Sadly, the Olympics are over.... plus a hilarious story

Sigh, the Olympics are over. I officially have one hour still taped to watch, but I believe it’s just the post-Closing Ceremonies celebration with bands and I’m not that excited about it. I miss it already. I can’t even tell you how much I love the Olympics. I just can’t get enough of the excitement. I remember when our apartment became basically “Olympic central” during one summer in college and people were always over to watch. That year was hilarious because we started writing down the weird things the announcers sometimes say. Just listen next time. Seriously ridiculous things. I also remember being home for part of the Beijing Olympics and watching synchronized swimming and the final basketball game until late in the night on one of our small televisions downstairs with lots of static and loving every minute of it. And who can forget the amazing Beijing Opening Ceremonies?! Not to be confused with the “opening exercises” as I kept calling them over the past few weeks. I grew up loving the winter Olympics more than the summer, probably just because I lived in Utah and knew more about the winter sports. Over the past several Olympics though, I’ve learned to love and appreciate the summer Olympics just as much as the winter.

So, imagine my joy when the Vancouver Winter Olympics roll around and, for the first time ever, I can use DVR and actually tape the Olympics! I’m new to the whole tivo world and am loving it. Especially with these Olympics. We had to be really careful about our limited space because we would tape in HD and that takes up more space than normal shows. Do you know how many hours of Olympics were on every day?? Many! And I taped almost all of them. I would come home and just hunker down on the coach and revel in the Olympics magic. I would often be a day behind and just try to stay away from the news. I relearned all about the crazy different sports they have. Mark once asked me which one was my favorite and I really couldn’t answer. I started spouting off almost all of them. I love the snowboarding (love Shaun White!), luges, skeletons, bobsleds (go USA!), speed skating (both short track and long track, long or short or team events… relays are so cool looking!... go Apolo and Celski and Shawni Davis!), ski jumps, moguls, ski and snowboard races (go Bode Miller and Lindsey Von and Mancuso!), even Nordic combined (go USA!) and cross country. We only watched one curling game though and only the US/Canada hockey game (although I fast forwarded until someone scored). Interesting games, but too long and not my thing. I also have to admit that while I do enjoy figure skating and ice dancing, I’m really not the hugest fan. I almost hate to admit that because I think as a girl I’m supposed to love it. I did enjoy it though and watched each competition unfold (go Chinese cute married couple and Davis/White and Lysacek! sad day for Jeremy Abbott though…). I just became really good at watching the right parts of all the events. Otherwise I would never have had enough time. Sometimes I would fast forward until the USA people would compete, or just watch the scores or placement updates. It was fun watching all of the "looking back" videos they had during the Closing Ceremonies or as the games went on. Each race they showed, I had watched. I kept saying "yep, saw that one, know what happens there."

I am so utterly grateful for my Marky during the whole two weeks. He often just let me watch while he did the dishes and sometimes even started cooking dinner by himself. I felt so spoiled and loved. Mark really enjoys the Olympics, more the summer than the winter, and was glad that I enjoyed myself, but I think he was probably a bit surprised at my near obsession. It will be good to get back into the real swing of things, but I’m also seriously sad that the games are over. And now we have to wait two more years until the next ones! I sure hope we have tivo capability again at that time so I can watch mass amounts. I just don’t know how I am going to be a mother at the same time as the Olympics in the future! I’ll just have to figure that out when it comes time though.

Now, for a random story that made me laugh really hard the other day…

Mark and I were heading to our friends house and had to run into the grocery store to buy something on the way. As we headed out to the car with our purchase, in a bit of a hurry, Mark walked over to my side of the car and opened the door and let me in (sigh, I know, such a gentleman!). As I sat in the car waiting for him, Mark made his way around the back of the car to the driver’s side, opened up the backseat, and sat down. He even had the keys pulled out like he was going to drive away. I laughed so hard!!! His facial expressions as he realized that he was in the wrong place cracked me up. He quickly moved up to the front seat so we could get going. I suppose he was just distracted as we were rushing around? Oh my gosh I couldn’t stop laughing. Good times.