Sports

Watching: Winter Olympics

I gotta say, I'm more than a little annoyed that I'm watching a three-hour tape delay when I'm in the same time zone as Vancouver.

I was all ready to enjoy some live tweeting of the Olympics, but while everyone on Twitter is going "Look at the tap-dancing fiddlers!" I've got Tom Brokaw yammering on about the trade relations between Canada and the US. No offense to Mr. Brokaw, as he's very good at what he does, but he is not a tap-dancing fiddler. Or a fiddling tap-dancer.

Boo. Hiss.

At any rate, I did enjoy the Opening Ceremonies. These things always have an element of weird. (Nothing beats the walking snow globes in Albertville.) But Vancouver seemed like the Canadians looked at all the other recent ceremonies and went, "You want weird? We got weird. Check this out!" There's was an element of fun there, as they were - of course it's the Olympics - taking things seriously, but they're not really taking it too seriously.

Watching: Catching Up Over the Weekend

Well, quite a bit went by over the last week or so.

Dollhouse - Epitaph Two

So it's over. I really think that once they put their head down and started telling the story they intended, the show got infinitely better. And there was a lot of potential ground to cover, as evidenced by how much had to be winked at or left out. For one thing, what was the deal with Alpha?

One strength of this episode was that it squeezed every last drop out of all the dialogue. Every sentence had to move the story forward - including enough information to keep the viewer oriented to this new world order - without descending into dull exposition. It's a fine line to walk.

Caprica - Rebirth

Really liking this show. They added both local color world building and plenty of humor, while not losing the heart of the characters. I was especially impressed at Amanda figuring things out so quickly. Any other show would have dragged it out For.Ev.Er. Instead, they play the fallout, which - let's face it - is the far more interesting part.

It also occured to me that the old-style look and feel of Caprica is very appropriately. The story so far reminds me a lot of those early sci-fi short stories from the forties and fifties that asked some of the same "What If?" questions.

A Year in Provance

Via Netflix. Old fashioned Brit comedy based on the book by Peter Mayle. It was sweet but not very challenging. A sort of palate cleanser of a show.

Australian Open - Men's Final

There's going to be an entire decade where tennis players measure themselves with, "And then I lost in the Final against Federer."

Watching: Golf

Sportscaster #1: "[Tiger Woods] is supposed to do that. He's number one in the rankings on par five..."
Sportscaster #2: "Nobody is supposed to do that!"

Watching: US Figure Skating Championships

Aside from the one girl who broke my Carmen Rule (no one is allowed to skate to Carmen unless you can prove you seduced a soldier then dumped him for a bullfighter), it's been really good. The commentators keep trying to jinx things by talking about how consistent everyone is, but they've all stayed on their feet so far.

Watching: Olympic Trials

I love the Olympics. I really do. But I do not like sport-casters. Seriously, I wish they would all put a sock in it.

Except Scott Hamilton, but that's just because he's so pinchably cute.

Watching: Wimbledon

ESPN is getting a little passive-aggressive about the "embargoed" matches.

I'm watching the tivo of their early morning coverage all week and it's always just before going to whatever second-rate match they are covering this time, the presenters will mention the big match of the day and mournfully inform the audience that the other more interesting match is "what we call embargoed" and you'll have to wait for (insert just the tiniest bit of spit) NBC to see it.

Watching: Wimbledon

It makes me giggle when they talk about Rafael Nadal's entrance to the court, "like a boxer with his dressing gown over his head." Now, I know that by "dressing gown" they mean "robe," all shiny and macho - but I do suddenly have a mental image of tough guy Rafa Nadal in pale green silk with marabou trim.

Watching: Baseball

Baseball

They pre-empted Firefly again. At this rate, the Angels had better make it to the World Series.

Watching: World Figure Skating Championships

Men's Final

It's all fun and games until your tie flies up and puts your eye out.

Watching: Winter Olympics

Ladies Long Program

They finally got it right.

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