Except The Last Supper painting is in Italy. I’ve heard that the segment was a refers to a Bacchanal painting and the Greek reference.
Brian
And seriously, it was men dressed up as women. It was not people having debauched sex in the street right in front of god and everyone. 
Oh, you know I saw the big woman eating or whatever and wondered what was up with all that. It didn’t even dawn on me that’s what it was.
USA convincingly 3-1 over Germany in women’s soccer… first few minutes looked shaky, I thought we were heading for a repeat of the last WWC. But quite solid after that (despite goal #3 being a fluky deflection).
In the other group match, Australia was down 5-2 to Zambia and came back to win 6-5, highest scoring match in Olympic history.
True, but they did ultimately destroy Serbia pretty handidly. But, yeah, better competition than the '92 team faced by a mile.
I think the USA, if it stays aggressive, should win every single game this year. They looked pretty unbeatable today.
Wait, was it not 4-1?
:checks:
Yep, they scored again in minute 89. 4-1 USA
Might have caused scheduling problems to cancel Canada’s games. You’d have a lot of unhappy ticket holders. And the teams Canada was supposed to play would be getting a rest day while other teams were playing. In a tightly scheduled tournament like this, that could give those teams an advantage in later games.
Can someone please send Michael Phelps a memo?
The man-bun is so over.
So, so over.
I’m watching the equestrian cross-country, which is being held on the grounds of Versailles. I can’t decide if that’s the most elitist thing ever, or actually pretty cool.
Don’t have Peacock, and given how fragmented NBC & CNBC’s programming is, plus the sheer number of events, I’m only ever going to see snippets at a time (yeah, I miss the days where I could watch a whole event front to back on free TV). So for now, brief notes on what I’ve seen, and I’ll most likely move on to specific stories when I get to them.
Air rifle: I’ve only seen a few minutes, but this is already mounting a serious challenge to racewalking for “most unwatchable Olympic sport”. Basically nothing happens for a really long time, then you see a little dot on a graphic, rinse and repeat. At least archery lets you see the arrow leave the bow and enter the target.
Handball: I appreciate sports where 1. smart, creative, active offensive play puts points on the board and 2. defense has to earn its keep. I hate soccer because the most electrifying offense can take on the shakiest defense and win 1-0 (and occasionally lose 1-0). I’m not a fan of the NBA either because defense has become so artificially neutered that any bottom feeder can put up 100 points. Handball is fast paced with plenty of ball movement, a variety of shots, and teamwork absolutely vital to success. Slack off on defense or expect the ref to do the job for you and you’re giving up a goal; fail to move the ball around or take the right shot and you won’t find the net. Scores are high but not runaway. Great sport! 
Skateboarding: Haven’t seen anything spectacular so far. A rail slide here, a kickflip there. I know the Olympics doesn’t get the elite of this sport, so I’m not going to set my expectations too high, but I’m hoping that someone can wow me.
Fencing: Ehh, still don’t dig this. Seems to be a mixture of lots of shuffling, some tentative poking, clumsily running into or even past each other, and one laaaawwwwnnnnnggggg judges’ conference after another. I get that one tiny moment of carelessness can end a point so they have to be defensive, it’s just not my idea of a good time.
Beach volleyball: The women are no longer required to wear bikinis, which I think is simply fantastic. Because now when a team does wear bikinis, we can dispense with all the annoying mansplaining bullcrap and accept the fact that some women actually like wearing very little clothing, and it’s none of your damn business why. (And if one of them wins the gold, which looks highly probable, so much the better. 
)
Rugby: It’s a fun, fast-paced spectator sport, and, as someone who lost interest in football, provides a nice contrast. (In football it’s difficult to prevent the opponent from advancing but easy to gain possession; the opposite is true for rugby.) This is one of the few sports where the women’s game isn’t noticably inferior to the men’s, and it shows how field sense, quick reactions, and team coordination matter more than brute strength. Once the initial blowouts are done with, should be a must-watch!
Anyone notice that NBC is really pushing the women’s sports? I guess they learned that appealing to women via lots of super boring stories wasn’t working and have switched to what they should’ve done in the first place. Approve. 
Beckdawrek - I saw three colorfully-dressed young people read (presumably) romantic literature, get all playful and giggly, and run into a room before one of them closed the door on us, remaining fully clothed from start to finish. I’m sticking with “cute”.
