Sighinide

With a week out from everything, this is probably the perfect time to close out this series.

Some final thoughts, then.

1) It was fun, but altogether, kinda… underwhelming? IDK how to put my finger on it, but some kind of magic was missing.

The Olympics were a revelation 10-15 years ago, with the advent of high def TVs. I could actually see what was going on, and that was awesome. Now, since I’ve seen it all already, it’s… kinda, not as impressive? Or maybe not as interesting? I guess? IDK.

But, yeah, something was missing.

2) The commercials were brutally dreadful. Lordy, did I despise them. A week out and I remember none of them fondly, and I hope I never see any of them again. I remember little from them besides the overt, in-your-face NWO politics, the LOUD music, and the withering assault of their awful CGI.

It used to be that commercials tried not to upstage the programs they were situated in. Those days are clearly gone. The spectacle of the Olympics this time paled in comparison to the blistering and ghastly attention whoring of the commercials.

I’ve never in my life given the mute button on a remote the kind of workout that I did this year during the Olympics.

The racial politics, especially, were obvious and angry. I swear at times that these commercials were mad at me, for something. Over half of them seemed to feature snarling, glowering black athletes. It was an ugly, toxic spectacle.

The coverage of the games themselves reflected this. Over and over again, the most important topics discussed were overtly racial ones, with the most important topic by far the status of black American athletes. Literally, over and over again, the same racial stuff just kept getting dredged up, as if to apologize for the fact that countries like Norway were just crushing everyone.

The commercials themselves seemed almost to be embarrassed to be a part of the winter games, and so did too the coverage of everything by NBC and other stations. It’s like… these games are too white, and so we don’t really want anything to do with them, but since we have too…

It was really bizarre, and the entire thing was an uncomfortable watch, even during the best of times. It was good to see the athletes, but man, the rest of it was just painful and weird.

I read online about how the ratings for these games were dreadful, and that doesn’t surprise me.

As for myself, I might skip the NBC stuff next time to focus on other streaming options. Hopefully, not all of them will be as awful and toxic.

3) Not a fan of Eileen Gu.

She bugs me. Whatever her contributions are to her sport, she herself comes across like a spoiled rich kid who just can’t help but look… spoiled.

Her whole thing is very… not grounded. I mean, her approach to everything, including choosing to represent China. She comes across as a brat.

Let’s break that decision down. She said that she chose to represent China for two reasons: 1) to promote winter sports in China, and 2) she wanted to represent her heritage.

Both reasons mark her selfish and spoiled, IMO.

China doesn’t need Eileen Gu to promote the winter games, or winter sports in general. It is sandwiched in between two winter Olympics powerhouses: Russia and Japan. Seriously, it’s not as if China is in South America or something. This explanation from her makes no sense, and she was so obviously lying when talking about it that I felt bad for her. And also a little angry. Seriously, I could not believe the nonsense that she expects people to think.

She’s representing China for selfish reasons. She wants to build her “brand” in some way, and this is part of that plan. Nothing more.

I mean, for fuck’s sake, without Gu, team China would have fielded 175 athletes for the games this year. 175! Out of the 91 countries competing, China had the fourth most athletes. They fielded over twice as many as Norway!

Yeah, she’s just a liar, and she’s a pretty bad one, at that.

Her second explanation is equally as bad: that her choice to represent China to due to her wanting to respect her heritage, as if she doesn’t have any here, in the place where she was born, raised, pampered, and given everything she needed to succeed. The US has given her more than any other country in the world, and she seems to be embarrassed by that on some level, almost as much as the the commercials and the coverage seemed to be embarrassed by the games in general.

She just comes across like a sheltered, spoiled Asian kid. In short, she’s a brat.

4) Kamila got robbed, and Lordy, did I get tired of hearing over and over how she shouldn’t be skating, blah blah blah. Awful, truly.

I mean, fine. Voice your opinion, okay, it’s a free country. And then move on, please. Nobody watches figure skating coverage for political analysis, or for the backroom stuff. We watch it for the spins, jumps, dancing, etc.

Seriously, guys. So annoying.

5) Well… other stuff. It is always fun to watch the athletes and the sports. It’s just… the container is just so bad, sometimes. Not always- in many sports I think the commentary is interesting and I learn a lot from it, probably since many of the commentators are former athletes and even champions themselves.

