How cool are the Olympic Games? I'll go ahead and answer that, but in terms my kids would use.
They're wicked hella filthy sick.
Which means really cool.
For
ninety-nine percent of the participants, it's the one opportunity every
one-thousand-four-hundred-and-sixty days to step from the shadows of
obscurity and bask in the fuzzy warmth of a life's goal realized.
Most of these competitions aren't even televised during non-Olympic years, other than maybe sandwiched between Corn Confidential and How to Paint Your Fence the Same Color as That Thing Was Before on Wichita Public Access Television.
Yet
before we're allowed to sink our incisors into some piping hot amateur
boxing or beach volleyball, we're obligated to endure a five-hour Super
Bowl halftime show to kick-off the fortnight.
I try, I really do.
I want to like the opening ceremonies, and it is fun to watch nations
like Cape Verde and Comoros and Lesotho prance down the track on equal
footing with the superpowers.
But by and large, the Olympic
opening ceremonies bore me to distraction. Remember that show with the
purple dinosaur—Barney? Yeah, unfortunately, the lip-syncing and dancing
and Manson family-esque facial expressions remind me of turning on
Barney and ten thousand of his closest pals. It's a small world, after
all.
Once the sports get going, though, nothing beats settling
into the old barcalounger after a nice evening repast, firing up the
black and white Zenith and tuning into events which transpired ten hours
previously.
Seriously, I'm not bothered by the delay as much as
some people. It's not like I'm going to get up at four in the morning
or miss work during the day to catch the live feed. The networks have
experienced this issue since Al Gore screwed the final tubes into his
internet machine.
I am, however, here to offer some unsolicited
advice to the National Broadcasting Corporation. These folks have taken a
lot of heat over inadvertent spoilers, sappy cameos, and provincial
slant to their coverage. If they could simply initiate a few informal
chats with the International Olympic Committee to tweak a few of the
events, I think the Olympics could gain unprecedented popularity and a
television ratings windfall. Tape delay be damned.
Here are my suggestions, NBC:
1) Add a new event called team javelin—one thrower, one catcher.
2)
Eliminate the shot put from the decathlon. In its place between the
high jump and pole vault, each contestant must eat four sausage
calzones.
3) Team diving will be modified slightly. The divers must exchange swimsuits before resurfacing.
4)
Sorry, but China just isn't evil enough. The Games will hold one "Retro
Day," where the Soviet Union and East Germany will return to compete.
Performance enhancing drugs will be not only be allowed, they'll be
encouraged. Due to the newfound hormonal equality, men's and women's
swimming will be merged into "swimming."
5) Each men's 4 x 100
meter relay team must include one fifty-year-old male who's at least
thirty pounds overweight. These men will run the anchor leg.
NBC
will also alter a bit of its production. Bob Costas can never again
refer to John McEnroe as "Johnny Mac," because no one has ever called
him that and it's freaking stupid. Also, when a reporter asks a
still-dripping swimmer who just finished fourth, "What were you trying
to accomplish out there?" the reporter is entitled to an exclusive and
immediate swim in the Olympic pool.
Oh, yeah, one more thing.
Seacrest? Out.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Hey, NBC! Some Suggestions for Fixing the Olympics.
Labels:
humor
,
kids
,
nbc
,
olympics
,
tape delay
,
television
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