For the last two weeks, the Olympics brought Americans together in confusion as to where half of those other countries are located.
In case you missed any of the action, don’t worry! Now that they’re done, I’ve (slightly) recapped the past two weeks and will start by saying that if they banned crying and hugging, the whole thing would take a day, day and a half tops.
And that’s just from the announcers.
Anyway, I admit that most of my viewing consisted of hockey and whatever was on at the gym while I was in the cardio room, after which time I would be so inspired by the women’s ski jumping that I would trip getting off of the treadmill and receive a .5 deduction from the Russian judge.
There’s always 2018.
But that brings me to my first point: every Olympic event should include one average person competing, just for reference. Think about it. All the competitors did something to make it to the Olympic games that 99 percent of other people on the planet can’t do—like a triple axel on skates or speeding down an icy mountain at 80 mph.
Whenever I watch I always think, “Oh my, gosh! That was amazing!” right before the announcer says, “That was the worst performance I’ve ever seen in my life.”
It’s because I have nothing to compare it to.
Now if they threw some accountant on a snowboard and forced him to try and ride down a rail and an icy jump, that would provide me some perspective—and most likely an increased interest in watching the games.
At any rate, from what I gathered there was a judging controversy with the figure skating and ice dancing, but the only thing I know about those two events is that Johnny Weir commenting on ice dancing while looking prettier than most Russian women was like a giant middle finger to Vladimir Putin.
Gold.
In terms of hockey, it was quite disappointing, and the only real miracle on ice this Olympics was that they could fit the names of the Russian players on the back of their jerseys. Also, as TJ Oshie demonstrated, a quick way to get thousands of new Twitter followers is to score the winning goal in a shootout against Russia.
Why didn’t I think of that?
But now that the Olympics are done, you can look for the medal winners to appear in a commercial for Subway, McDonalds or Coca-Cola. These companies were sponsors of the Olympics, which is like Paris Hilton sponsoring a job fair, but America always gets the gold in ironic commercialism.
And as much as I enjoy the patriotic spirit of the Olympics, I have to admit that I’m glad people on skis with guns will now be replaced with new episodes of “Ellen” and “Modern Family.”
Plus, there are only two more years until the summer games, where much like in the winter games Swiffering becomes “curling,” ping-pong will suddenly become “table tennis.”
Let the games begin.
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