their country’s native folk dance – Is USA’s folk dance stripper-related?  I so did not know that.

The two-man bobsledders. There is so much going on here that is wrong.  Their outfits are skin-tight and super-shiny, which means that you can see the outlines of, well . . . everything.  And the bobsledders tend to be big boys, which just makes the whole “squeezed-into-a-sausage-casing” thing that much more spectacular.  These men have enormous butts and thighs, which I could see in extreme close-up, because the cameramen film the start of the race from directly behind the racers as they bend over and shove the sled down the track.  Turns out there is such a thing as too close.

Speaking of too much closeness — these large sausage-casing wearing men seem to touch each other a lot.  Many of them signaled the start of their run by slapping their bent over partner noisily on the back or butt.  And then the second man has to jump into the sled, fold forward, and basically stick his head into the front man’s ass.  And they all seemed to hug each other a lot during post-race interviewing.  All perfectly normal if everyone’s wearing jeans (except the head up the butt thing), but the outfits made it all vaguely creepy and sexual.

Or was that just me?

Finally, the snowboarders. While I can appreciate that they want to look cool with their oversized jackets and low-slung pants, there is no way these clothes are enhancing their performances.  My question is . . .Why have all of the competing snowboarders from all over the world agreed to wear clothing that can only slow them down and keep them low?  It seems only a matter of time before one of the less cool countries figures out that shiny testicle-revealing clothing will make their snowboarders go faster and higher.

When that happens, let’s just all agree to make them all wear athletic cups.

No one wants to know what Shaun White is packing.  Really.