it's that time again!!

Hey guess what??? There's going to be a winter Olympics this year!! With all the bruhaha in Chicago, I for one was not paying any attention to the rest of the world (typical) and when I saw the NBC commercials for the Vancouver Olympics I was like "huh? Vancouver?" but it is apparently true. And I am excited. While I am not at all an athlete (my days of high school gym were PURE HELL - except when we had those teachers that didn't give two shits what you did during class because they were talking to the jocks. I give you Gustafson's tennis classes where Heidi and I lobbed balls consistently over the tennis court fences, went "oh, crap" then ambled off to go get the wayward balls (that sounds wrong), returning only to hit them over the fence again, and so on, until class was over.) - whatever, I love watching OTHER people do amazing athletic feats. So yeah, I will be tuning in (unless, of course, something awesome is happening on American Idol).

I find the Winter Games to be totally hypnotic. I will spend hours in front of the tv watching sports that I never knew even existed and would not otherwise be caught dead watching. One year, I was doing something or other and got totally sucked in to some kind of cross country skiing race. I was watching it for hours, rooting on the Norwegian who was in the lead. I even got teary when he won. Go, man, go.

I also tuned in, rather inadvertantly, to many men's hockey games. I was on the edge of my seat for the gold medal Sweden team game (and it had NOTHING to do with the cuteness of their goalie, officer!) It has already begun, even though the games themselves won't start until February - last night I was bored and cruising channels when I found the World Cup Ski Jumping competition. How crazy is that, by the way? I want to know who it was that ever thought that would be a fun thing to do? And how do you practice for that, without killing yourself? But so yeah, I was watching it, and was literally transfixed by watching these guys (no Americans, by the way - there is no way we are not crazy enough to do stuff like that - what gives?) flying down the hill at top speed and then soaring, their bodies parallel with their skis, then landing on the ground and not falling over. I am amazed.

So I am ready and waiting. Bring it on, NBC. Bring me your curling, and your hockey, and your half pipe.