Yay, who'll be watching? The opening ceremony is tonight. I love seeing many of those sports you never get to watch on TV otherwise.
One of the Lugers from (the former Soviet) Georgia was in an accident and died this afternoon. So tonight's Opening Ceremonies have already lost a little of their shine. http://bleacherreport.com/articles/344533-breaking-olympic-luger-dies-in-practice-run-preventable
Incredibly sad... As we did our work today, I put the torch run on the smart board... Very exciting! It's being broadcast online.
I love watching the Olympics, but i'm not a big fan of Bob Costas... my bf and i have a bet going on how long it takes for him to say something either painfully obvious or painfuly stupid. I don't think it'll take very long
I don't do sports. AT ALL. Why did I agree that we could have a Olympic unit celebration later this month?! I know nothing about any of this other than multiple countries are involved and it is winter. I definitely don't know how to turn it into a meaningful kindergarten event that won't embarrass me in front of my coworkers. Sigh. I'm in trouble on this one. Don't worry about giving me ideas here. There's another thread I'll bug when I drag my butt out of denial. I just happen to be on this one when I gave myself a mental shake.
:lol: clarnet... I have to say... I sometimes watch NBC from time to time, and I just can't stand some of the things that are said on there... and the time delays that exist that they pretend are actually "live"... I REALLY like Canada's round the clock coverage.
Me too, dfleming! I'm eagerly looking forward to becoming immersed in the whole thing; my class has homework this weekend--watch the Olympics! Who do you think will light the caldroun? It is a shame that the opening will be shrouded in the tragedy of earlier today.
I've heard that Terry Fox may just light the cauldron... I gave my kids that homework too MrsC! They have to watch the short track speedskating!
I love the Winter Olympics! I'll watch any Winter Olympic sport except for hockey, but I am especially obsessed with figure skating and follow that even in non-Olympic years. Alice-I saw that earlier and it is incredibly sad.
I heard that today as well--although I may just break down in tears (along with most of the rest of the nation) at that! I forgot that short-track was on over the weekend! They are supposed to watch the Opening Ceremonies tonight--or at least parts of it on-line, and parts of at least 2 other events. I brought home the paper with the event line-up so that I can plan my weekend (I'm such an Olympic nerd!)
I love watching the Olympics! I really like watching speed skating...and I'm kind of fascinated by curling.
I love curling! I'm actually going curling with some fellow teachers tomorrow. (Had I thought about it when I first signed up, knowing it would be on day one of the Olympics, I might have thought twice :lol: )
I'm an Olympics JUNKIE! I get UBER patriotic during the Olympics and cry every time the U.S. anthem is played.
Oh, he kills me. I try to tune him out when he's talking. This opening ceremony is unreal--- I'm in such awe watching the amazing effects!! Of course, it was awfully exciting watching our 216 athletes enter the arena!!
I really enjoyed the opening ceremonies... I kept thinking as Wayne Gretzky was lighting the torch... I had a torch JUST like it in my hands, just yesterday! How cool is that? So exciting, and such a great celebration of Canada's history and culture. It's not often that we as a nation are proud, but I am really proud to be a Canadian tonight... even if we can't seem to get all the pieces of the Olympic cauldron to come out of the ground properly, and even if some of our official representatives have difficulty arriving on time for the opening ceremonies :lol:
I'm so enjoying watching the opening. I'm getting even more excited that I'll be sitting in thearena of the opening ceremony in person for the 2012 summer Olympics (& seeing the sports of course)! BTW, Mary Carrillo is the one I can't stand. She may seem alright here, but she commentates all the pro tennis matches & many people on my tennis discussion board hate her.
Did anyone else think it was inappropriate to show the luger dying. I was totally unprepared for it and was in shock. There are little kids watching and they basically just watched someone die. I didn't think it was necessary to show. Everything else about the ceremonies was great.
That must have been an NBC thing... I didn't see that at all. They have showed it on the news, but always with a warning beforehand.
I missed the warning on NBC. I just felt it was a bad way to start the games. With so many children watching they could have had a special tribute to the man without showing him die. I understand showing it in a newscast (kind of) but not during the opening ceremonies where everyone is watching. I have seen pictures of it and even that would have been better than the actual video.
