I love the Olympics. You know what’s extra cool? That’s right: the Olympics in French.
They get so, so excited. It’s not melodrama; it’s fun. And it’s the pride of an underdog country on the line, so when there’s a medal opportunity the announcers go absolutely out of their minds. There’s no pretense of impartiality; they are fans watching along with you, not journalists.
When the French won their first gold medal, one of the announcers started sobbing hysterically. He kept it up for nearly three minutes, just hiccuping loudly into the microphone while his counterpart shouted over him. When an official’s decision goes against the French, there’s the kind of shouting and complaining you would expect in a home-team bar. And the on-the-scene guy, who does his own translations, likes flirting with the American women.
They don’t do the fanfare and slow-motion, much less the tear-jerking background stories: at the end of the day it’s one big party, and even the heartbroken got to have some fun.
Fun is a valuable commodity around here these days. Our less-than-fully housebroken younger puppy has learned to escape from her crate at will, which, although clearly the result of poor design, the website claims is not covered under their warranty. They did kindly offer us a six-month 10% off coupon code, though, and given how much said less-than-fully housebroken younger puppy eats, I’m pretty sure that we’ll end up about even.
And she’s gotten close enough to housebroken that Nick and I spend whole hours not wanting to wring her thick little neck–although I have threatened to dock her tail on more than one regrettable occasion. In fact, things have gotten so relaxed around here that I’ve been able to go to the grocery store on a regular basis…and, yesterday, shoe shopping. There just are no words.
We’ve been cooking and watching ER reruns and taking the dogs to the circuit-training path in the woods, and the residents of our neighborhood are slowly trickling back from their vacations. Life is getting back to the way that it goes.