Field Theory: And like that, it's gone
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Back OT, I didn't watch much Winter Olympics, and what I did was mostly for novelty value.
It does seem like the surprise hit of the games coverage was women's curling, thanks in no small part to the MILF-y appeal (and not only to the chaps, I gather from Emma Hart's tweets) of some of the competitors.
And not just here: I grabbed some TrendsMap screenshots on Sunday and "curling" was trending big-time in the US Twittersphere.
Sky didn't help by cutting away from the first hour I actually sat down and watched (one of the women's ski events) with the Canadian competitor leading and only the US skier to go -- in favour of a pre-produced PC cringe-fest about how fabulously the games were serving indigenous Canadians. That was annoying.
Basically, I don't relate to any of the sports staged, and I find them either mystifying or excessively contrived. OTOH, I love me some summer Olympics. Go figure.
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The craziest (and coolest) thing I saw was the skiers who raced down and did jumps against four other people. Great stuff. More of that and less curling which always seemed to be on when I was watching, sometimes on three channels at a time
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BlairMacca - you mean ski cross. Its like roller derby on snow - awesome. But don't take away the curling! I lived in Canada for a year and you get an appreciation for the weird awesomeness of it. Its a very skilful game and, like test cricket, watching it is a fun way to spend a lazy afternoon (shared with a book or some rather boring work you need to do).
And Russell - the appeal of the male curlers isn't at all MILF-y :P. Many of them are under 30, and the canadian and swedish teams in particular totally cute!
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More of that and less curling which always seemed to be on when I was watching, sometimes on three channels at a time
Wasn't that weird. I thought about halfway through that they might as well rename the winter olympics "Curling, Biathlon and some other sports." Or even "Curling, etc."
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It does seem like the surprise hit of the games coverage was women's curling, thanks in no small part to the MILF-y appeal (and not only to the chaps, I gather from Emma Hart's tweets) of some of the competitors.
I'm glad you mentioned that. The women's curling I found to be the beach volleyball of the winter games. I think it's because the camera lingered on the athletes and they didn't have goggles on.
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As someone who can't receive any sort of television (despite co-habitating with almost one of the largest TVs in the world, go figure), I thought it was amazingly easy to watch the Olympics through Prime's streaming of them. Eric Young seemed to hold things together pretty well, and didn't even make too many inane presenter-puns. Anytime I watched they seemed to have something fairly interesting on, and were good about cutting to NZ competitors as well.
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Huh. I thought The Crowd Goes Wild on Ice was fine. It's usually the only (free-to-air) sports show/news/whatever I can watch.
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There seemed to be a lot of ice skating/dancing going on which was amazing to watch. Impossibly immaculate and smiley people without cuts or bruises whizzed, glided and leapt about and were tossed around in the air by their partners all at a million miles an hour on narrow metal blades on slippery ice. Meanwhile the narrators criticized them to bits. Sometimes they fell on the hard ice but never seemed injured, and kept smiling through the humiliation.
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Curling, you say?
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3410,
Hadyn,
Would it've killed you to mention this? -
Most of that Canadian curling team play for a club called the Calgary Cougars.
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Seriously, how did everyone know about the stream on Prime's website? At Ignite last night nobody I spoke to had heard of it (including some annoyed Canadians).
Curling, you say?
Now THAT is comedy.
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Hadyn,
Would it've killed you to mention this?They don't play cricket at the Winter Olympics. Unless... Russia 2014!
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Curling, you say?
Lolz.
Here's a goodie from Tom Scott.
And Canuck-turned-Kiwi Diana Wichtel summed it up best not long after the 2nd Gulf War exposed the cultural gap between the US & Canada (my emphasis):
I've long since got used to the fact that my native land is a running joke, and not just on South Park. Blame Canada? Why not? Everyone else does.
Still, after curling made it into the Winter Olympics, even I began to see the funny side. This is the nation that gave the world Pamela Anderson and depressive folk singers from Leonard Cohen to Joni Mitchell. Further sapping the will to live are such punishing Canadians as Celine Dion and Alanis Morissette. One of our most famous sons, Jim Carrey, achieved stardom by talking out of his bum.
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I'm talking speedskating rather than cycling. Crazy builds.
Actually, I used to share an office with a dutch bloke who'd been a competitive speed skater in his youth. He reckoned that one of their training regimes was to line up at one side of a field, crouch down, then basically hop forward in a crouch until they got to the other side. Definitely one of those sports where you're really only using one big set of muscles.
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Indoor bowls combined with housework
Lolnui. Bill Bailey's take:
what's the practical application for this? someone on a frozen lake needs a flagon of cider deliverd accurately! ok!
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Dear Lord. Bill's twitter feed is truly a spectacular window onto the stoned mind.
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There were too many athletes in the finals who seemed to slow down early, sliding across the line rather than giving it everything. Many of them were saving something in reserve for other events, and this indicates to me that there is a lack of sufficient competition to see people forced to become true specialists in particular distances. (as compared to swimming or running, for example).
That sounds exactly like running or swimming. The top competitors tend to do exactly that in their heats during the summer olympics.
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At times I was convinced there was nothing else happening, as Curling Live, or Curling Replay was all that you could watch. It was only introduced as an Official Olympic Sport in 1998, but it seems like the games were going on since forever, after aboot 2 minutes of watching.
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Actually, I used to share an office with a dutch bloke who'd been a competitive speed skater in his youth. He reckoned that one of their training regimes was to line up at one side of a field, crouch down, then basically hop forward in a crouch until they got to the other side. Definitely one of those sports where you're really only using one big set of muscles.
Do the tracks always go one way? I'd hope they rotate.
That sounds exactly like running or swimming. The top competitors tend to do exactly that in their heats during the summer olympics.
I turned on coverage, and thought I was watching heats. I got to the end and they handed out a gold medal (to a man who admittedly deserved it).
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Firstly, curling!
New Zealand has a community of curlers, I've been led to believe on the basis of Mainland cheese ads. I'd like to give it a try!
The ski sports were another disappointment. Wonderful to watch, as always, but there were problems. The record warmth meant that the snow conditions deteriorated as skiers went down the mountain, and if you were last you were mired in sludge. A climate change writer gives his take on this Winter Olympics.
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Hadyn,
Would it've killed you to mention this?Just quietly, just seethingly, ragingly, furiously, loathingly-albeit quietly, can someone please tell me why the hell NZ supported capitulated on John Howard's candidacy for the ICC (and don't dare tell me it's politics, he was rejected by the voters of Australia and by the good residents of Bennelong yet embraced by NZC?)
Now that I've got that off my chest...
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@Paul W
An ACB v NZC battle was only ever going to have one winner.
But it’ll be fascinating to see what the Asian Bloc makes of him
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I'd've preferred Greg Chappel. Another injustice to sit alongside the under-arm?
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Vancouver hasn't finished with the snowfest - the Paralympics start March 12th (so more curling).
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