I think Weir and Lapanski are very good, so long as they keep their yaps quiet about politics and focus on the skating. I mean, seriously.

I watch these games to get away from politics, and then they just keep dragging me back in, lol.

But yes the events themselves are nice, so that’s why I watch.

6) The opening and closing ceremonies are things that I might talk about later. Kind of have something else to do now. But I intend to, at some point. There might be another entry in this series, then.

I do want to expound more upon some of the good things about the games. This post was mostly venting, it looks like.

Well… that’s it for now.

Go Russia! I hope they sweep the podium. They deserve it.

IDK and IDC about the details of any of this, even though I suspect that I know enough to make a valid moral decision, if nothing else. The Russian skaters deserve to medal and I hope they do; all of them.

Fuck all these hypocritical Team USA athletes and their sanctimonious bullshit surrounding the drug scandal. There is no country in this world that has done more to promote the use of performance enhancing drugs than the USA. Even if there was something shady going on, who WTF cares? Turnabout is fair play, I think, in this case.

Remember Lance Armstrong? Dude was doping himself up for decades, and everyone knew it, and nobody gave a fuck until he was at the end of his career. You could fill a dictionary with the name of professional American athletes that have been caught using steroids. Pro baseball players, UFC fighters, boxers, NBA players, NFL players, college athletes, etc.

Case in point- everyone knows that every fighter in pro MMA is doping. Yet, nobody cares. And honestly, how much do you want to bet that there were roid heads on the field in Sunday’s Super Bowl? I’ll bet anyone there was. It’s just a matter of “catching” them. Though of course they got avoidance down to a science by now, so good luck with that.

I would not be surprised at all if the majority of players on the field Sunday were on something. Maybe not steroids, but something, absolutely.

While watching the Olympics I have been bombarded with exercise commercials featuring The Rock of all people. Holy shit, people. He’s 50 years old and has more muscle mass than professional natural bodybuilders half this age. This guy must eat steroids for breakfast and probably does.

For fuck’s sake, I remember the Rock when he was with the WWE. Back then, he was nowhere near as big and as muscular as he is now! And he’s 50 fucking years old!

Seriously, guys. Who the fuck do you think you’re kidding, here?

Fuck it, seriously. Go Russia! It’s not their fault that no other country’s skaters are as good in comparison.

And don’t give me some nonsense about how it’s the Olympics and they should be held to some higher standard, blah blah blah. I distinctly remember seeing American athletes who were obviously steroided up to their necks as far back as my childhood. I also remember that at least one American track and field athlete got his medals retroactively taken away from him. I don’t remember his name and I’m too lazy to look it up but I do remember it happened.

And let’s not forget all the roid freaks that countries like East Germany produced to promote the international revolution wayyyyy back in the day.

Fuck it, go Russia! Sweep the podium!

Ugh.

Um, didn’t really watch it. It’s been too much TV for me lately.

I’ve been watching TV the last couple of months for 3 reasons: 1) After not owning a TV for well over a decade, it’s all new to me again, 2) The Olympics are on, and 3) These new fangled flatscreens are interesting gadgets, and as someone with geeky tendencies, their opportunities and abilities interest me. I want to know what they do, and how they do it.

So I’ve been watching a lotttttt of TV, and I’m burnt out.

So, anyhow, some thoughts:

Holy shit are modern commercials annoying and strange. Every one of them seems to revolve around three things of their own: 1) Selling diversity, 2) Being as loud, flashy and in-your-face as possible, and 3) Well… the first two are basically it. Though I suppose hawking products is in there, somewhere. Fuck if I know where.

Good Lord, people. Tone it down a few notches, okay?

I sometimes watch collections of older commercials on youtube, I guess for nostalgic reasons. To relive parts of my youth, or for memories of this or that event. When I watch them, they’re… comforting, for more reasons that the feel goods I get from just reliving some part of my teen years or whatever. I mean, they’re often genuinely funny, and the products they sell make an impression on me. Like, an old ad for a car, or for a McDonald’s sandwich, seems to want to make me interested in the product.

Modern commercials are… a giant blur to me. They all just look the same. Is this a part of getting older? Maybe? But it’s like… what the fuck even is this stuff?

