I <3 Olympics

as i'm sure you're all aware, i've been following the olympics as much as i can between classes and lab work, and so far they've been very interesting. i've seen men's and pairs figure skating (sorry, didn't catch the women's short program last night since there was a pilots game, but i hear sasha cohen kicked ass and is in 1st by a hair), curling, women's half pipe, cross country, men's combined skiing, speed skating (and all of the chad vs. shani controversy that came with it), ski jumping, men's downhill, and of course i've been watching tons of olymic hockey. wow, that's a lot of different sports, huh? i've tried to watch a little bit of everything, and i've tivo-ed some of the hockey games. i had to make sure i caught niittymaki in action, right?

just in case anyone is still wondering, that bit about the sport that "involves making your body do something that your brain tells you is suicide" referred to ski jumping. i was watching with my mom last weekend, and that was a line from the commentator. he said it when he was talking about how far the jumpers have to fall (20 stories!), and it was one of the best lines i've heard from any of the olympic commentators in any sport... and quite accurate, too. someone would have to push me down that very steep hill kicking and screaming. oh wait. they'd have to drag me up there kicking and screaming, too. i still like to watch, though.

i'm also pretty into figure skating (but not ice dancing, it's kind of boring). i watched part of the men's competition, but the only american i saw skate was johnny weir, whom my little sis and i nicknamed "girly man" when we saw him skate at nationals. you've gotta admit that he is pretty damn feminine. this view was confirmed when i saw a bio on him before the short program. the one thing he said that really stuck with me was, "people think i'm a diva. johnny weir is not a diva." his skating outfits are sparkly and girlish (even for a figure skater), his hair is kind of girlish, and he talks very girlishly. girly man fits him well. oh, and his program was pretty good. he came in 2nd after that...

now, what i'm really itching to talk about is hockey (like you all didn't know that already). who would've thought that finland and slovakia would be the teams to beat? or that canada would be eliminated in the quarterfinals... and get shut out 3 times? i'm not that surprised that the USA was eliminated so early, considering their scoring woes and the simple fact that derian hatcher is one of their top defensemen. i watched their elimination game against the finland powerhouse today, and derian hatcher was responsible for finland's 3rd goal. he managed to move in front of dipietro just in time for his big ass to screen a shot. so dipietro doesn't really see it, the puck goes in the net, finland regains the lead, and derian hatcher is to blame. well, i guess all of the dumb penalties the americans took probably had something to do with it, too. but anyway... niittymaki was spectacular in the 3rd period when the finns only had about 5 shots (last count, late in the 3rd was 3 shots for the finns, but i figure they managed one or two more) and the americans had about 20. he got scored on once in that period, but it was on a fantastic play, and he had no chance to make the save. his defenders should have taken care of that one for him. his flyer teammate mike knuble deflected one past him in the 2nd period that he also didn't really have a chance on, and if any member of the US squad was going to score on nitty, i'm glad it was knuble. hopefully, niittymaki will continue his streak of awesomeness friday against ovechkin and the russians. since the USA is out now, go team finland!

my "go finland" attitude is only increased by the news that russian darius kasparitis (see my hockey survey below and notice that he is one of my least favorite hockey players) managed to injure simon gagne in the process of eliminating canada today. bastard. gagne is the best forward that the flyers have right now, and that bastard had to find a way to injure the competition (the race between the flyers and the rangers [the NHL team kasparitis plays for] for 1st in the atlantic division is pretty tight). so, i really hope that finland kicks russian ass friday. niittymaki played well against jagr and the czechs, so i think he can manage.

all right. that's enough for one day, huh? i've got papers to read for tomorrow's class.