I’m not sick of them because I have watched exactly 0 seconds of the coverage. I think it must be the first time ever that I have totally skipped an Olympics. It wasn’t a conscious decision, I just never started watching anything about them.
Think about the chutzpah it takes to wear that granite gown.
Let’s see:
In Montreal: The city was really excited to get the games. It wasn’t until afterwards that the pricetag became apparent. In the years leading up to the games our school, and probably everyone else’s, put on a mock Olympic Games.
The construction of the new facilities were barely done in time for the games, and in fact part of the stadium that wasn’t strictly necessary for the competition (the tower) wasn’t finished until years later. Partially this was because it turned out to be much more expensive than first estimated, and that was in turn partially because the construction workers staged several militant strikes, knowing that there was a strict deadline.
I visited the construction site of the Olympic Stadium several times; truly impressive.
It was pretty easy to get tickets to all but the most popular events. I saw Bruce Jenner win the decathlon. I saw the high jumper Dwight Stones take the bronze medal despite the fact that he was booed constantly by a large part of the crowd because he had earlier made disparaging remarks about Quebeckers.
I also went to judo, canoeing, wrestling, and water polo. Gymnastics was the only tough ticket.
There was a practice track near the stadium, and security was so lax that I actually walked right out onto the track and spoke to a few of the athletes. I have the pictures to prove it. One from England and one from Barbados, I remember.
Los Angeles: They only built two new facilities for the games, a swimming center and a velodrome, and they were both finished way before the games. (And they were both built as cheap as possible, too.) Everybody was afraid the traffic would be terrible, but actually traffic was better than ever during the Olympics.
Tickets were much harder to get for the L.A. games than for Montreal. As a result, I only went to two events: First a preliminary round soccer match at the Rose Bowl between two non-contenders (Egypt was one; I forget the other one). Second was cycling, which included several events of which the most exciting was the final of the individual pursuit.
Those games are enormous undertakings and I can see why a city would be reluctant to go through the trouble. But I still remember those experiences as being very special times.
Not sure if it counts, since I was four, but I lived in Calgary in '88 and I currently live in Vancouver.
Am I sick of the Olympics? Well, yes and no.
I don’t watch too much TV, so the coverage or lack of coverage doesn’t get to me at home. However, work has the Olympics buzzing on every TV all the time, so it gets to me during the day. I love seeing how this city has completely changed and come alive but I hate how the changes have impacted my normal routine. Getting groceries is now a bit of a trial since I can no longer park anywhere. The extended transit has been fantastic, but the city is so busy that every bus is late and packed with people who have no idea where they’re going. I like how the city has tried over and over to put its best face forward. People are happier, friendlier, more helpful to strangers. I am ashamed that newspapers around the world are arguing about whether we’ve hosted the worst games ever.
A lot of the Olympic experience annoys me, but I know I’ll feel sad when it is over.
I don’t know if I’m sick of it, just disappointed.
I believe it was Tuesday when the men’s hockey was scheduled to kick off. So I got up nice and early. I live in the EST, and Vancouver is on PST, so I figured I would get some early stuff going on. All I got was curling. CURLING. (And yes, I know that it is actually a sport and quite difficult, but whatever. They have compared curling to “chess on ice.” All fine and good. Have you ever watched a chess match on TV? I’d rather eat the yellow snow.)
So around 3 PM EST, the men’s USA hockey finally came on. I had a fun, albeit brief time. The game seemed to last a lot shorter than a regular NHL game. I also wanted to watch the Russians play, so I could see what Ovechkin would do, but all I got after the USA game was… you guessed it, MORE CURLING!
Fast forward to the rest of the day - cleaning house, making dinner and what not…Grew tired around 9 PM and still no more hockey. I fell asleep with the TV on. Around 3 AM (I guess), I woke up to see Russian hockey! Does this mean they’re playing the Russians at midnight to hit their time zone? Doesn’t the wreak havoc with the players’ biological clocks?
The next day: Almost nothing but women’s curling and figure skating. I figure the best I can do is DVR the whole thing and pick and choose what I want. So I’ll probably watch the olympics after the medal presentations.
Wooo. Go USA. Well, go somewhere at least.
Don’t be ashamed. Munich '72 has a lock on that, for obvious reasons.
Media people like to bitch about things when their bus is crowded or late or there are lines to wait in before they get fed. Pay them no mind.
From what I can tell, there is a hockey game on at noon, 4:30 and 9pm PST, which means the games start at 3, 7:30 and 12pm EST. The game times locally in Vancouver aren’t all that different from typical NHL start times.
