Bye-Bye Olympics

The Olympics are over, and we're all sad here. We had to have ice cream after dinner last night because we couldn't think of anything else to do. Well, that's not totally accurate--we actually did take a walk and THEN have ice cream, but everyone went to bed at a reasonable hour. What's up with that?!

I love watching the Olympics. We didn't have a TV at all while I was growing up, but we would rent one during special times, like when the Olympics were on. And then my brother Dan and I would glue ourselves to the TV and watch all the obscure sports you never see any other time with total and complete absorption. I am proud to say that I am passing down that tradition to Nathan and Luke, who are following the path I forged in Olympics watching. Nathan's favorite sport was basketball, while Luke's was swimming. Both of them liked beach volleyball second, although Luke did specify men's. Whew! But they watched pretty much all day, so they also become experts on sports like rowing, team handball, water polo, and synchronized diving. They also are much more familiar with the flags of the world, which all started with the flag game at our Olympic party. Anna's quite up on the American flag at least, so she's got a good start, LOL.

Nathan was pretty faithful at daily filling in the medal bar graph I had made to hand out at the party as well. It was interesting to track which countries were in the top 5 at different parts of the competion. I had picked the U.S., China, Russia, U.K., and Germany to track, but at the end of the first week, the U.K. and Germany were not in the top 5 at all, and everyone was wondering why I hadn't included Australia, South Korea, and France. I probably should have put Australia instead of Germany (who did indeed finish in 6th place), but we have that German family on our cul-de-sac, so I definitely wanted to include them no matter what. What I should have done differently was make the graph go up past 50! I never dreamed China would get over 50 gold medals, so I only had the parameter be 40 for each kind of medal! Even though I don't think they deserved some of their gymnastics golds, the ones for their prepubescent "women", it still is an amazing accomplishment.

I definitely enjoyed the swimming the most. All those exciting races! Track just isn't as exciting to watch. I will say that the new suits pretty much make men look like women, and vice versa. I'm not a fan of them, although I don't really want them to bring back the tiny Speedos either, LOL. Seeing them in diving was more than enough, thank you very much.

I think female swimmers must have a lot of self-confidence in their looks. I mean, to get in front of a big audience, including TV watchers around the world, with your hair smooshed into a lumpy plastic cap, goggles, raccoon marks above your eyes where you had your goggles before the race, and an androgynous suit that emphazies your muscular neck--they all look like frog creatures from another planet. Then I would see them on the medal stand and think, "Hey, she's actually pretty attractive! I never would have guessed!" I just don't have that self-confidence, and that is clearly the only reason why I never became an Olympic caliber swimmer. That, and I'm not really a water person. I'm more of a water-WATCHING person. It's just a small difference.

So now the Olympics are over, and we are getting back to our regular routines. This means me actually exercising, as opposed to just watching other superbly conditioned athletes do their thing, while envisioning myself in that kind of shape (but realizing that none of them have had 6 babies, so of course I'll never look like them. And that's the only reason why.) Actually, when I was doing my workout this morning, Nathan helpfully pointed out that even if I wasn't pregnant, I would always have a bunch of extra skin on my tummy, so it would never REALLY be flat. Hey, thanks! I was wondering about that! I'm going to start putting all my spare change in the "tummy tuck bucket", I guess. LOL!