London 2012 Olympics: Victory and Defeat

The Thrill

Oh Olympics, you were so much fun! It's amazing that nothing makes me more of a couch potato than two weeks of intense competition by the world's best athletes. You'd think for spending two weeks doing nothing but couching it I'd be restless to get out there and do something, but the truth of the matter is, I'm exhausted! I'll miss the abs, seeing the adorable Duchess of Cambridge in cute normal clothes, and the emotional highs of victory with none of the work, but I need a break. I won't really miss the disparaging commentators, the insensitive interviewers, or the social media updates by Ryan Seacrest that I always fast-fowarded through, but I'll be glad to take a break from seeing Olympic rings tattoos, hearing Michael Phelps's name, or rolling my eyes at Bob Costas's snarky transitions.

This was real grass. And they rolled it up and carted it off mid-ceremony.

Great Britain proved itself to be as quirky and adorable as I expected. Their opening and closing ceremonies were whacked out and strange, but there are so many British celebrities to call upon and salute that it was easy to overlook some of the crazier artistic decisions because moments later the delightful David Beckham would show up on screen.

I'd say the real winners of these Olympics were the makers of that Physio or Kinesio tape or whatever, amiright? That stuff was everywhere, and sometimes so awkwardly positioned poking out above and below the shorts. I remember Keri Walsh Jennings sporting it in Beijing (time out: Keri, seriously, no hyphen? If you gotta be like Misty May-Treanor and take two names, couldn't you guys at least agree to the same convention?), but this time it was everywhere.

The Agony

But let's discuss a few monumental failures of the Olympics experience for a moment, shall we? Not of the games themselves, but of the shockingly dissatisfying experience of watching them on NBC. I get the delay, okay? I'm not gonna rant about the delay, because I do work during the day and am fortunate to be in the group of people to which "prime time" television caters. (Doesn't mean I didn't enjoy the NBC Delayed twitter feed, though.) I'm cool with avoiding spoilers on the internets during the day so that I can come home and experience how the events unfolded in all their suspenseful drama. But that means NBC had at least 5 hours to edit together a coherent and interesting story of how the events unfolded in all their suspenseful drama!

The worst offenders of this choppy and incoherent story-telling were the gymnastics broadcasts. Gymnastics, like Track and Field, is one of those sports where multiple things are happening at once. This can pose a challenge, but on many occasions while watching I was uncertain if I was watching something that happened while I'd been watching something else, or something that happened the day before. And I didn't know if I was being shown it because it was interesting due to the eventual outcome, or what. I really needed a "Meanwhile, on the parallel bars..." or else just pretend it's happening in one linear timeline and leave out the past tense language! I wouldn't know, and I wouldn't have to try and figure out if you are trying to give me dramatic irony with your commentating or if I can just tune you out like usual. Because seriously, it's best just to tune you out. Or mute it and provide my own commentary of "That was a HUGE mistake" whenever anyone takes a step of any size.

It also wasn't cool with me how in the men's gymnastics team final you got me all invested in the American dudes, but after showing a few bad routines on pommel horse, you ditched them completely to show me some other countries' teams, who I hadn't seen compete at all, sitting around for 15 minutes waiting for the results of an enquiry (And yes, I looked it up, it was an Enquiry with an E). You couldn't even montage together a few of the other 9 routines the US team did even though we all knew they were out of the medals?

And while we're talking about things you didn't show, what about the still rings? Did you forget about that apparatus until you couldn't avoid it any longer in the individual event finals? There may not be as much flying through the air as the high bar or the vault or floor, but the still rings are some seriously cool strength work.

And while we're talking about talking about things NBC didn't show, did you know that the London 2012 Olympics had an official song? It did! And did you know it was performed at the closing ceremony by a popular British rocker in a seriously sparkly suit with a fierce backup choir? No? Oh, that's because you live in the US. No worries, me and Perez Hilton got you covered.

I could go on and on, but as previously stated, I'm tired, and I need a break from all this. Can I pass the torch to you now, and will you add your beefs with the Olympic television coverage to the comments? NBC needs to know (and I'm sure Bob Costas reads my blog)!