(1) OK…I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the opening ceremonies. Beijing in 2008 was a technical masterpiece, but this seemed quintessentially Canadian to me: very very WHITE, a bit hokey, lots of earnestness, moments of flash, mixed with moments of sentimentality…and a technical goof at the end to round it all off.
My two highlights: Sarah McLachlan’s performance of Miracle (I do very much adore her & her golden voice), and the entry of the Canadian team into the stadium…which actually managed to make me tingle with excitement and patriotism.
(2) Message to the Vancouver Olympic protesters-nee-thugs: there will always be olympics, expos, and grand schemes that governments will spend billions of dollars on…and they will NEVER spend those amounts on homelessness and poverty. Perhaps changing their minds with something other than breaking store windows and beating up bystanders would be more effective. Then again…such strategies require thought, intelligence, and no need for a bandana to cover up the faces of criminals and retrograde scum.
(3) Alexandre Bilodeau won Canada’s first gold medal at these games…AND our first gold as a host country (3rd time lucky, it seems). He also has the brightest, widest smile I have EVER seen on an Olympic athlete. It sparkled so much I thought my TV screen was going to shatter! His future in endorsements and pin-up magazines is, no doubt, confirmed…
(4) The CBC just reported that the Brits think we’re bad hosts and there is a “moral vacuum” at the heart of our games…going as far as to blame us for the tragic death of Georgian luge competitor Nodar Kumaritashvili, in our selfish “lust” to own the podium.
Then the CBC revealed that this diatribe against us appeared in The Daily Mail — the racist, bigoted, rat-infested right wing rag most likely to be used in the process of wiping your bottom after a case of explosive diarrhoea.
In other words, nothing to see here…move on. Mind you, if you wish to head over to the Daily Fail and tell Martin Samuel where to stick his fecinine excuse for a head…don’t let me stop you.
