Well!
Some more thoughts, in a semi-random order:
I think today’s basket of ideas just re-enforce the things I was thunking earlier.
- Sports have a definite element of randomness to them; and
- The media does I believe try to play up some divisions sometimes; and
- This is one epic vacation!
Regarding 1), I saw Michaela Shiffrin’s win in Slalom, she was fantastic ofc. I’m glad she got the fantasy closure that she needed(?). Well, I’m glad she got the fantasy closure the media said that she needed, lol. I did notice something interesting when watching the other skiers, though- I saw not one, nor two, but three other athletes get disqualified for missing the first gate! Yes forreals. In the Olympics. I mean I’m not judging them personally; I’m just using this as evidence to point out the randomness of athletic competition. Sometimes, you can be the best out there and… stuff just happens.
I saw as well Jordan Stolz’s race today, the 1500 meters. He got in second. Not because of anything he did that was wrong, he just got beat. So he exits with two golds and a silver. It happens. Another racer pulled a perfect race out of nowhere, annihilated the OR before Stolz hit the ice and that was that. I saw Stolz’s two other races before this one and I was rooting for him, but even I could tell that when that time was posted that it was going to be impossible for anyone to beat it. It was fun to watch tho. It’s stuff like that that makes the Olympics worth watching. So much fun.
So before the Women’s Free Skate, I checked out the backstage training / warm up session on Peacock Premium. It was kinda… voyeuristic? Also performative, on the part of the athletes. It’s not at all what it pretended to be, a free, open behind-the-scenes look at a performer’s life. Some thoughts:
- It was vaguely creepy how the skaters didn’t look at the camera. All except, of course, for the ones in the far off corners, who would occasionally cast fleeting nervous glances directly at the camera lens. It was in those moments that I got a minorly creeped-out voyeuristic vibe from the whole show.
- I did admire Skating Barbie’s (Amber Glenn, *ahem*) efforts to not look at the camera or at the camera human when the camera was pointed directly at her, or when the camera human was LITERALLY ON TOP OF HER. Nah, the linoleum floor is much more interesting; we’ll look at that instead.
- Amber Glenn’s workout routine is bonkers BTW. I took note of some of her stuff, some of it I know I can incorporate in my barre routine. Thnx Amber!
- The skaters obviously knew each other very well and were very comfortable in each others’ spaces. NBC et al. likes to paint stuff like The Olympics as some kind of bloodsport or gladiatorial combat but that is obviously not the case IRL. I mean of course there is competition, but not… that much. I’ve criticized TV in general for this before, and here it is again.
- Back to the camera people- One funny moment occurred when the picture slid too far to the right, catching an actual cameraman in-frame. He was an overweight, middle-aged Italian man in a scruffy black baseball cap, with a bored expression on his face, sitting on a chair by the door. This was apparently NOT ALLOWED, because the picture quickly jerked backed to the left, putting him out of frame.
- A different camera dude found his way in frame, behind Skating Barbie when she was doing one of her performative workouts. He was another Italian, very tall and very fat, who was trying in vain to hide his frame behind a TV showing Jordan Stolz’s skating event. Oddly, his camera looked like one of those packs from “Ghostbusters”. To say that he looked out of place amidst the sea of tiny, lithe, teenaged waifs in bedazzled outfits practicing their twizzles was an understatement. There’s something to be said here about the media, but I’ve not sure what, yet.
- All of the athletes seemed to be “on”. And it seemed to be so natural to them that I wonder if they, having been raised in the age of social media, even know what “off” is. A scary thought, and one that just occurred to me. Of course, I of all people should not complain, and I’m not. I’m just… thinking.
Well- to the performances- There’s not much to say, it’s all on streaming. Props to Amber Glenn for holding out so long in first. Perhaps barre really is the key. I enjoyed myself immensely. It was so much fun. I mean I can’t even imagine having a better time doing anything else. And I mean that exactly as I typed it; I cannot imagine a better experience. Seriously, like… I can’t even fathom what one could possibly even be. I mean, I was having fun with the athletes, the announcers, and anchors, the crowd, I mean, it was just incredible, a stupendous, mind-blowing, beautiful experience. Doing a “mind-sync” with Alysa Liu during the final part of the Free Skate-including the medal ceremony-was a breathtaking, awe-inspiring thing to behold. I cannot imagine anything on Earth that could compare.
So that’s it, lol. It’s the pinnacle, there, of human experience. Once you’ve felt that, experienced that, channeled that, allowed that energy to flow through you and connected to that kind of… vibration, everything else seems less than.
I buoyed her with my power and she allowed me to feel her experience. Pretty awesome stuff.
You know- for a moment- a brief moment- during the free skate, I felt a twinge of regret. A small twinge, but it was there. It had to do with Ekaterina Kurakova’s performance to a medley of Moulin Rouge. See, one of my girlfriends, the erstwhile Meg Donnelly, is on Broadway finishing up her run on that particular musical, and before the Olympics I was wondering… should I be watching that, instead?
Now, I can say: No, lol. Sorry, Meg, sorry, everyone else, but there really is nothing that compares to this experience. It truly is superior to everything I can think of.
I mean, we’ll see what the future holds, but Goddamn, lol.
Alysa Liu and her F-bombs FTW!