1 week down 1 week to go

So the first week of the Olympics are in the books and Team USA is kicking the world's ass, thank you all for participating, now go home. Here are my observations after the end of the first week.

Biathalon is very interesting sport, I believe it could be incorporated into the Summer Games, somehow using the women's volleyball teams. 6 foot tall, bikini clad women with rifles is curiously erotic.

Last night's performance by Apollo Ohno in the semi qualifying 1000M round was spectacular. If you missed it, he won by a few inches of a skate blade.

Is curling perhaps the best sport ever invented? I know understand why the Winter Games take 18 days, because curling matches take forever. The game has 9 ends, much like baseball has 9 innings and the matches seem to last as long. This sport has timeouts? Why? I believe that the company which makes the Swiffer, has missed a huge opportunity with the Winter Games. They should have manufactured the brushes the curlers use, just another lost opportunity.

What is up with the Norwegian men's curling team's pants? They are wearing the upstart Loudmouth golf pants which remind me of the Zubaz pants of the 1980's which were just as obnoxious.

Men's figure skating saw an American, Evan Lysacek win a gold medal for the first time in 20 years and it wasn't without controversy. Silver medalist, Yevgeny Plushenko was upset that he completed a quad and Lysacek didn't and the Russian ended up with a silver. Word to ya brother, yes you completed a quad, but the rest of your jumps were very very sloppy you arrogant freak.

What the hell is a triple lutz? I thought Lutz was a town just east of Tarpon Springs Florida.

The men's and women's skeleton. This ice racing event is the same as the Luge, except you run head first and use a smaller sled. Wonderful. This sport most likely got it's name because if you crash, your skeleton is all that is left.

I watched some of the men's bobsledding last night. What is up with the outfits? These suits make shrink wrap look like a pair of cotton Chinos. Hell, you could tell each racer's religion by just simply watching.

Tonight is the much anticipated hockey match-up between Team USA and Canada. Let's go USA!!!!! Crush Canada like a bug at a picnic.

Let the Games begin!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Following the tragic death of Georgia Luger, Nodar Kumaritashvili, 21, the 21st Winter Olympic games in Vancouver opened last night. While the games opening ceremony was not as eye popping and jaw dropping as the 2004 Summer Games, but remember that 1 billion people live in China and more people live in California than in the entire country of Canada. Nonetheless, it was quite a spectacle and the producers use of 72 different projectors around the arena which acted simultaneously created some very vivid and rich images. So as I watched the opening ceremony, of course I had to make just a few observations.

Prior to the start of the events, NBC aired the video of the remake of the song, We are the World, where over 80current recording artists participated the song in which the proceeds will go towards the Haiti earthquake relief. I remember when the original song was recorded and 25 years ago I could name every artist in the room. Last night as I looked on, I wondered, am I really getting old or do I just care less and less about self absorbed celebrities?

During the hours long epic coverage, Coca Cola aired a commercial which featured a snowball fight in the Olympic village. This commercial was funnier than 99% of the commercials which aired during the Super Bowl, and I bet it cost a lot less.

Differing from the Summer Games, the Winter Games allow the athletes to enter the arena to watch the ceremony prior to the start. I couldn't help but be struck with irony as Joe Biden was watching Team USA entering the arena as they were wearing hats with moose on them. Just the whole Sarah Palin thing hit me. The Canadians had mittens on with little maple leaves sewn in the palms of the mittens. We get it already Canada, you are all about the maple leaf. (even though you didn't adopt the current flag for your nation until the 1960's. Please. At least we picked a flag and stuck with it for a few hundred years)

Then as all the country's athletes had their butts in their seats, out comes Nellie Furtado and Bryan Adams. Nellie wearing a blue dress which looked like body paint was used to apply it. Nellie is a very beautiful woman but two words here, Jenny Craig. Much more Canadian bacon and you won't be fitting into the front seat of a Humvee. To close out the show, the organizers trotted out K.D Lang. Wow. Bryan Adams and K.D. Lang? What were they thinking? If the whole production fell apart, they could always revert back to a quick 1986 retro closing show? And what the hell was up with the outfit Lang was wearing? She looked like she just flew in from Vegas, where she is a doing 6 shows a week as an Elvis impersonator.

So the performance starts, and the voiceover is from Donald Sutherland. I had no idea that Jack Bauer's father was from Canada.

During the first portion of the show, a giant polar bear is inflated at one end of the stage. I really think the bear wasn't a bear at all. It was the stay-puff marshmellow man from the GhostBusters movies. It's a tough economy and he's got to find work where ever he can.

The rest of the production was pretty good, but the fiddle segment was troubling. After the dude with the imp-ish looking hair was done fiddling in the canoe, the stage exploded into a myriad of fiddling and tap dancing performers. The key focus was on the man on top of the wedding cake looking stage, and he was fantastic on the fiddle, but were those really tattoos or did his daughter just go crazy on his chest with a Sharpie a few days before the opening of the games when he fell asleep after too much Molsen Golden? He later broke into some scat tap dancing, but his outfit reminded me of a cross between Larry the Cable guy and some guy wanting to wash my windshield in Tampa on my way to a Bucs game.

After the performances were over, the Governor General of Canada declared the games open. When did Wanda Sykes take political office in Canada?

The Olympic torch ceremony was nice in the arena, as the top 4 athletes in Canadian history all did a relay inside the facility. Is Catrina Lemay Doan, Katies Couric's long lost sister?

The only glitch of the entire performance occurred while trying to raise the 4 pillars which would surround the cauldron housing the Olympic flame. 3 of the 4 went up. Memo to self: Don't purchase any hydraulic parts manufactured in Canada.

Does anyone else think Biden was drunk at the post ceremony interview? He was an absolute joke as the man one heartbeat away from the office of President. I've never heard a VP use terms such as Dude or Awesome. He wouldn't even give his wife an opportunity to answer questions asked by NBC correspondent Lester Holt.

Overall, it was a very nice ceremony and I look forward to watch Team USA run the table on the rest of the world. Best of luck to all the athletes and enjoy the next 16 days.

Jiminy Cricket wins an award

ProFootballtalk.com announced today that NBC color commentator, Chris Collinsworth has won the Pat Summerall award. The what? Is the prize a case of Jack Daniels or a commemorative shot glass? The past winners of the award include James Brown, Greg Gumbel, Jim Nantz and Chris "Boomer" Berman. Jiminy Cricket and Chris Collinsworth were separated at birth.

Sure, one is 6'5" tall and the other is 3 inches. One has actually gone to Walt Disney World and the other wanted to but never won a Super Bowl. One of them is the voice of conscience for Pinocchio and the other is an annoying voice in Al Michaels ear. One of them went on to do a cameo in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and the other does work with Roger Rabbit, oh thats right it's Keith Olberman.

Collingsworth has won over 5 Emmy awards, further proving that award shows are highly overrated and irrelevant. Chris is one of the most overrated announcers in football with a pitchy voice and quick to crown each player as the greatest ever. He has made my list of the most annoying sports announcers, joining the likes of Tony Kornheiser, Joe Theisman, Joe Buck and Tim McCarver.

So, in a moment of self importance, the members of the media have gathered to crown one of their brethren with a phony piece of hardware. So in the spirit of Pat Summerall, raise your glasses in a toast, (or bottles) and hail Chris Collinsworth. And in the spirit of Emmitt Smith, I guess he "blowed out" the competition.