For men’s hockey, the US is playing Norway as I type this (well, they’re in the first intermission), Canada plays Switzerland at 7:30pm EST, and Russia plays Slovakia at midnight EST. Women’s games are at 5:30pm EST and 10:00pm EST; US-Finland and China-Russia respectively.
The entire schedule is available here, with all times listed PST.
Sweet Evil Elvis Christ, that was funny.
My complaints:
The advertising (as mentioned above) has been over the top.
It’s in Vancouver… a 3 hour time difference from me. Show the things live. It is almost impossible to watch anything sports related without seeing results being scrolled at the bottom of a screen. I guess I could stay off the net, radio, and tv, but I like watching things in real time… I think this has been the biggest drawback for me.
I love the winter olympics, but I don’t like the inclusion of the x-game events, like the half pipe in the games. I love the x-games in their own context, but they don’t fit the winter olympics I used to love to watch. Bobsled, Luge, Curling, biathalon, the downhill… I’ll even watch figure skating (as long as I don’t have to see Johnny Weir or any other man dressed in spandex and fur).
And as an American, I can’t stand the background stories on every one of the US athletes. I don’t give a crap! I know people seem to like the People Magazine approach, but I want to see as many of the athletes as I can instead of only seeing the top Americans and a few others. I’d love to see all the downhill racers, and scratch the x-game snowboard stuff.
Is it my imagination, or has the hockey pool been watered down, and the ability to move to the next round fairly easy?
I have a fairly strong memory of the 1980 games for obvious reasons, and I remember the US were undefeated through the entire tournament with one tie. I can remember that getting that tie was instrumental in getting them to the next round.
Are there less teams now, and that’s why there is a difference, or is my memory to blame? There are only 3 pools this year. I think there were 4 pools in 1980, and they had 5-6 teams/pool.
I guess I’ll do some searching to see if I’m close.
ok, I was wrong. There were 2 divisions… the red and the blue, with the top two teams moving to the medal round.
The medal round was also a round-robin, unlike this year’s single elimination.
I’m pretty sure this year has 3 divisions, but I won’t swear to it. Clearly, I’m in a fog.
I’ve been sick of the Olympics ever since they went from having it every 4 years to every 2 years. Now, its no longer a special event - its a (bi)yearly ritual.
I haven’t watched a single second of this year, and only watched hockey in the last one.
I also HATE the way NBC handles their footage. Their damn logo is the olympic rings, even when it isn’t a olympic year - its like they have to brag that its the only thing that network has. Plus the way they have a tendency to show lane boring documentaries on the athletes rather than the events, and how when its in a foreign timezone, they would TELL YOU the final scores before airing a time delay.
Also, the way that the ceremonies seem to get more attention than the games - I hear tons of people say they only watch the opening and closing. Who wants to watch 2 hours of people marxhing?
One of my college rooms went apeshit on me for not watching the Olympics back in 2000. He was acting like it was my DUTY as an Earthling to give it notice.
I say make it every 5 years and stop having it in the US. I’m sick of it all…
Last night my wife was watching something she had taped -I don’t know - the day efore or so. They were showing the women’s short-track 500m (or as they seem to call them in speedskating - females!)
Now here are a couple of things I hate. They are showing the heats and narrating them as though it is being done live. Then, they come back from a commercial to say the upcoming heat had already been called back to the start twice, and one skater had been DQed. I got a couple of problems with that. If you are not anouncing it contemporaneous with the damned event, be up front about it. But also, show us the damned false starts/interferences/wipeouts/DQs/whatever. Hell, you had enough time to waste 10-15 minutes on Stephen Colbert goofing around with Costas…
Then, after the prelims had been run and the final 4 was set, you go to break and say you’ll be back shortly with the final - and cut to some other event.
Call me when it’s over - I’ll be downstairs watching UFC unleashed or the old Pride re-runs…
I’m damn sick of the commercials. I think the curling has more commercials than football. By the way, did you know that Tom Brokaw is apparently doing a show on the Baby Boomers?
It’s been “Ladies” here… Ladies and Men’s speed skating. It strikes me as odd…those words aren’t really gender equivalents! But whatever, the ladies have brought home 3 medals so far, we’re just waiting on the men now!
When the CBC had the Olympics, I’d occasionally switch to NBC (they’ve had them for the past few, right? if not, whatever American channel had it). This year, I haven’t watched anything that wasn’t on one of the Canadian channels. I hope the Olympic Media Coalition or whatever they call themselves, decide to stick around for future years because while there are definite improvements to be made to their format (notably letting us know more often what will come on when, and what’s happening on the other channels), this coverage has really been awesome and I’ve rarely had to see a commercial I wasn’t patient enough to sit through. It’s fun to have a choice between curling, hockey, figure skating and [insert sport here].