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Aaaahhhhh. Yaaaaaawwwwnnnn. Hmm. Just woke up, excuse me. I was watching the Olympics.

Look, I am not taking anything away from the athletes. Well, that is not actually true, but I will get to that in a second. But for the most part, I am not taking anything, or much, away from the athletes. They train and do endorsements and try very hard just to get to the Olympics. Winning against the worlds best athletes is tough. I know that. I used to play competitive sports and I gave it my all and was nowhere near Olympic material. But for me, the Olympics, and especially the winter games, are a huge bore. The past 16 days were just a distraction while channel surfing and DVR-ing my shows. Thanks to the networks for not pulling all my favorites like they have done in the past. Couple of thoughts.

- Figure Skating. I will admit I liked figure skating. I watched that event the most, for about 20 minutes, total, over the 2+ weeks. I actually found myself yelling to Patti in the other room "She NAILED that triple double" and "Did you see that sow-cow, it was AWESOME". But something about Sasha Cohen and that Russian chick that bugged me. Maybe they looked and sounded like rich spoiled brats on a school field trip. At least the Japanese girl who won was kind of humble. But who was that American (at least Western) guy who was all over her? I hope it was her husband because one more second and I would have told the kids to leave the room.

- Emily Hughes...

- Emily Hughes. Emily Hughes (this one time, at band camp) looks cute. I never watched Buffy The Vampire Slayer but I had no idea that in addition to slaying blood drinking undead she was a pretty good skater. Holy Crap did Sara Hughes gain some weight. Freshmen 15? Try Sophomore 60. And why did she look so pissed off every time she was on camera. She looked like someone just walked into her dorm room with a case of beer when she wanted some alone time with her boyfriend. Seriously. I have seen prisoners look happier. She had this pus on her face that said to me “20 grand to sit here is not enough, hell, my dad gives me more than that a month for spending money”. But Emily looks like someone I would want to have spending time with my daughter.

- Speed skating. Don’t get my started on this. How many freakin events do they have? Short track, long track, 1500meter, mens, womens, team. Good Lord they put a lot of effort into something that I am not sure is actually a sport. And on the rare times that I passed over NBC when it was on, the athletes looked like they were out skating around Houghton’s pond with their kids. I guess those were the longer events and they were saving up their enery. The only good thing that came out of it was the Damon-Schilling like bickering between the black dude and the surfer guy. I just wished the black dude punched the other guy when he reached across the platform to shake hands. Feeble attempt to look classy. It didn’t work. The press conference looked like a Bobby Knight post game interview after a lop sided loss. Nothing captures the true Olympic spirit like two coddled athletes looking for endorsement deals throwing verbal jabs at each other and acting like fools during interviews. The highlight of the Olympics.

- Bobsledding. I like sleigh riding, I really do. Love it in fact. When I was a kid we used to get on my friend’s huge wooden bobsled and shoot down a slope through trees like we were dive bombing a ship. But two, totally different, single person events? The skeleton? Luge? A little research found that one event you go down on your stomach head first to your death. The other lets you see between your feet as the grim reaper’s cold hands push you faster down an ice tube. Good times I say.

- Curling. Oh, curling. You are such a silly silly sport, aren’t you? Arian looking Wisconsinites pushing a rock across the ice while other less skilled “athletes” sweep the surface while the rock slowly, slowly, slowly, heads down the rink. (The redneck chauvinist side of me wants to say something about those doing the sweeping, like the men should be allowed to hire women to do the sweeping during their turn since its women’s work anyway, but with two older sisters I decided to skip it). This event mocks me. When I find it while surfing, I stop, fascinated, wanting to get out there, drink a twelve pack and try it. But after watching it for 5 minutes I am bored out of my skull and wonder what made me watch it in the first place. The Olympic committee is dropping baseball but keeping this? Some things even I don’t get. How about a snowman building contest? Or snowball fighting? Men’s, women’s, doubles and short track snowball fighting. Maybe ice fishing? Or a snow shoveling event?

