And Some Other Thoughts ...

While many of you like to watch "Tony Stewart and His Bumper Car Racing" on whatever channel you get, I would like to remind you that REAL RACING (aka Formula 1) begins on March 12th, with the Gran Prix of Bahrain. Follow the Speed Channel for details.

We've seen many strange things during the 2006 Winter Olympics. Bode Miller, for one. Johnny Weir for another. While the results may have been disappointing for the US (and why not, since this iteration of the Games were not held in the US), who can forget some of our best? That historic "quad" in pairs figure skating and the out-of-their minds bronze result in the men's short-track speed-skating relay last night? I do vote that we change some of the Olympic sports, however.

• The one woman commentator for NBC should have her DNA tested. I swear she is a man.
• I think we should have "Tank Driving and Firing Accuracy" rather than the Biathlon, where men and women ski cross-country while packing a rifle and shooting at targets. Everyone knows that tanks with the appropriately-wide tracks are much more suited to winter warfare than a single person on skis with a rifle. Everyone also knows that a 120 mm HE round does a hell of a lot more damage than a .22 ... but hey that's just me.
• Is it just me, and while I don't "not applaud" her efforts and results, or did Sasha Cohen really deserve a Silver Medal for falling twice during her free-skate program? OK ... they've changed the scoring, and maybe I don't fully understand it ... but it used to be that if you fell, you were "out". I hereby vote for "skater-derby" as a new sport.
• Is it just me, or was the segment on the WWII veteran who helped liberate Torino from the Nazis in WWII one of the most poignant interviews of the entire two weeks? God bless Vernon Baker and his comrades. I hereby vote for "Liberation Actions" as a new sport.
• At the same time, doesn't Chicagoan Shani Davis's speed-skating medal seem so tainted, when he decided to focus on an individual medal and to not participate in a team medal effort as he was scheduled to do? Can anyone say "Terrell Owens"? I hereby do NOT vote for an "Individualism" medal.
• Is it just me, or does the fact that we have been promised during the Closing Ceremony that everyone will be wearing a clown nose seem as if Federico Fellini has come back to film production? I hereby vote for a "Surrealism Award" to be given to the most bizarre ceremonies for the host countries.

In the very least, Andrea Bocelli will be worth watching.