PatrickLondon - Oh, cool, thanks.
silenus - “Children’s drag performance?” What children’s drag performance? Wait, were they talking about the pole acrobats? For crying out loud, those are period costumes, who gives a rip?? What next, whining about choirboy robes? Friggin’ dungheap of a website…
Dinsdale - I hear ya. It’s been a long time since I could watch a network show live. So much dead air, and I can attest to 5-minute commercial breaks not being an exaggeration. “DVR is your friend!” (Are we still saying that? Because it’s true.)
RickJay - I’m pretty sure the main obstacle to parkour is liability, both the potential for serious injury and damage to property. But yeah, it could work. I actually think it would be a perfect demonstration sport, but the IOC got rid of those a long time ago.
You appear to be more right than me. Look at this stat:
31 minutes of having Jokic on the court: USA 81 Serbia 81
9 minutes when Jokic was sitting down: USA 29 Serbia 3
If the US men’s team continues to shoot 62% from the field, and 52% 3-pointers, they will waltz through the tournament.
But this probably won’t happen. LeBron James was 9-13 (1-3 3 ptr), and Kevin Durant came off the bench to shoot 8-9 (5-5 3 ptr). Doubtful that those two, or anybody else, will shoot like that again.
With the exception of biathlon, all rifle/pistol events are less exciting than watching paint dry or watching grass grow. They’re not spectator sports, and whoever thought they might be, should give their head a shake.
I was a competitive shooter (never made the Olympics, but I came close), and believe me, rifle/pistol is just plain boring if you’re not competing. They’re great when you’re on the line shooting, but they’re dull as anything when you’re not. I sat around a lot of ranges being bored, until I figured out that once my scores were in, I could leave and go play tourist in the city where I was competing.
Thank you. And lose the Silver shoes, too.
If that is your take.
“Cute” is fine.
The “childrens drag queens”, someone, other than me noticed was supposed to mean the parody of the Last Supper or whatever that was. It was shown, kinda briefly, in snippets, during the fashion cat walk.
Supposedly there’s a child in there. I can see a small person. I can’t tell if it’s a child by the pictures I’ve found.
To me, (IMO) the library threesome was much more prominently shown. And while well done. I found it cringey. Not asking anyone else to think this. My take only.
Yeah, there are really no great solutions to punish the Canadian team here. Kicking them out messes up the tournament too, particularly because they’re using the “best third place” rule in the group stage. It’s kind of a mess any way you go.
As it stands, Canada may very well get out of the group, and then the penalty doesn’t amount to much. They’d probably go through as the 2nd place team, so I guess that gives them a tougher QF match. But that just means their opponent is drawing a 2nd place team that’s playing like a 1st place team.
Goddam that women’s 100M butterfly was electric. Torri Huske overtook her own teammate and world record holder Gretchen Walsh in the last 10 or so meters and took gold by .04 seconds. After she missed making the podium in Tokyo by .01 seconds. She looked genuinely shocked and overwhelmed.
For all the bullshit, it’s moments like that that make the Olympics still some of the most compelling viewing on the planet.
Get this. Apparently, Olympic tennis has a really bad tennis alternate situation. If a singles player can not play, they allow you to…take one of your doubles guys/girls and they can replace them. You can’t bring a backup player even.
This happened to Australia. They had to have one of their doubles guys, who is not strong in singles at all, play. Who did he play?
Just Novak Djokovic.
Novak won: 6-0 6-1
When the Australian guy got his 1 game in the second set, the changed sides and the Australian guy patted Novak on the back and said, “Thanks for that!” and they laughed. Hey, he didn’t get double-bageled.
Andy Roddick is tweeting about it. They need to allow backup players to go or have some kind of system in place to replace people better than, “Hey, you played doubles! Get in the singles tournament now!”
Men’s 100M butterfly was the same. It was so tight between the top 3 that nobody had any idea who won until it was shown on the scoreboard. Martinenghi from Italy finished at 59.03 seconds, and Peaty from Great Britain and Fink from USA both finished at 59.05.
Peaty won the last two gold medals in this event.
Handball is very, very fun to watch.
Men’s basketball: Damn it Steve Kerr, your team is up by 20, put Tyrese Haliburton in the game!