- The Athletes. I feel bad for Bode Miller and that Dunkin Donuts commercial girl who tried to show off at the end of her snowboarding race and watched her Gold metal slipped away like her endorsement deals. Bode, because it is the biggest sports choke since the Yankees dropped 4 in a row to the Red Sox in the 2004 playoffs. That hurt to write that. It really did. And when my kids get to the point that they are competitive in sports, I am going to show them the Lindsey Jacobellis video as what NEVER to do in sports. Pathetic, and embarrassing. The only thing I commend her on was doing all of the interviews that her contract called for. She got in front of the camera and took her medicine.

- Speed Skiing. I remember years ago a skiing event where these lunatics would race down a steep mountain with the goal of hitting unhuman speeds. No idea what it was called but it was crazy. They even wore aerodynamic helmets that made them look like soldiers in Battlestar Galactica. I am not exaggerating when I say that it was one of the most intense sporting events I have ever seen. I loved it. They have CURLING but they got rid of speed skiing. Go figure.

- Biathlon and Nordic. When I was a freshman in college I played division 1 lacrosse. I was pretty good in high school and went to a team where everyone was pretty good. Our team was ranked in the top 20 that year and for some reason had a large number of seniors. The only way that I or any of the other freshmen got any serious playing time was in mop-up duty, when it was a blowout. That is what the cross country skiing event is in the winter Olympics. The stories are over, the major events done, the metals are handed out, the well known athletes did all the talk shows, and now NBC is stuck showing people skiing on flat terrain. Plus skiing with guns, or the biathlon. I am sure people in Maine are glued to the TV but not around here. When the ancient Greeks started the Olympic games I am sure that downhill skiing was what they had in mind. But trudging across open fields stopping every now and then to shoot rifles between deep breathing might not be what they had in mind. But then again I doubt curling was either. And why not have a summer Olympic event where people run threw the woods shooting guns. I think they have shooting but not while running. Put that in there in 2008. I should run the Olympic committee, I really should.

- Alpine Skiing. The only event I really have no issue with is Alpine Skiing. I ski. I love it. I am not that good but can handle a moderate black diamond. These skiers are in a world that is different than you or I. It’s an impressive thing to watch and there is so much competition in that event from the northern Europeans that for anyone to win a gold is amazing. I’ll admit I like watching the crashes but that comes with racing around poles at 55 miles an hour. Bode said he has skied drunk. So have I but not at anywhere near the same speed as him.

- Freekstyle Skiing. Freestyle skiing and the half pipe snowboard events are just an attempt to keep people watching. To sell more expensive advertising to younger viewers. It just shows you how corporate the Olympics have become. I would be surprised if they are still events when I am sitting in a nursing home screaming curses at some orderly for not bringing me my beer.

- Ski Jumping. Ski jumping is always a fan favorite. I actually like this event. Anyone who is willing to ski straight down a ramp and shoot into the air to land on rock-hard snow is my friend. Plus we have all seen the “agony of defeat” image of the ski jumper. My only change would be to allow the jumpers to wear some kind of batman outfit with wings to let them sail for miles. Or to add “style” points so jumpers would do stupid things like put their hands in front of them like superman.

- Ice Hockey. Who can blame the American men’s ice hockey team? Really? It’s been a pretty tough couple of years. The lock out. A salary cap. New rules. Trying to get fans back into it. Not really doing a good job of getting fans back into it. The hockey season is still going on. Can you really expect these guys to have two weeks off from their professional jobs and give it a 100% for their country? Yeah, I guess you can expect that. But these guys are getting paid a lot of money to play for the NHL and are not going to risk a freakin THING for a gold metal.

- The Metals. The summer Olympic host country has no say in changing the look of the actual metals. It’s the same every Olympic. But the winter host team can create whatever they want. I think Turino held a pre-school design contest and chose the weakest one. The metal I won for coming in third (out of 5) in the Milton 5K 30-35 division last year looked more professional. Again, I should be the chairman of the Olympic committee.

So that is my take on the Olympics. The Today show was terrible while over there and NO ONE CARES if Katie Couric can freakin ski. And Matt Lauer finally took off that stupid wrist brace. If you are looking for sympathy from me you are way off the mark. What did you get that injury from? Counting all your millions? Couric is a diva midget that makes more money sleeping than I do in a year. I hate you both! And to all the news stations, I have Google Earth as well. I can show an aerial shot of the Italian landscape from my PC at home. Try to add some graphics to what you put on the screen so that it doesn’t look like a high school AV project.