Olympic Valentines

We are an outdoor adventuring family. We’d rather do than view, so our old television mostly resides in a closet in the basement, occasionally pulled out for use with an old VHS videotape. But with the Olympics happening just over the border from us, we hauled that heavy relic up to the living room and discovered that we can get a Canadian channel that has almost non-stop coverage.

We watched the opening ceremonies (wow!) and played What Country Will Be Next as the alphabetical parade of nations was shown. Who knew that Ghana sent an athlete and that Iran would participate? We’re also liking the Games as covered by Canadians compared to how we imagine they are getting covered by American stations. The Canadian station has commercials for British Columbia, and shows entire heats of long track speed skating when there aren’t even any Canadians in the race.

While I woke up twice in the night thinking sadly of Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili who lost his life Friday morning, being more connected to the Olympics is pretty inspiring. Wayne Gretzky carried the torch in the same rain that was falling that night at our house.