Wednesday, August 13, 2008

I am getting ready to hunker down in front of the TV set on Tuesday night and take in the Olympics. I am not going to change channels tonight because when I start watching other things like the Sox game, I seem to miss the important stuff on the Olympics. NBC switches around a lot during their coverage, and between them switching around and me switching around, I end up missing almost everything that I really want to see. The women’s team gymnastics is slated for Tuesday night, and I have to say that women’s gymnastics is my guilty Olympic pleasure. During the Winter Olympics its women’s figure skating. I’m not sure I should be admitting this, but there you go.

I just went and checked on the ages of the USA Women’s Gymnastics Team and after only checking on Shawn Johnson I’m already ashamed of myself. Shawn is only 16 years old, Samantha Peszek is 16 years old, and Bridget Sloan is 16 years old too. Thankfully Nastia Liukin is 18 years old, and Alicia Sacramone is 20 years old. I’ll root for Nastia and Alicia. Nastia is a potentially really hot and problematic name. It’s a good thing that her dad is always hanging around to keep perverted old men like me away. What’s the deal with that Béla Károlyi? I can’t understand a freaking word he says. Did you know that the USA has a trampoline team?

I am fascinated by the concept of gymnastics. Where does something like that come from? As far as I’m concerned, there is nothing that they are required to do (both the men and women) that I would ever even consider unless someone had a gun pointed at my head or maybe if I were on fire. I have spent my entire life trying to avoid even doing a somersault. I couldn’t do one right now for you if you offered me $1000. I’m also fascinated by the concept of diving for any reason other than to get into the pool more quickly. Synchronized diving is flat out freaky. It’s freaky, but it’s also kind of cool. It seems more natural watching the women do the synchronized diving. The men’s “synchro” seems, well, you know…