I may not be the only one requiring therapy after seeing some of these guys...

Apologies to all for the huge delays between postings. With the Olympics going on around here, the clock seems to fly by. Plus, that crazy Apollo Anton Ohno keeps calling me wanting me to be his wing-man. Who can say no to that?

So I watched figure skating for the first time in, well, forever. I do not profess to even remotely understand figure skating. I hope for wipe outs, or hot ladies in cute costumes. I'm that guy who waits to see if someone slips on a flower someone threw on the ice. Bad I know, but thats why I might watch.

I am always amazed at how "open" these ladies are with letting their male partners touch them all over the place. I would love to see what practice looks like on lift day or twirl day. How some of these people can hold a straight face when pulling off some of these moves is beyond me, like this picture. The guy is smiling, and I can see why.

Now what I do understand about figure skating is the concept of ugly, as in that is one ugly costume. I'm still angry at my mom for some of the stuff she dressed me in as a child, but in comparison, these male figure skater dudes need some serious costume management. Now we can all debate the stereotype of the sexuality of many male figure skaters. I won't go there. But any man really needs to be comfortable with himself to dress like this in public.

Regardless, like a bucket list item, I managed to make it through an entire evening of figure skating without flipping stations. Well, OK, I did change a few times, but I flipped back quickly. I would have hated to have missed any more of these crazy costumes.

Oh man, that's my cell again. I already know who that is....

I'm in the Olympic Snowman-Making Competition! Want my autograph?

As the Olympics continue to plunge forward, a few more random thoughts crossed my mind:

- How exactly did someone come up with the biathlon? Cross country skiing, and rifle shooting. Hmmm. I get the cross-country skiing part. That epitomizes winter athletics. But rifle shooting? After a good hard ski, who does not like to hunker down and cap some stuff with your rifle? "Say honey, I think I need a good ski to get the juices flowing. I think I'll carry my rifle for good measure in case the crazy Yeti boogeyman gets in my way. Feel like some rabbit or squirrel for lunch?" As an aside, in Canada, the Sasquatch, the biggest winter boogeyman of them all, is also the mascot for an extremely popular line of beer. If someone actually saw one, rather than run, they'd be inclined to ask for a free six-pack.

- I remember when the X-games first rolled out. Extreme sports, extreme action. Crazy events with young people from across the world, trying things like doing handstands on skis or performing awesome flips and flops in mid air whilst strategically placed advertising adorns their boxers. Those crazy kids. Now, lo and behold, an X-Games event, the appropriately named Half-Pipe, is an Olympic sport. Wasn't the whole point of the X-Games to promote non-conventional sports. Now here it is in one in the most conventional competitions ever. Whats next? Competitive Driveway shoveling? "Joe, from Maine, is the Worlds fastest snow shoveler out there. He can do 5 driveways per minute, and he gets great style points for his snow piles and shovel manipulation. Bravo Joe, bravo. Can I get your autograph?"

- Another event I'd like to suggest. For those artistic types, how about the Snowman making competition? Kids will love it! Everyone starts with the same box of crap, you know, odd shaped buttons, dead tree branches, raw carrots and Where's Waldo scarves. Points scored for artistic merit and endurance when put under extreme warm temperatures. "Oh no, the head of the Polish snowman has just rolled off! That will cost them significant points!. They are devastated! You just cannot put such a big head on without building a proper body. Not at this level of competition!"

By the way, saw the Tiger Woods interview this morning. I trust millions will be commenting on the obvious topics, so I'll avoid that. What I noticed was once the camera flipped to a side view of Tiger, did anyone else notice he hardly ever changed pages of his script he was reading from? He spoke for easily 5+ minutes straight and changed pages maybe once. What size font did he write with? Maybe he had scrupulous notes like "Apologize to Wife...yadda-yadda-yadda." I dunno. Seemed kinda weird to me.

OK, time to be quite again.

