What I Have Learned From the Winter Olympics

 

—If a Russian skater falls on the ice, it's like a tree falling in the forest with nobody around. It never happened, and it won't cost them a point. 

Really. Good luck even finding a picture of these two falling on line. Not there, didn't happen! 

Down the memory hole. Along with Ukraine, soon. But I digress.

—Maybe it's NOT the best idea to build a downhill ski course on which about half the Olympic racers fall down. Just saying. 

Ah, dictatorships. But hey, you CAN find a picture of Americans falling!

—Curling:

BEST. SPORT. EVER.

Sure, I know it doesn't look like much. Just a big, polished chunk of Scottish rock, pushed along the ice. With lots of sweeping. 

Is curling the only Olympic sport that incorporates housekeeping?

I don't know. But who cares? Get enough first-rate bourbon, or some very good pot, and watching curling can take you into a whole new, Zen state of tranquility.

What? The bourbon and pot don't come with it? Never mind.

—All of the downhill skiing results are determined by gamma rays. 

Or earthquake tremors in Uzbeki-beki-bekistan. Or a butterfly flapping its wings in Argentina. Or something.

"He's bleeding time!" was a typical commentary I heard at one point during the Alpine skiing, followed by the rejoinder, "You're right! He's a full second behind!"

Oh, bite me.

These Sages of the Slopes look at how much snow someone's skis are churning up and try to tell us that they know that precisely what is happening. I don't believe it.

Think of how long a second is. Missed it. 

That second whizzed by while you were starting to read that sentence. But the other day, we were told that some poor schlub had missed out on a medal by seven-one-hundredths of a second. Someone else finished two-one-hundredths of a second behind.

You will never convince me that human beings can invent a timing device that can accurately measure 20 or so people skiing down a mountain to within two-one-hundredths of a second. Or, especially, that the human eye can detect why that difference was so.

Two-one-hundredths of a second comes from someone stomping their feet against the cold near the computerized timepiece. Two-one-hundredths of a second is the network helicopter passing overhead. Or not.

Yes, there are time differentials like that in track-and-field, and things like speed skating. But we can tell who won because they're right next to each other. 

"Well, you see, Kyle, he leaned in too far before the second gate." "He wasn't attacking the slope with confidence there, Missy." 

Spare me. 

How about: "The earth's magnetic field may have shifted infinitesimally during that run, Bob. Hey, just being honest!"