Olympic Blogging, As Such

I haven't blogged or tweeted as much as I wanted to this week, during the Olympics. There are basically two reasons for this. The first is general busyness; people have finally figured out that I'm back from vacation now, so I'm getting more work. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. One of my contracts has finally come through with some nice semi-lucrative work.

The other reason/excuse is my residence, out here on the west coast. I don't want to know what's happened until I actually see it, so that I'm surprised. In some cases, it's okay to know the result of competitions before I get to see them when NBC shows them during prime time here, but that's three hours later than many of the other folks on Twitter or Facebook. As a result, I'm reading what they're saying hours after the fact. I'd rather have the fun of being surprised than being up on everything.

So by the time I'm exposed to everything, I don't much see the point of adding anything. In my old Usenet days, we called that "lurking," and it's a perfectly valid way to do things. That being said, here are some brief impressions, this fifth day of Olympic competition.

The Opening Ceremonies. In some ways, I enjoyed this opening ceremony more than Beijing. Unlike Beijing, where my mouth hit the ground in amazement, I was touched. It was quintessentially Canadian, even down to the Great One waiting to light the torch. It was more subtle, and in some ways, more beautiful.

Apolo Ono. That was such an exciting race on Sat., and I'm looking forward to his next one. Today or tomorrow, I can't remember which. I helped pass his Wikipedia article to Good Article, so it's on my watchlist. The article's traffic has been huge, so it's been fun watching what's been going on with it. Like Ono, it has had its share of controversy. Speed skating is so much fun, almost as much fun as...

Figure skating. The skating, as is normal for an Olympics, has been outstanding. I am in heaven! It's had all the normal emotional ups and downs for me. I cried when
Shen and Zhao won their gold, and felt sad for the end of the Russian dynasty. I thrilled at Pleshenko, smiled with Johnny Weir, pumped my fists in the air after Evan Lysacek's marvelous short program and cried as I watched his tears in the Kiss and Cry, and felt Jeremy Abbott's disappointment. Can't wait until tomorrow night! It's a virtual tie, and I so want my prediction about Evan winning the gold to come true.

There are other reactions, of course, but time is short and I'll stop here. It's my hope to blog a bit more, but with my schedule this week, I'm not promising anything.