A Skewed View

You know that whole " Maybe this year, if it looks like Canada's going to take the gold in hockey, I'll pop over to a sports bar and watch it with a whole crap load of people. Lord knows I felt stupid jumping up and down and screaming alone in my apartment in 2002 " bit from last week? I'm home. Alone. Plotted out my day so that I'd be in front of the tv at 3:00 p.m. EST, housework done, grocery shopping put away. Never ONCE did the thought "Hey, I should check out that bar thing I was talking about before" come to mind. Sigh. Hope my downstairs neighbours don't mind a lunatic in the building.

The Olympic Sport for Day Sixteen: Women's Team Pursuit Speed Skating Semi-Finals The Olympic Athlete for Day Sixteen: Germany's Anni Friesinger-Postma Her Moment: In the last lap of the semi-finals against the Americans, Anni began to really struggle to keep up with her two teammates. Already unsteady, she teetered after the last turn and finally tipped over to fall on the ice. If her teammates, having already slowed down when they saw how far behind them she was, didn't actually see the fall, they sure knew it was coming. By time Anni was splayed out on her belly, her two teammates had assumed defeat was inevitable and started to coast to let their momentum carry them across the finish line. But Anni did a few breast-strokes on the ice as she slid along towards the finish, and kicked her right leg up by her head to make her skate cross the line quicker -- and won the race! Anni lay face down on the ice, sure she had cost her team a chance to medal. After a moment, she loo...

The Olympic Sport for Day Fifteen: Um ... well ... I'd have to choose ... okay, I'll choose Men's Hockey The Olympic Athlete for Day Fifteen: Team Slovakia (ha! didn't expect that, did you?) Their Moment: Now bear with me -- there is a difference between losing the game, and not winning the game. And who among us was not on their feet in the last five minutes of that game, wishing the clock to run down quicker or Canada to snap out of it and pull themselves together. It was just a matter of time -- the way Canada was playing by the end and the way Slovakia was playing by the end -- before Slovakia tied the game. That the clock ran out before that time came does not mean Canada won; it means Canada did not lose. I saw it. You saw it. I'm just going that extra distance and writing about it. Maybe it was only for five minutes, but Slovakia was the Olympic Athlete of Day Fifteen. CLOSE Runner Up for Sport/Athlete/Moment: Charles Hamelin in Short Track Men's 500m Spe...

The Olympic Sport for Day Fourteen: Women's Hockey The Olympic Athlete for Day Fourteen: Team Canada Their Moment: Shut. Out. CTV had a background package where it highlighted the lack of love lost between the Canada and USA women's hockey teams. The American players who were interviewed tried to come off like World Wrestling Federation villains, saying they love playing in Canada because they love the power of silencing the crowd when they score. Maybe next time, girls (... but you should have a back up plan just in case).

The Olympic Sport for Day Thirteen: Ladies 5000m Long Track Speed Skating The Olympic Athlete for Day Thirteen: Clara Hughes Her Moment: She crosses the finish line, she sees her time and her ranking (at that moment, 1st), and her face lights up like a small child the first time they saw their Christmas stocking stuffed by Santa Claus. Surprise and joy. After 14 years -- fourteen years -- of medals in four Olympics -- summer and winter -- and it still tickles her socks off when she excels. And that smile. Just makes you want to squeeze the stuffing out of her when congratulating her. Honourable Mention: Men's Hockey: Canada v. Russia. That was fun. Women's Bobsleigh: Canada1/Canada2. Gold/Silver. That was nice.

The Olympic Sport for Day Twelve: Women's Figure Skating, Short Program The Olympic Athlete for Day Twelve: Joannie Rochette Her Moment: I doubt there was a dry eye once she started sobbing immediately upon finishing her performance. Heck, I'm teary right now just typing about it. Honestly, what a champion. I really felt bad for her, the cameraman closing in as her coach hugged her, although it wasn't as simple as media feeding off of people's suffering. A skater gets off the ice after a performance, cameras are going to be there. Still, I think I wish they had given her a moment right then -- or even just afforded her the appearance of a moment, by backing off physically and letting her feel less intruded upon. She is in a position where she has to choose between grieving so very publicly or letting go of everything she has worked for in the past few years. Is it too much to think television cameras can choose to use their zoom functions to show a little respect? Hono...

The Olympic Sport for Day Eleven: Ice Dance The Olympic Athlete(s) for Day Eleven: Scott Moir & Tess Virtue Their Moment: On the podium, Olympic Gold around their necks (for a performance that actually made me snore, btw -- I liked the Americans' performance better ... at least I didn't keep nodding off during it), these two kids sang their hearts out to the national anthem -- Scott actually threw his head back and belted it out near the end. They were cute and excited and you could see Tess at times seemed a bit shell-shocked in pure happiness. Two kids who really let themselves feel it. I like it. Honourable Mention: Ice Dance's Sinead Kerr & John Kerr, from Great Britain. Sinead is as tall, if not taller than her partner John, and seems kind of more solidly built. Just when I thought "Man, betcha she could lift him", she did! I don't know how they landed in the standings, but it got me watching an event that usually ranks below "Watch Paint ...

