Sports

Day 3 on Wimbledon Radio

(Love the internet!) Mahut and Isner going to 59-59 in the fifth set - record breaking match. There's no tie-breaker in the fifth set at Wimbledon, so they could well keep going and going and going. They'd lost the scoreboard by the end and everyone was so punchdrunk that they couldn't talk about anything except how they really really needed to pee.

They finally stopped because of darkness and will have to finish tomorrow. The announcer agreed with me that this wasn't the time for a TV interview, all "How do you feel?"

"What are they going to say?" she asks. "They're exhausted and they haven't even won yet."

And tomorrow, the Queen is supposed to visit. I always wondered when they talked about her being there if there was an Brit in the Final. Was that the only way she could get to come? I mean, what if she just wanted to see Federer play? ('Cuz if she had to wait for an British Final, it might be a while.)

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."

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.

My friend and I used to joke that Dick Button had the world's second biggest beer bong sitting next to him as he tried to interject some poetry into his commentary. (Chris Matthews has the biggest.) Only in the end, poor Dick would wind up going on and on about how some skater was "caressing" the ice or "oozing the essence" of the mambo. (Note to Dick: oozing is never a compliment.)

Aside: my favorite Dick Button story is when one of the sportcaster guys who does "sports" as opposed to "figure skating" asked Peggy Fleming if she thought there were any girls outside the US who could beat Michelle Kwan and company that year. Peggy gave a polite diplomatic answer, and Dick just piped up with an unsolicited "Not a chance." The silence that followed spoke a thousand words and I just had to love him for that.

Back to Beijing: NBC has begun really pushing the Olympic trials - because the existing weeks of competition aren't enough, they want to drag the Olympic season out to months and years just like the election - meaning that there will be months and years of drivel to wade through before we finally get to the good stuff.

The track and field coverage had a commentator who desperately needed a thesaurus. He who kept describing people as "dangerous". "He can be really dangerous in this race." "She'll be very dangerous here." Okay, find a new adjective, sweetie. You go right along the line before each race; they can't all be dangerous. How about troublesome? Devious? Hazardous? Perilous? And you know there occasionally has to be someone who's just flat out harmless, just for variety.

Oh, but the swimming...

Did you know Michael Phelps is going for seven gold medals? Really. He really is. Seven gold medals. Seven, I tell you! Mark Spitz! (Best name for a swimmer ever.) Michael Phelps! Seven!

I swear the commentators are so programmed to mention Michael Phelps, that if one of the runners had knocked over a water bottle, the brains of the guys in the booth would have trip-switched at the sight of a small body of water and they would have started talking about Michael Phelps and his seven gold medals.

Or Dara Torres and the fact that she's over forty! She's been swimming at the Olympics since she was fifteen or something, which is an extraordinary thing to accomplish - but damn! There is simply no reason to harp on the fact that she's... Just. So. Old. She's forty here, not a hundred and forty. There's no imminent danger of breaking a hip. Senile dementia is at least a couple decades off. Get over it already.

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.

Men's Final

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