what a fucking game. to anyone who tuned out after canada got a 2 – 0 lead, you missed out on one of the greatest fin­ishes in olympic hockey history. this entire country exploded into street parties and debauchery. i’m pretty depressed now that the olympics are over. i never watched curling more intensely in my entire life. or figure skating, for that matter.

mel­lisa hollingsworth

some favourite moments from the 2010 van­couver olympics:

mel­lisa hollings­worth breaks canada’s heart with her tearful apo­logy after fin­ishing 5^th in women’s skel­eton. she had been leading after 3 runs, and a costly mis­take in the final run costed her gold (and medal con­ten­tion). the tears streaming down that pretty brunette’s face cap­tured the pres­sure that canada’s ath­letes were under at their own games in van­couver. she had nothing to apo­lo­gize for. video: http://​www​.you​tube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​K​s​a​s​Q​N​Z​a​yd8

jon mont­gomery and his golden beer

jon mont­gomery’s vic­tory march. epic, unre­hearsed, full of win. he gets a pitcher of beer handed to him and pro­ceeds to knock back a quarter of it without missing a beat, sur­rounded by police escort who don’t care that he’s drinking in public. video: http://​www​.you​tube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​n​W​g​Z​k​U​c​C​9hM

tessa virtue easily being one of the cutest creatures god has ever cre­ated. she embodies the “girl-​next-​door” appeal.

video: http://​www​.you​tube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​f​v​h​i​d​A​5​G​ekM

after win­ning her bronze medal in a cross-​country skiing with a col­lapsed lung and four broken ribs, slov­e­nian skier petra majdic makes the entire world cry at the terry fox awards press con­fer­ence, talking about how she’s just a girl from a small country, and there was no way anyone could stop her from achieving her dream. tried to find the presser video where she says all this in her broken eng­lish, but i can’t. so here’s the news story instead: http://​www​.nbco​lympics​.com/​n​e​w​s​-​f​e​a​t​u​r​e​s​/​n​e​w​s​/​n​e​w​s​i​d​=​4​5​1​4​2​4​.​h​tml

tessa virtue’s per­fect proportions

unex­pected and awe­some comeback by fin­land in the bronze medal game against slov­akia. a team that got embarassed 6 – 1 a game earlier by the amer­icans gain a little bit of redemp­tion with a gutsy come-​from-​behind per­form­ance against a slov­akian team who was des­per­ately looking for its first medal in olympic hockey.

after the epic, over­time win­ning goal by sidney crosby, team canada’s youngest player, drew doughty, grabs a massive cana­dian flag from a fan and skates around with it on the ice. the huge ova­tion from the crowd for amer­ican goal­tender, ryan miller, who gave his team every chance to win that game, was also a classy olympic moment. miller deserved better. but i’m glad we won.

some things i’m glad i don’t have to hear about anymore:

lindsey vonn crying about her bruises, playing up her “injured hero” motif that was prob­ably care­fully crafted by her PR people. her con­stant repe­ti­tion of the same lines over and over every time a camera is on her face is pretty telling of the rehearsal that’s taken place — sort of like beauty pageant con­test­ants trying to recite their lines during the ques­tion & answer period. embarass­ingly enough for her, other ath­letes have been com­peting with far worse injuries and don’t say shit about them.