Olympic Break-Up

I’m out.  I’m done.

Don’t get me wrong; I really tried. I watched things like the Slopestyle and the Cross and biathlons and speed skating and even figure skating – men's, women's, and even pairs!  But you know what? I’ve had enough. I just can’t do it anymore. And that’s too bad, because there’s plenty of good Olympics to come!

But the Olympics has worn me down. They shot their wad and burned me out. See, I was into it. I was into the spectacle of it.  The pomp, the pageantry, the theme song. Bom-bom bom-bom bom-bom bom-bom.  Daaaahhh dun – da-dah dun dah duh – dun dun duh-dah, dun dun dun da-dah dun dun daaaaahhh. Repeat x 2. Or 3.

But by the time Week 1 ended, I had had enough. 

So what's the fix? What's the answer? How can future Olympics keep me interested? Frontload gold medal contests for sports I would be interested in? Well, they sorta tried that. They decided to stick a cool, hip, unknown sport first and go right to the medal round: Slopestyle Snowboarding. Sweet, dude! It sure looks cool. Couldn’t do it if I had to, but – righteous! Flips and spins and wipeouts. Dudes wearing parkas while competing – just like on my local mountain.

But then, before long, they pulled back the curtain on that sport and revealed, oh, we actually do this for men and women. And on snowboards and skis. And we do it in heats. And then we take 'wild card' qualifiers based on rules and specifications that there’s absolutely no way of you understanding, and then sometime, in some way, we’ll determine that it’s time to have the Finals. And there will be a couple Americans of whom you’ve never heard but you’ll feel compelled to be excited when they’re running. Or we’ll find the hottest female and showcase her a lot so you root for her.

Yeah, you know? Enough! 

Far be it for me to tell the IOC how to organize their Olympics. Personally, I’m partial to the team stuff. But I know you can’t just launch into the gold medal game for men’s hockey.

Maybe the Winter Olympic Games and I just need to agree to disagree. We just need some time apart. I just wish they didn’t look so hot from the start. It’s that flirtatious theme song that always lures me in.

At least I tried.