Yeah, they gave a warning, but then showed it multiple times. I had just sat down with my 4-year-old to watch part of the opening events and had no idea the tragedy had happened. I do think it was fitting that they discussed it right away, but, still, I was caught completely off guard. My son asked a million questions and said, "I'm not going to do that sport when I grow up. It's too dangerous." Then he evaluated every other sport according to how dangerous he thought it would be. Certainly not what I expected him to take away from the opening.
And honestly, I didn't think it was incredibly graphic-- and I have VERY low tolerance for graphic stuff. If you hadn't known how the story ended, you might not have guessed-- it didn't LOOK any worse than some of the "agony of defeat" clips that are so often asssociated with sports. I think the whole Ceremony was wonderful-- very tasteful and entertaining. My favorite parts, aside from the torch lighting and the parade of nations of course, were probably the snowboarder coming in through the rings, "Both Sides Now", and the poet. I haven't heard "A to Zed"since my grandmother died in 1986, and laughed for a good 10 minutes. k.d. lang was also incredible, as were the video images on the "mountain" in the middle of the arena. Kudos to the IOC and the COC for a job very well done!
I was up way past my bedtime to watch the Opening Ceremonies, and it was worth every minute. Highlights for me--the snowboarder coming down the mountain and then through the rings, the ovation for the Georgian team, the emotion of the Canadian team entering the stadium, k.d. lang (one of my favourite songs!), the poet and the anticipation of who would light the Olympic caldroun. Now, if the east coast could ship some snow out west, we'll be set! Edited to add: the footage of the luge accident wasn't part of the ceremonies--it was shown once or twice on our Canadian channels during the preview show (with a warning). It was disturbing because we know the result, but wasn't sensationalized on our coverage.
I so wanted to watch all of the ceremony, but kept dozing off! The snippets I caught were really great, though. I don't think NBC sensationalized the luge accident. I was just caught off guard sitting down to watch with my preschooler and having the first words be about death. I think they would have been remiss if they hadn't mentioned it, though.
I watch all of the opening ceremony an quite frankly I was very disappointed. I found it incredibly boring (for the most part)
Yes and when I saw it, there was no warning.hmy: I saw the clip before the Olympics actually came on. It disturbed me..I still have that image in my head at times. Doesn't matter to me how graphic it was or whether it was blood or not. The fact is that they showed a 21 year old kid lose his life. I wouldn't want my death shown for the world to see. And if he were my family member...I just can't even imagine. They do that all the time now though. Just like they showed when that teenager in Chicago was beaten to death by a mob. Again, I made sure to turn the station once the warning was given. I'm just uber-sensitive and had they warned me, I know I would have turned away because I always do. I havent even seen any Haitian destruction or bodies. I am sure to avoid that since Hurricane Katrina images affected me. And 9/11 images from online, and the tsunami and so on. I've seen enough.
I agree with you. I didn't think that it was graphic, but just thought that it was completely inappropriate to show, warning or not.
They said last night on NBC that they won't show the clip anymore. They did show his parents in Georgia and his dad was saying that he hadn't seen it and he didn't ever want to see it. His dad was also an Olympic luger.
I wasn't too sure how excited I could get my class, since they're only in grade one... they have no concept of the world yet, or how amazing some of these athletes really are... some recognize Sidney Crosby, but that's about it. I've been really hyping it, and we're going to write a book as a class that goes through the Olympics day by day. Today we watched highlights from the opening ceremonies and I had them write about their favourite part. The writing was SOOOOOOO good! I was near tears with one kid's writing! I've finally found something that works in writing!!! I'm so much more excited now :lol: I feel like the class is feeding off my energy, and I'm feeding off their energy...
I have a hard time watching the figure skating- but LOVE speed skating, snowboarding, and any skiing. Also, have a weird love of curling. I did an entire unit in school on friction and the Olympics.
On Friday, I assigned weekend homework to my grade 7 and 8 students--watch at least part of the Opening Ceremonies and part of at least one sport. They all did their homework! Most found themselves much more interested than they thought they would be (they aren't, generally, a sports-minded group). Today we'll watch highlights of Canada's newest gold medal!
I've gotten to watch a lot more than I thought I would (stuck home with snow days); I'm going to miss that when we go back to school!
YAY Canada!!!! You guys have had a great opening!!! And poor Norway-- they're not doing anything in the events they expected to sweep. Possible spoiler..... Poor Lindsey Jacobellis!! It looks as though her childish stunt 4 years ago really did cost her her only lifetime shot at an Olympic Gold!!! At the very least, she'll have another 4 long years to wait!