"Sorry Lady. I'm not trying to smell your ass. I'm practicing short-track speed skating"

I have been glued to the television watching the 2010 Olympics. Now the entire concept of the Olympics evokes great patriotism. It also evokes a crazy passion for watching events you normally would have no clue were even happening were the Olympics not on. For example, the Moguls event to most people is really a bunch of crazy kids skiing the part of the mountain most would not dare venture to, trying flips and flops on their self-made snow ramps. Me, I'd rather head back to the comfy chalet for a nice hot cocoa, and to warm my Yeti-frozen feet.

I remember when I was learning to ski, on mountains very close to where the Olympics are today. The highlights of my lessons were (a) trying to ski down the mountain on 3 foot skis (that’s what I learned on - no joke), without ski poles - another ingenious teaching tactic, and (b) figuring out the best way to wipe out cute girls on the hill so I could work on my suave Grade 4 moves. I guess I knew then that I would not be good at most Winter Olympic events. But I digress.

The funniest part of the Olympics to me is the great knowledge people somehow gain on what differentiates the stronger competitors from the weaker ones, especially in judged events. While watching the moguls this past weekend, I heard my dad screaming at the TV in another room about how there is no way that guy should have got "that" score, since his legs were much farther apart than the last guy, and his helicopter turn was no where near as sweet at the other guys "somersault twisting thingy". It was my dad, so he clearly knew what he was talking about. He'll be giving me his analysis of physics of the Skeleton soon enough.

Another of my favourites is watching Short-Track Speed Skating aka Roller Derby on skates. People speed skating around a hockey rink, 6 or 7 at a time for multiple laps, trying to maneuver around each other, all the while wearing helmets and safety equipment like they had in the roller derby. This is the event for me!

Among the things I have learned from watching Short-Track Speed Skating:

1 - While body checking is deemed illegal, it seems to be quite tolerated, and almost expected, as seen by the fact the edge of the rink is well padded in anticipation of collisions. Not sure about you, but I do NOT want any grown man bumping his gonchless butt into me at top speed while skating around pylons.
2 - Small Asian guys, who seem to be the minority in most ice rinks I have been to, rule this event. I guess all those Asian little-leaguers who dominate in Williamsport all grow up to be short-track speed skaters, since they disappear from baseball, and few if any play in the NHL.
3 - Non-Asian competitors, such as the Europeans, Canadians and Americans, appear outright gangly, thus must have cool ponytails and/or goatees to help control the wind resistance.
4 - This is the one event where sticking your head as close to the ass of the guy in front of you is considered great strategy. I hope they have nose plugs

Speaking of which, maybe it was just me, but was the Womens short-track speed skating team pursuit race not somewhat arousing, watching those ladies gracefully skate up behind one of their teammates at full speed, and gently place their hands on the butt of their teammates and push as hard as possible. OK, maybe it was just me.

Time to be quiet now.

Undercover Boss - not my Reality

Not sure if anyone out there caught the debut episode of Undercover Boss (UB) last night, following the Super Bowl game on CBS. I, as I have been prone to do, fell asleep during the football extravaganza, so missed UB, but thank goodness for TIVO.

The concept of this show is simple. Find some high ranking executive, and get him to go under cover within his own organization as a plebe, to see what life is really like. Then the executive circles back with his executive team to present findings. I’ve seen this concept before, but this was the first time for a big network.

I had mixed emotions watching this show. Its classic that they had this guy actually clean toilets – porto-potties in fact, even worse. I cringe at using them let alone the thought of cleaning one. They also had him climbing the side of a hill to collect garbage, run a recycling assembly line, assist a garbage delivery schedule, and other waste-y things, none of which he appeared to do well.

Yet every person he met made no attempt to slag the company! Maybe I’m living in a different world, but where was the “executives know s**t about what happens out here" spiel from the field. I wanted to see someone royally put their foot in their mouth. I wanted to see the union shop steward guy come out and wave the union flag. I wanted conflict. I wanted him to walk back to his glass office with his head between his knees realizing heads need to roll. None of this “we need to set up a sub-committee” stuff. ZZzzzzzz.

