The Olympics

So now that the Olympics have started I feel that it's my patriotic duty to root for my fellow countrymen and women. For some reason I feel like I have to actually watch some of the coverage on NBC to do this. Even though the events are taped delayed, and even though I've probably seen the results at ESPN.com, I still pull for any American athlete. Well, except maybe New Hampshire's own Bode Miller.

Bode Miller seems like an ass to me. I applaud anyone who chastises the Barry Bonds' and Jason Giambi's of the world for being involved with Balco and Victor Conte. I cringe when someone criticizes Lance Armstrong, if only because there is little evidence against Lance to date and what little "evidence" does exist seems driven by angry French media-types. But I laugh-out-loud when the criticism stems from somebody who visits a banned doctor in Mexico to be injected with some concoction intended to promote "growth of new tissue by the reproduction of similar cells." 1

Miller also recently admitted to skiing drunk. I just hope he was alone when he did/does it. If he wants to kill himself, that's fine, but if he hurts someone else, I want to see him suffer.

All that and Bode has fallen on his face so far. I personally hope he comes home empty-handed. Nothing is more satisfying to a sports fan that when the experts are wrong.

I'm only really interested in a few sports during the Winter Olympics: ski jumping, freestyle skiing, and curling. Yes, curling. If I ever train for the Olympics, I'll be a curling master. Then I can compete until I'm 80.

So far NBC's coverage of the Olympics has been spotty at best. They have had some trouble with their HD feed and the overall image quality is below par. Just guessing, but maybe it's the distance they need to transmit the feeds. The audio has given some people trouble, but I haven't tried using my receiver when watching any of the coverage. I don't think speed skating or cross country skiing really warrant surround sound. My cable provider doesn't offer Universal HD so I haven't seen any of the extended coverage, but I hear that it's worse than NBC's feed.

I wonder if Tweeter is pissed at NBC since Tweeter is hyping HDTV's for watching the Olympics.

1 http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/winter06/alpine/news/story?id=2317978