First, argh! I had some links in this entry and my HTML isn't working in this Blogger system. Grrr. If you can help me with some basic coding/tags, please comment.
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I have to admit, I usually find the Olympics a snore. It's a terrible thing to say, since in theory, it's an inspirational and ancient tradition of physical competition. That said, I feel like this is a credible opinion, since I actually attended an Olympics - LA in 1984.

My parents thought it would be an adventure to take the family West. Make a summer of it, if you will...fly to Denver and spend two months traveling to and through the New Frontier. I hated it. I was 11 years old, at that awkward stage when you are a physical mess, mid-transformation from child to adolescent, and I just wanted to hang out with my friends who were also awkward. Instead, I was sucked into a Griswald adventure.

As a thinking, functioning adult, I can admit the experience was landmark. I can also remember how much I hated sitting outside on the high metal benches of UCLA that summer, reading Judy Bloom as the LA sun beat down on me in my pink corduroy OP shorts, and briefly lowering my book to watch Greg Luganis and others dive like a divine human specimen.

I just didn't want to be there. And there were some standout athletes who wowed me; the memory of Mary Decker being tripped on the track right in front of my eyes, but for the most part, that was the year that I started to abandon the Olympics. I'm sure the ensuing adolescent and young adult stages that followed play a part in why I wasn't interested. I had crushes and note passing to focus on!

This Olympics is different. Maybe it's because I'm a marketer. In my world, the Olympics are really about pending endorsement deals.

This year, however, the athletes have been a breath of fresh air. Even if their disputes and comments are a soap opera , I love that the snowboarders and skiers approach the Olympics like it's just another day they decided to get up and ski. And some shoot their mouths off and other's hold their medals up to their eyes like spyglasses and announce goofy things like that they have crushes on other atheletes.

For the most part, they don't speak in soundbites and they don't deliver key messages. They are everyday people who have just done extraordinary things.

What a breath of fresh air! I look forward to their upcoming endorsement deals that make them ubiquitious. No really! At least they have an accomplishment that propelled them into the limelight and some of them are not manufactured professional athletes. A refreshing change and well deserved.

I'm staring at you. Is it working?

Welcome to my new blog. I should have something up here soon...