I started flipping around the channels last night, maybe 8:30 - 9:00 EST, and came across Family Guy. Sometimes that show is just hilarious. Other times, it is a painful in-joke between the writers and someone where they take one gag that is funny then run it into the ground for so long and so far that the fact someone is getting paid for this crap eats your innards like a vampire tapeworm. But yesterday's run into the ground gag was kind of funny. Stewie and Brian get trapped jumping alternate universes by one of Stewie's inventions, and seeing the different worlds they popped into was kind of funny. I watched the whole episode. Wait - what? There was a game on last night? Oh. How'd we do?

The Olympic Sport for Day Nine: Men's Curling: Canada v. Great Britain The Olympic "Athlete" for Day Nine: The Crowd Their moment: Have curling fans always been this raucous?! Watching tape-delayed coverage I was shocked and alarmed. The crowd was singing O Canada (properly, btw Nikki Yanofsky), stomping their feet in the stands, blowing horns, ringing cow bells, chanting "Can-a-da", shouting out choreographed cheers ... I just don't know how the players could concentrate amidst all the weight of all that ambiance. But, way to throw your voice and support behind your team! Go Curling Crowd! Honourable Mention for Day Nine: Jon Montgomery's acceptance of the Gold for Skeleton. In an Olympics where Canadian athletes seem to have translated "Own the Podium" as "What Do You Mean I Have to Perform ... Don't You Just Give Me The Medal?" (a close second translation being "Olympics? No, This Is Just Another Competition For Me. Que Se...

I do not have an Olympic Sport/Athlete/Moment for Day Eight. (did I mention CTV following Julia Mancuso to the outhouse and staying on the door once she'd gone inside on Day Seven? Yes? Okay, that's all I have.)

The Olympic Sport for Day Seven: Men's Hockey The Olympic Athlete for Day Seven: Martin Brodeur His moment: Basically, he was the only guy I wasn't yelling at during the game against Switzerland. Might not be as noteworthy a moment as when CTV followed Julia Mancuso to the outhouse during the Ladies Super Combined, Slalom Run ... and stayed on the outhouse after she went inside ... but since I had threatened after the second period to move to Buffalo if Canada loses, Brodeur's last save was a relief to me. (p.s. why didn't I give Sid the nod here? Cuz Brodeur was the one working his pads off for 65 minutes, not just stepping up in the end with an effort.)

The Olympic Sport for Day Six: Alpine Skiing Ladies Downhill The Olympic "Athlete" for Day Six: The Mountain Its moment: The dark horse of the race, Whistler Creekside burst out of the gate and massacred the competition. With each successive run, it became clear that the ones who get the medals will be the ones who get through their events alive and with all their joints in the right orientation. The mountain took out one Swiss Miss who ended up on her tookus, legs out in front of her sans-skis, sliding the rest of the way like she was sitting on a toboggan. Mixed in with her sobs of disappointment (and probably her core-depth owies) was her laughter of appreciation upon hearing the crowd's cheers that she was okay. The mountain launched a Swedish skier so high and for so long off a jump that she spun like a rag doll around a marker upon landing and kept spinning down the hill. A Romanian had to be airlifted off the hill after slamming through two rows of fencing, and a F...

The Olympic Sport for Day Five: Ladies Snowboard Cross Qualifications The Olympic Athlete(s) for Day Five: Isabel Clark Ribeiro, Dominique Maltais, Callan Chythlook-Sifsof (and others whose names I did not catch) Their moments: These ladies took tumbles in the qualifications, but got back up again to keep racing. Or tried to. Isabel took quite the bounce on her back over a jump, but struggled to her feet to continue on. Dominique had to crawl/hop up a jump with both hands and feet after toppling over in order to get back going. Callan had to crawl/hop over two consecutive jumps to continue on, making it over one and starting up the other when she chose to call it a day -- I award her kudos, nonetheless, for whatever was going on in her head at the moment she tackled that second jump. None went on to medal. (Yay Maelle!) But I was just as excited to see them get up and keep going as I was disappointed to see the other ladies who fell just shrug and slide off the course. You've come ...

