I have not been paying attention to the Olympics, save for watching the parade of nations during the opening ceremonies. That I always enjoy. It is genuinely nice to see all of the countries enter, and especially to see the small ones announced, and to see the genuine happiness of their athletes involved. As was said, there have been calls for this parade to be trimmed down but, for once, I applaud the Olympic committee’s decision to leave it as is as it puts the focus of the games where it belongs, on the athletes.
And while the Olympics bore me, for the most part, I can at least be thankful that I’m living in Canada and dealing with the CBC. Their commentary is a darn sight better than what we can get south of the border… although occasionally, the inane chatter does produce some gems. Like the following from Bob Costas:
That reduced me to complete gales of laughter when I heard that one.
Watching the Sydney 2000 opening ceremonies and switching between the CBC and NBC, we got a chance to compare the styles of laid back CBC broadcaster Brian Williams and NBC broadcaster Bob Costas. At one point, when the flame was lit and rising to the top of the stadium, Costas shrieked “how is Athens going to top this?!”
And Erin turned to me and said, “I think Athens should light Bob Costas on fire. And then drop him from a helicopter into the torch. That would top Sydney!”
That got us through the rest of the broadcast.
And ever since then, whenever we hear Bob Costas speak, we chant “Light the torch! Light the torch!”
Blogography
A blog worthy of your notice is Blogography. This blog of the life of David Simmer is well designed and well written, with a clean interface and interesting posts on television, photography, MacIntosh computers and music. There are even cartoons.
While not overly political, Dave isn’t afraid to rant about what irks him. It’s a fascinating and very personal read that I quite enjoyed.
At present, Dave’s home town of Cashmere Washington (?) is dealing with wildfires, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed that he stays okay.
I discovered Blogography because both Dave and I use MTBlacklist.
The Last of the Wisdom Teeth
Earlier today I bid a fond farewell to my last two wisdom teeth. The first two vanished during dental surgery over ten years ago, when my dentist decided that a severely impacted tooth had to go (and there was no question about it. Looking at the X-rays, it was like the tooth was growing in perpendicular to the rest). Though they had to put me out for that surgery, I decided to only have two teeth removed (the impacted one and the one above it), as the other two were fine, and this way I could chew out of one side of my mouth. Some thought that I should have had all four out, and told me to keep watch for signs of midline shift (the teeth moving over to fill the spots left in my now-unbalanced mouth.
After ten years, this didn’t happen. But the two remaining wisdom teeth, being faaaar back in my mouth, and not fully through the gums, started to become magnets for gum disease. Finally, the dentists convinced me to have these out; in part by assuring me that these last two were simple extractions that could be done under local freezing.
Well, they were right. The dentist that handled me was so professional, I didn’t even feel the needle. The hardest time was waiting the five minutes for the freezing to kick in. Then it was in with the forceps, slick! slick!, then bite on gauze, then I was done. Under two minutes.
Still, now that the freezing is off, my mouth is not happy. But I’m almost back to normal and expect to eat somewhat normally tomorrow.
There is a lot more room in my mouth now.
My mother-in-law is waiting for me to be fully recovered from my wisdom teeth extraction before she regails me with her wisdom teeth story. Which apparently involves a hammer, a chisel and a winch.