It’s the same every year, only it’s getting worse each time. Since every commercial is selling “diversity”, even if only subtly, they all blend together, and it becomes “the diversity show”. And since the human brain can only process so much at once, that’s what you remember from the commercials. Just a bunch of diversity. I can’t recall any of the actual products that were on the offer. There were a bunch of references to my relationships, and some commercial with Anna Kendrick with Barbies and a big Barbie Dreamhouse. Who knows what she was selling. It wasn’t Barbies, IIRC. There was a He-Man playset in there too, with a bunch of He-Man toys. And this wasn’t a toy commercial. Who the fuck knows.

Why do commercials have to be so loud? And filled with So.Much.CGI? It’s too much information. You know what happens when people receive too much information? They tune it out; they stop paying attention.

I was curious about what the commercials had to say about my relationships, so I wound up having to mute the game to concentrate on the commercials. Give my ears a break from all the noise, and give my eyes a rest from the onslaught of bad CGI.

Seriously. What the fuck?

Anyhow, I didn’t really give a fuck about the game itself. I know none of the players that played today and none of what happened on the field had much of an effect on me. The stuff that happened during the game that referenced me was interesting I suppose for purely narcissistic reasons, but… man are NFL games lonnnng. The game started at 5 and was supposed to go until 10:00 or something. Holy shit, that’s five whole hours!

That’s a long ass time to watch a football game. Were they always this fucking long? It seems to me that the NFL games of my youth weren’t nearly as long as they are now.

All of these events are too fucking long. The Oscars are too long, the Super Bowl is too long, fucking everything is. I remember reading online how the recent WrestleMania events were like 6 or 7 hours long! Something like that. Holy shit! I mean I hate to come across like a grumpy old man or something but that’s literally a whole fucking day!

When I was a kid WWE events were aimed at… kids, lol. And they were much shorter and to the point. And probably a whole hell of a lot more fun to watch.

Well… IDK, it’s late again; after midnight. I suppose I’ll dissect the Anna commercial for it’s symbolism before drifting off to sleep.

Tomorrow’s another day.

Hmmmmnn…

Yup. And- I know, I never expected to continue this series, either.

But yet, here we are.

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It was an interesting experience seeing Jason Brown on the ice again. For myself, I strongly identify Brown with the other members of the 2014 USA skating team, including Gracie and Ashley Wagner. But, mostly Gracie. The two of them seem to be close friends, and I remember seeing Brown often in Gracie’s social media, back when she was more active online.

Of course I remember his distinctive style on the ice as well, and the various things people said about his skating during the 2014 games.

Well, I think it’s time to finally add my two cents.

My opinion – Brown scores too low.

Not a LOT too low, but yeah. He does.

Basically, I’m thinking the same thing most everyone else is.

There is no way he should have been outscored by Hanyu. Seriously. Hanyu bricked two jumps completely. Sorry, I know that’s oversimplifying things, but that’s how it looked on my TV. And Brown, although he delivered a performance that may have had a lower starting value than Hanyu’s, was absolutely perfect.

I’m not sure I like how skating is becoming the quad show.

That is not to take away from the skaters, like Chen, how can complete quads, successfully and well. The problem is when skaters toss things like quad axels into their programs they everyone knows full well they have a less than half chance of landing, simply because they score huge with the jumps even if they fall in some ugly manner.

I think skaters should be penalized more for falls than they are. One point seems too little.

I think the key here is that I want to see skaters perform their best, and not to attempt the absurd. I want to see the best looking skating. And I’m not alone in this.

I thought this back in 2014, and recent events have only solidified this opinion.

Brown should have taken the 4th spot in the final tally, and the gap between his score and the Korean skater should have been significant.

As an added bonus, this change would ensure more longevity for skaters on the ice. It would go some distance to ending the “one and done” culture that applies to everyone except gold medal winners at the Olympics. It’s cool to see people return for another run, to see how they’ve grown. It creates continuity, etc.

Seriously, think about it.

So yeah, Brown is cool. And while I’m thinking of him…

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Ummmmmn hmmmn.

So… anyone else wonder what Gracie is doing right now? I mean besides the obvious. Or is that just me?

Probably just me.

