Olympic Fever

I confess I haven't much followed the Olympics over the past few times. Something about changing from every fourth year to every other year seemed to steal a bit of the magic. The last Winter Games took place while SVV and I lived in Denmark, and go figure, the only event you could catch on the tube was curling. TWENTY-FOUR HOURS STRAIGHT OF SHUFFLE BOARD ON ICE. But Kristin, you say, they probably only have 24 hours total of curling the entire Olympics, you must be exaggerating! But oh no, they played that sucka nonstop, over and over again, like a CD track stuck on repeat, because you see, it's the only winter sport in which the Danes actually excel (sorry, Denmark, but 'tis true). And while the Summer Games have always been my favorite, last week I couldn't have even told you where the last ones were held--that's how little I've paid attention in recent years. In fact, the last Olympics I actually strongly recall were the 1996 Atlanta Games, and that's because I grew up in the glorious South, just two hours north of the Georgia capital, and well, it was kind of hard to bypass the chaos.

But I'm trying to get back on board, I really am. I'm a patriotic American, after all, and I do love my country (and um, the brutal honesty that we kind of kick a$$ and take names when it comes to athletic competitions and (almost) more than my love for my country is my love for WINNING). So I turned on the women's basketball and what did I find (besides the USofA clearly rocking the house), but three out of the five Americans on the court were my Tennessee homegirls! My Lady Vol homegirls, to be precise. And if you don't know what a Lady Vol is, well then why are we friends again? (Though it took SVV a good year and a half into our relationship to actually be able to define a Tennessee Volunteeer, so I guess I can forgive you and spare you a bit of a learning curve--but only this one time.) Anyway, right there on our projector screen were Candace Parker, who I had the pleasure of seeing on a daily basis during college (I was on Pat Head Summitt's marketing team for a year, meaning I was at every home game and a lot of practices; and yes the Legend herself is every bit as scary, intimidating and AWESOME as she seems), Kara Lawson and Tamika Catchings making me proud to bleed orange

Then, I was watching swimming, and whaddya know? The silver medalist in the 100m butterfly, Christine Magnuson, also a Lady Vol! I think maybe you get my point that in the South, Tennessee in particular, we don't mess around when it comes to les sports. (Now if only this would spill over into our football team come kick-off day in just three weeks(!).)

But my favorite event of all--and I'm sure you needn't even guess this--is the gymnastics. In fact, as the Opening Cermonies began, I flipped through my DVR schedule for the upcoming two weeks and set every hour to record that promised even a glimpse of the event. I don't care much for the dudes, but man I'm pretty sure I have a girl crush on every one of the tumblers on the women's team (which in retrospect sounds a bit creepy, as the average age hovers somewhere around 16). But how cute are they? And wee? With adorable little ponytails that make me want to chop off my own locks. And abs I can never even dream of looking down and seeing. And way more personalities than any of those drab (albeit talented) Chinese, Romanian or German gymnasts. And every one of them could beat me into the ground with the pinky toe of her 4'11" frame, I have no doubt.

So there's really no point of this post at all, in case you haven't yet reached that conclusion, but I'm curious, have you all caught the Olympic Fever? What/Who are your favorite sports and athletes? Is there any event that I mustn't miss out on?