I don't have an Olympic Sport/Athlete for Day Four. I watched a lot of the coverage, but nothing stood out for me as a moment I just had to share. Except the coverage itself. CTV's growing pains covering the Olympics is really driving me to distraction. On-air hosts are given the wrong information by their behind the scenes crew, and are then left looking vacantly at the camera while the footage they were told is cued up, or the guest they were advised is in studio, is MIA ... or a completely different sport than they've been told they are introducing. So far the hosts have kept their humour ("Boy, hockey has sure changed since I was a kid", after speed skating is broadcast upon being set up as hockey), but I for one am tired of having to watch them continually tap dance in order to cover that who ever is speaking in their ear pathologically leads them down Red Herring Lane. I have taken to recording blocks of the programming while I watch other shows, then come b...

The Olympic Sport for Day Three: Mens Moguls The Olympic Athlete for Day Three: Alexandre Bilodeau His moment: Think about it. And a thought for Day Three's Counter-Olympic moment: Did you see how utterly inconvenienced Dale Begg-Smith looked to be at the Olympics? How much he appeared to resent having competed? I don't think he moved to Australia. I think Canada spit him out. There was no place to fit a butt like him in our national consciousness. Condolences, Australia, that the spit-arc landed him on your fair shores.

The Olympic Sport for Day Two: Ladies Moguls The Olympic Athlete for Day Two: Kristi Richards Her moment: Kristi Richards was in fourth place going into the Ladies Moguls final, but lost control after her first jump. She took quite a bit of a tumble, and not all limbs took the tumble in the same direction with her. Frankly, I was glad to see her get up. But she hadn't gone out of bounds so the clock was still ticking on her run. She fixed the ski that had popped off, snapped it back on, slid over to the centre of the course again, and threw her hands up to the crowd as if to say "Damn it, eh?" While the crowd cheered her on, she gave herself a moment to consider how she wanted the next few minutes of her Olympic experience to go, then finished the race with a spectacular second stunt (if I understood the announcer correctly, a Roundabout Four? I don't know moguls). For the crowd? For herself? Either way: Brava.

Welcome to Day One of my Olympic commentary: Facebook has a webpage that calls for Nikki Yanofsky to be exiled. Saves me the trouble of creating one that calls for her to be charged with Treason. I have long abhorred artists who use sporting events to try out their personal interpretations of national anthems. These aren't "songs", people. They are anthems . Recognized expressions of national pride and identity. To choose to butcher a national anthem in order to feed your own personal ego at the random hockey or baseball game is contemptuous enough. To have been given the privilege of singing the anthem as a representative of a host country in a moment of globally expressed pride and patriotism, only to feed your own ego at the expense of your country's is beyond shameful. Beyond. Shameful. A friend of mine put it perfectly: That anthem didn't move anyone or give you goosebumps cause you couldn't even recognize it! Shame Nikki Yanofsky. Shame.

Luckily, I've been extremely focused on writing in the past few weeks, so I haven't spent the time sitting around staring at my wall coming up with pithy comments to come online and share. I should let you know, though, that I have received my money back from Canada Post, as well as a personal call from the guy in charge of the postal outlet who accepted the wine I sent, and a call from the manager of the customer service lady who was severely lacking in service to the customer. I'm actually very pleased with the response to my complaint (the guy from the postal outlet said "Your letter is making the rounds, up and down the line, and has made quite the stir"). So, I must reiterate: if you have a complaint, go online. Don't bother talking to anyone in person, don't bother calling the phone number. Send your complaint through the online page and you may actually come away not cursing Canada Post. Finally, I am so excited for the Olympics. I'm not sure wh...

Hello, Thank you for your message to Canada Post. I can certainly appreciate your concern and would like to sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused. I have opened an inquiry for a postage refund which will be sent to our Claims department. Your customer number is [xxx] and the case number for this inquiry is [xxx]. You should be receiving your postage refund cheque within 10 business days. If you have not received your reimbursement by then, please feel free to write me again. I have filed an inquiry for you with regards to this issue to insure proper training is provided for this postal outlet. The case number for this inquiry is [xxx]. We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused you and will see to having this matter rectified. Should you require further assistance, please feel free to contact us again. Regards, [name] Customer Service **************************************** Wow. If anyone ever has problems with Canada Post, I so suggest using the online complaint/...

I have a complaint regarding two Canada Post Employees. One of the employees accepted my money when I have been told it is against Canada Post policy to do so, and the other employee escalated my query call into this complaint letter. I wish to be reimbursed for the money the employee erroneously accepted from me, and to inform you of the glitch in your customer service line. The Background: 1) On January 29, 2010, I went to Canada Post at 1032 Pape Avenue, Toronto Ontario. I gave the Canada Post Employee there (I do not have this employee’s name, and will refer to her as Pape Employee) a package I wished sent to Alberta. I told her that my package was a bottle of wine, and asked “Can I send wine – do people send wine in the mail?” Before she responded, I continued to explain that I put it in bubble wrap and a cardboard wine container (a cylindrical tube, a little over a foot high and a couple of inches in circumference, which I wrapped in brown paper and addressed to the recipi...