Sunday, August 10, 2008

Let The Games Begin!


Thanks to modern technology, I did not miss the opening of the Olympics. The beach house we stayed at had no TV. We got home too late last night to do anything other than crash in our beds. This morning was full of church and meetings and choir practice. As soon as dinner was over I put on my comfy clothes and fluffed up the Love Sac. The kids made popcorn and we started the DVR recording of the Olympic opening ceremony.

The best part?

We skipped all commercials (well, except for the new Heroes commercial. We had to watch that).

We could skip over the countries we weren't interested in marching into the stadium. We cheered for the USA and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. We skipped the rest.

As for the pageantry, all I can say is WOW! How much did they budget for fireworks? Costumes? How on earth did they coordinate all the guys posing as blocks? The drummers? How did they get the tai chi masters to form such perfect circles? How did they keep them from crashing into each other?

Another thing that was interesting to me was all of the emphasis on balance and harmony, especially with the environment. I don't know if China has plans to reduce their pollution. All I hear from the media is that China constantly fights the international goals of reducing pollution and emissions by a certain date. I would be interested in finding out if they have their own agenda for environmental goals.

Musings aside, we are very much an Olympics-watching family. Mr. Wonderful is the mild-mannered alter-ego of Aquaman so we will be watching all the swimming and diving. As I type this I can hear the USA-China basketball game on the TV downstairs (again, gotta love DVR). Gymnastics is just a given here (doesn't everyone watch gymnastics?) With my new found love of running, I am looking forward to the track events this time. I just received my Olympic edition of Runners World in the mail and I plan on using it to learn about the athletes before I see them compete. With any luck, I might even sound intelligent as I tell Mr. Wonderful and the boys about the events and convince them to watch with me.

What is your favorite Olympic event?

2 comments:

Chaotic Joy said...

I love the Olympics. All those dreams hanging on the balance in a moment. I worry about them so much the drama is almost too much for me sometimes.

I watch the Gymnastics last night and it is one of my favorite events. Men and womens.

Michelle Johnson said...

F was in gymnastics, and will hopefully be in gymnastics when we get back home. So we will for sure watch that. :) I would watch all of the swimming if we didn't start school this week. I just don't have time for that right now.

I'm totally bummed that I'll be missing the Special Olympics up there though. I wish, I wish I could be there for them.