The Static Page

All hail the great god of the Olympics!

Regular as clockwork, the Olypmics come around every four years, interspersed with their Winter cousins and various other, lesser international sporting meets. To those of us not into it, not preparing for it, not competing in it, it's something like two weeks of disruption to normal TV programming.

This time, for me, it's different. This time, The Olympics are being held in the city where I live.

Actually this segues nicely from the last Static Page about Cities. Australia in general - and Sydney in particular - has been awash with Olympic this and that for months. It's only now, with the games genuinely underway that we see the effects that hundreds of thousands of extra visitors are having. Probably the most visible is the issue of public transport, since after Atlanta, Those In Charge are desperately afraid Sydney will stuff it up, too. We seem to be doing well, however, despite the odds.

And I am holding my jaded-ness in abeyance. This time around, I am not that annoyed at essentially "losing" one of our (meagre) free-to-air TV networks exclusively to Olympic sport. Perhaps this is because the programs I currently watch aren't on Seven. Perhaps because some of "the Olympic spirit" has touched me. I dunno. I admit I watched the Opening Ceremony on Friday - all the way through, too. But it wasn't sport, as such; a telling detail, I'm sure, as I have been heard to lament the excessive amounts of sport on weekend TV.

So what's the Olympic hype like in your neck of the woods? Is it easily dismissable because it's not in your city? Or maybe you actually like following it? There's a lot about it I haven't mentioned, either - like the drug issues, and all the IT involved.

Wade Bowmer, aka Static

Comments? Email me at static dash page at yceran dot org.