Sometimes I wonder if I did things right with her. Sometimes… it’s reeeeally hard to tell.

It’s an easy thing to see if Victoria Justice is happy. Real simple. Same with Haley Pullos, Kat McNamara, Kathryn, Peyton… and a bunch of others. Just look at their social media. They post nearly every day, and give me frequent text updates (in the form of post descriptions) with how they’re doing, what they’re feeling, etc. Easy peasy.

Not so much with Gracie. Gracie isn’t the type to do this, and in fact, she rarely posts much, if at all, for great big stretches of time. Which is fine; that works for her. But it has left me scratching my head, and that was even before it was apparent that she was struggling with mental health issues.

So it’s not hard for me to wonder, considering Brown’s success, if that could have been Gracie instead, had I played my cards with her differently. I mean… you know what I mean.

This is compounded by Gracie’s excellent short program at the recent nationals. I kept thinking… mayyyyybe if I would have done this differently, or that differently, than mayyyyyybe Gracie would have done equally well in the free skate, and theeeeeeeen…

It’s real easy to think along these lines. I left Gracie alone for long stretches of time, not really knowing what to do, and how she could be supported, or if she needed it, or even wanted it.

Sooooooo… yeah. Head scratcher.

Did I do right? Wrong? Average? Who knows, lol. Life is a complicated thing, and everyone, no matter their power or ability, has only 24 hours a day in which to live it. It’s tough to know sometimes how these more complex situations should be approached.

For what it’s worth, what I think now is that Gracie and I hit it off so well in Sochi because we have similar personalities. We’re both performers, and we enjoy being on a national/global stage, but we have strongly introverted sides to us, too.

I never was able to make much of a connection with Ashley Wagner, despite both of our initial attempts. We liked each other well enough, but… there wasn’t enough there to really go on for anything long term except for, IDK, a casual acquaintanceship. Our personalities didn’t “gel”.

So, there you have it.

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To tie this all together- what if these events were scored ever so slightly differently? A little more penalty for falls, a little more bonus for effective expressive elements and spins and such.

Who knows, maybe then I wouldn’t need to worry about some things so much. Would Gracie have made it into the 2022 games? She would have trained differently, had a different program, and… who knows. It’s an interesting thought. Her experience might have carried her through.

Well… it’s late, again.

Off to bed.

First- 2022. Holy cow.

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Beyond that, the ratings are fine. Just wanted to get this out of the way. I’ve read a couple articles saying that the ratings for these games aren’t what was expected.

Isn’t the explanation for why obvious? We just concluded the summer Olympics a few months ago. For me, Comcast stopped streaming them on October 1.

It’s perfectly understandable that some people, even fans, might have been feeling burnout from the games not very long ago. Hence, the reason for the lower ratings.

I don’t think politics, the fame of the athletes, or any other consideration really matters compared to this aspect. The lockdowns screwed up the schedules- including of those who watch the games. Hence, the disruption in ratings.

Seriously, that’s it.

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It’s interesting to watch these games on my TV, rather then stream them from my computer, as I had done for the past… 3 games? The return of the Williams theme is much appreciated.

The commercials… suck, for the most part. None of them are memorable, and none of them will be remembered, at least by me. Honestly, they’re worse than ever. Once again with a big sporting event, all the commercials are the same thing, just repeated over and over and over again, to the point where they all blend together in a strange mush of bad CGI, annoying sound effects, political and racial propaganda, and edgier-than-thou attitude.

Literally none of them stand out, this year. Seriously. Except for maybe the ones with the dinosaurs, and only then, because those are so odd. Olympics and dinosaurs reeeeally don’t mix, lol. It’s weird, but I guess different.

Remember that Coke ad with the Sia song? There is nothing even remotely as good or as human on the offer here. Everything kinda sucks, and I’m having a hell of a time even remembering what products are being advertised. It all just comes across as a large mass of commercials for the NWO.

I just mute them all, myself. They’re so loud, flashy, repetitive and annoying that they ruin the whole experience when I don’t. Sometimes I go as far as to turn the TV off entirely until I think they will be over.

Yuck.

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Other stuff… it’s interesting how the different games tend to bookend different parts of my life.

But… ah, it’s after midnight, and I need to go somewhere tomorrow morning. Will resume this later.