[Tournament] 2008 Olympic Games discussion thread

Originally Posted by Trigunnerz

Where the hell did you guys watch the event? Online?

Over here the BBC are showing pretty much all the events live either on mainstream channels or through the digital interactive thingy. Admittedly the time difference is less severe but it is nice to see things as they happen. The women's team archery final between Korea and China was pretty cool and not the sort of thing we ever would have got to see on the old days of pre-digital television.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Bigblah

Do people even play tennis indoors?

Mainly in America but it's not uncommon by any means.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

Do you forsake your own people just because something better might be on television?

Yeah actually, I do. I don't disagree that the effort involved in becoming an Olympian is incredible and people who do that should be rightly applauded but I've never really bought into the whole Team GB crap. For me, the Olympics is an opportunity to watch the greatest athletes in the world compete against each other and the fact that some of them live in the same country as me largely washes over me. I'd rather watch a mentally skilled table tennis match featuring a couple of slopes than watch a British guy run the marathon because watching a marathon is essentially really boring whereas a high paced table tennis match is incredible and because English people apparently suck at it, it's never shown here. That's why I'm such a fan of the BBCi coverage because now I don't have to just watch the stuff with Brits in, I can watch better contests featuring only foreigners.

I guess the main reason is that national pride is a big thing in America, it's part of your national psyche and as far as I can tell, drummed in to you from an early age. Over here on the other hand we're a nation of cynics and love nothing better than to see successful people fail and love supporting losers. Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards, the ski-jumper who never managed more than about 20 yards was hugely popular here whereas Paula Radcliffe, an incredible athlete and hugely successful is most famous here for the time she was caught on camera having a piss in the street during a marathon once. Linford Christie, fastest man in the world for a bit and we only remember that he was accused of drug taking and all rather enjoyed that. Steve Backley, champion javelin thrower? Cheated on his wife. Colin Jackson, champion hurdler? Won the Dancing on Ice gameshow.

I'm not saying you're wrong to support your country's athletes, far from it. I'll cheer on our no-hopers as much as deep down I'll hope that Phelps fucks up and drowns because frankly, nobody likes a show-off. All I'm saying is that not everyone will share your own jingoistic sense of national pride and the Olympics, for many people are not all about your own country doing well, they're about watching some decent athletics so don't be so hard on the kid just because he's not solely bothered about how his own country is performing.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

For some reason that photo reminds me of Goatse.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

And it's not like there were no fireworks. It's just that rather than film it live, they showed a pre-recorded version on tv and to the corwd in the stadium on the screens. The fireworks did go up and they did look like feet, it's just that flying a helicopter through that kind of shit would be ridiculous. Shaped fireworks like that are pretty commonplace these days although they're not cheap.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Either that or one of his parents was a gorilla.

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