I've never claimed to be a sports fan. It's ironic that I married someone who will watch just about anything ESPN broadcasts. By osmosis, I know that the Olympics start tomorrow. I do not plan on watching much of it, but I'm sure that something along the way during the next couple of weeks will implant itself in my memory. Here's a peek into my memories of Olympics past:1972 - Mark Spitz won a bunch of gold medals in swimming. At the time, I was just a little kid, but I remember thinking he was a good looking guy. Looking back at pictures of him from that year, he resembles one of the Village People. Or maybe my tastes have changed in men.
1976 - Bruce Jenner wins the decathlon. I thought he was attractive too. He started appearing on Wheaties boxes and is now on a reality show with his third wife and awful stepdaughters. I guess he's also a motivational speaker. I question whether he could really teach me anything.
1984 - I had just started dating my husband. McDonald's was doing a promotion where they gave out tiny tickets with your order. Whenever the USA got a medal in an event, if you had that event's ticket, you won free food. Little did Mickey D's know that the USA would do so well that year. Future hubby and I were poor college students, so we sure were happy to be getting all that free food that summer!
2004 - I sit through the entire opening ceremonies with my family because hubby thinks it's educational for the kids to watch it. I wonder how I got to be so old and still hadn't heard of so many of these countries. Pondering if these countries had changed names, or if I ate too much junk food in college and killed some brain cells?
2008 - My neighbor is going to be in the Olympics! Well, he technically is no longer my neighbor, but his parents still live here. I read in the paper that he considered his years as a newspaper carrier the start of his Olympic training. We do get some pretty big snow drifts in the winter! I will now consider our patronage of the local paper to have had a worldwide effect in sports.
Go USA!
What event is your neighbor going to be in!??!
ReplyDeleteHow exciting to know someone over there.
And I completely agree with Mark Spitz looking like the long lost member of the Village People. LOL.
There are a couple athletes from here who are going to be in the Olympics, too, but even with that as a draw, I just don't care that much. Probably because I'm not a sports fan, but more because I'm just not interested!
ReplyDeleteYour neighbor's kid is going to be in the Olympics? That's incredibly cool!
ReplyDeleteA guy from our kids' HS was a gold medalist several years back, and he occasionally comes by to give some tips to the kids, which is quite a thrill for my sons. . .
I'm usually a complete and total Olympics junkie, but I probably won't get to see much this time around - our TV isn't working, and I'm just not terribly motivated to fix it. But, I can always bum couch time from friends, I s'pose. . .
My memories consist of sliding across the linoleum in our socks during the figure skating competition as a kid.
ReplyDeletethat and My husband has a very unnatural obsession with curling. Other than that... Olympics-smolympics
Alice - it's a track & field event and he looks nothing like Vanilla Ice!
ReplyDeleteFADKOG - we are an apathetic couple of Americans, aren't we? LOL!
DJ - if a TV breaks in this house, my husband is at the Best Buy within the hour. Sometimes, I wish he were a little less motivated about the TV!
Frances - I remember doing the sock skating too. And I should have brought up the Dorothy Hamill hairdo!
That's a good post Cocette: am essay topic "What the Olympics mean to me?"
ReplyDeleteHow about 1988: Ben Johnson beats Carl Lewis then tests positive and has his medal stripped. Years later we learn Lewis was juiced too.
Have you caught the fever yet?
TT - Nope, I haven't watched a single event thus far. Too many Jon & Kate Plus 8 episodes to catch up on!
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