It’s a great concept, and more executives should try this tactic. That said, I guess I prefer more Jerry Springer conflict on some of these shows. The end result of this episode is the executive looks like a hero for helping people and fixing his company. Not sure this is true reality, let alone reality TV.

Free Grand Slams for Everyone

OK, I've officially crossed over to the dark side. And this is only blog #2. How can it be? The madness?

One of my guilty pleasures in life is I LOVE Denny's. Notice the capitalization of the word love. Means I really love it a lot. I may be a blog rookie, but I learned that one a while back. But Ummm...

I'm not sure when I grew the passion for Denny's. but I trust it came at an early age, like those babies in the E-Trade commercials (who totally crack me up by the way - "shankopotomus"). There's just something about a restaurant with the multitude of offerings, open 24/7 and its cheap but reasonably decent. Since nobody reads this, there should be no food snobs out there, but keep in mind, I also LOVE KFC, so saying decent is clearly subjective. I'll save that passion for another time. I can only take so much excitement in the morning.

I'll accept the cleanliness issues, the "unique" clientele, the even more "unique" employees, and the green coffee for a Grand Slam any day. So lo and behold, guess what I found yesterday and had to check it out. Yup, the Denny's frequent customer card. Kind of like those cards you get at the grocery store, or the casinos in Vegas, Denny's has a patronage card. And I may win free Grand Slams for a year! Is it Christmas again already? Where do I sign up? Here is the link so you too can sign up. Tell 'em I sent ya, and I'm sure they'll cut you a deal.

http://dennys.promo.eprize.com/freegrandslam/

Speaking of Denny's, its seems to be one of those restaurants which has that goofy arcade crane game, where a whack of stuffed animals sit in a glass box, and you manouvre the crane to pull one out. I swear those animals have extra weight in them, or they have used some of the pancake butter to grease the crane arms or something, since I can never pull the animals out. I tried for a good half hour to pull out a Winnie the Pooh from one recently. No dice. Its more the challenge of the game than the quality of the stuffed animals. I'm sure you could buy one at Wal-Mart for as much as you pay into the arcade machine.

Can you imagine the pitch from the sales guy for those arcade games? "How about we put in a money-making juggernaut, where nobody ever wins, and you watch full-grown adults go postal trying to pull out something they would not even dangle from their rear view mirror. They'll be so peeved, they won't even notice you've made them wait 15 minutes despite there being ample available free tables. Would that be something you'd be interested in?"

Now if they could get Denny's into Wal-Mart locations, well they'll be needing a crane to get me out of there, although I'm sure the crane will suck and I'll fall back into the store so I can buy more rolled back pricing stuff whilst digesting my Moons over My Hammy. I'm sure I won't be the only one either.

OK, time to be quiet again.

Growing up, I was always the quiet type. While others would make uncontrollable noises in random public forums like the McDonalds Playpen or the school Jungle Gym, I preferred to "save" my noise for a better moment. As if I had limited noise availability. As such, I was labelled an introvert.

The word introvert is peculiar to me. I always think back to my days of high school French, where vert was French for green. So does that mean that an introvert is someone who is green inside? Like the Hulk? I feel the urge to flex my pulsating muscles and watch my shirt shred into tiny pieces. But I digress

My parents would always say to me, "I wonder what is going on inside that head of yours?"

"Well, blood flow and brain activity I'm sure." OK, maybe I did not verbalize that, but that was what I was thinking. It always seemed an odd question to me.

As time passed, I realized I would need to take steps in my life to open up, like a pretty flower, like a great looking, Tom-Cruise-ish pretty flower that smelled good and all the chicks wanted. I could do that. I saw Cocktail, I know his game! Speaking of Tom, you ever notice that in almost all his movies, there is a scene where he is running? Think about it and get back to me.

So a good way to open up is to share my many thoughts. I know nobody is reading this, but somehow it feels therapeutic. I had to google therapeutic to make sure I spelled it right. Does that make me a bad person?

OK, time to be quiet again.