B E B E R E

Karen came into my office to talk about skating this morning. Went on about the histories of several of the skaters, about how the rules have changed in these games (kind of like a la carte pricing, as opposed to the chiselling off of points that used to be done), about the girl I kept mixing up with Ali G. Guess she's bulimic; no big surprise there.

No Dorothy Hamills or Peggy Flemings in this bunch. Not for a long time, in fact. Heck, I'm at pains to remember the names of any Olympian (particularly skaters) since the girl from the west coast went and had her husband beat the girl from the Cape with a pipe.

I think that Karen still watches because she used to skate. She has mentioned being disappointed, though. Since they don't televise my sport, I don't bother watching and so have no reason to be disappointed.

Tarnished by scandals these past few times around and with a schedule that makes the event much less precious than before, the Olympics have long ago lost their luster. Between the new doping charges, incomprehensible structural changes of certain events and the reputed poor coverage, I wonder if the games aren't moving towards irrelevance.