Dear Kid,

Have you heard the latest kerfuffle?

Kerfuffle: noun | (informal, mainly Brit) commotion; disorder; agitation

Kerfluffle: noun | chaotic plush toys

The latest is the 3033 Olympics. Nope, wait. Typing with the lights out can be dangerous.

The latest is the 2022 Olympics. Apparently, no one, but no one, wants to host the Games.

Basically, the world is playing a game of “nose goes” and the only ones without their fingers on their schnozes are Beijing (nowhere near cool ski mountains) and Almaty (the well-known winter resort of NOT).

Why is this? As I understand it (and to be clear, I did extensive research by reading exactly one post provided by My Friend the Internet—the title caught my eye which means it must be true), Russia lost a LOT of money hosting the Sochi games and no one seems to think that losing a LOT of money is a great investment.

Then there is the true blue honest and above board (and by “true blue honest and above board” I mean totally corrupt and bribery-infested) way that the IOC operates. It seems that while everyone knows it’s a hot mess, not all that many countries want to get involved. Sur-prise.

So it may be that the 2022 Olympics will be in Kazakhstan or China. Or they may be on Mars (according to a recent survey, no one on Mars hates the IOC – at least not yet). Or perhaps they’ll be someplace like Miami. It all makes about the same amount of sense to me.

The thing is, no matter where the Olympics are held, most of us will tune in to watch. And we will focus on the athletes, not on the IOC (except for the occasional snarky blog), and we will be amazed by what humans can do. We will cheer and we will cry and we will learn the rules of curling and biathlon only to forget them for the next four years.

Because no matter how hard the IOC tries to make this about the IOC, we-the-world know that the Olympics are about everything except the IOC.

Love, Mom

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Dear Kid,

Where were you in 1976? Don’t answer that. The point is that you weren’t watching the Montreal Olympics.

That summer (what with July 18^th being in the summer) Nadia Comăneci broke all the equipment at the gymnastics event. And when I say “broke the equipment” I don’t mean that at all. Nadia (who was 14 at the time) flew around the uneven bars, stuck the landing, and was awarded a 10. The problem was that the scoring equipment didn’t have enough room for four digits (10.00) and so her score was displayed as 1.00. This upset the spectators for several quality seconds until they realized that (in a strange usage of mathematics) 1.00 = 10.00 at which point everyone cheered.

Nadia went on to earn six more tens and capture the all-around, beam, and bars titles (she also got the bronze for floor).

Nadia was the youngest gymnast to win the Olympic all-around. In 1976, you only had to be 14 on the first day of the competition (that’s why I didn’t compete—I wasn’t old enough). The current rules say gymnasts have to turn 16 in the calendar year the Olympics are being held, so unless the rules change again, she’s got a lock on that particular record.

Because she was a sensation (the other day I heard someone refer to a stop-smoking program as a “smoking sensation” option—argh!), her face, her performances, and her story were everywhere. One of the pieces of music used for a montage of her on ABC’s Wide World of Sports was renamed (by the composers) “Nadia’s Theme.” Turns out she never performed to Nadia’s Theme, but most people don’t know that because it is so associated with her.

Here’s to making today a “10.”

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

Me (drying Booker’s feet): You owe Dad an apology.
Booker (lifting his right front paw): What for?
Me: For waking him.
Booker: Did not. He was going to get up to watch Olympic hockey.
Me: Nonetheless, you owe him an apology.
Booker: He yells louder at the TV!
Me: This foot please. You need to apologize.
Booker (confounded and frustrated): The house, maybe the entire Universe, was under threat of imminent attack!

Previously:

Half an hour earlier, there were four deer on our front lawn. Big deer. Really big deer. Booker sprang into action. And by “sprang” I mean “exploded.”

He barked. He yipped. He made sounds a dog five times his size would envy. He jumped. He shook. He tried to claw his way through the dining room windows to get to the deer. He made more noise than an entire pack of trained hunting dogs could make. I thought he was going to expel a kidney.

Synchronized deer turned their heads to stare (ooh! New Olympic sport: synchronized skiing!). They seemed slightly curious about all the mayhem but basically unimpressed.

Booker raced from window to window giving the impression an entire battalion was arming itself for an assault.

The look on the largest deer’s face clearly said, “Seriously little dude?” After a few minutes, the pack moved off down the street.

Booker upped the volume (which I didn’t think was possible). The commotion registered a 3.4 on the Richter scale.

I finally got a leash on him and we went out for our morning walk. By which I mean I walked, he pulled on the leash and tried to track the deer. This involved a good deal of Serious Staring, Sniffing, and Surveying and did not involve actual Deer Sighting. (The deer may be condescending, but they are not stupid.)

Which brings me back to our conversation.

Me: You owe Dad an apology for waking him. (And the entire Tri State area.)
Booker: I was protecting the house.
Me: The house is fine.
Booker: It is now.
Me: The deer were not interested in the house. You owe Dad an apology.
Booker: I protected all the bulbs you planted last fall.

Pause.

Booker got a few extra bits of kibble in his breakfast.

Hope you don’t need to defend your territory as ferociously today.

Love, Mom

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Dear Kid,

I have kept an open mind, and I am happy to report I don’t hate the team ice skating competition. (I’m sure you’re greatly relieved.) In some ways it is unfortunate weird odd to have competitors skating programs when they know their team can’t possibly win a medal. But that’s part of the Olympics. There are a lot of competitors in many events who are competing for the joy of being an Olympian (can you say Jamaican bobsled team? Or American biathloners? bialethetes? skiers and shooters.).

The Russians won the team competition quite handily (followed by Canada and the US).

Canada didn’t win any of the team ice skating events, but because they were so strong overall they won silver. So that’s pretty cool about the team stuff.

The US ice dancers Charlie White and Meryl Davis rocked (and by “rocked” I mean were completely awesome and won both of their events). Almost as importantly, their moms rock so yay for a shout out to sports moms. The US won bronze (way to go dudes).

The big star from the team competition is 15-year-old Russian skater Yulia Lipnitskaya. She won the short and long program and not only is she adorable, she is 15 kinds of talented. Watching her spin was breathtaking.

In case you’ve been doing something useful like studying, I should probably let you know that this might be the Sibling Olympics. You may have heard that there were three Canadian sisters competing in moguls. The Canadian Dufour-Lapointe sisters won gold and silver (the third sister did not medal). The Mulder twins dominated in the 500 speed skating. (They came in 1^st and 3^rd with a fellow team member coming in 2^nd for a Dutch podium sweep). There’s also a really nice story about Canadians Frederic and Alex Bilodeau. Alex successfully defended his gold in men’s moguls. Frederic is his older brother who has cerebral palsy and is Alex’s inspiration. They both became huge stars in Canada after the Vancouver Olympics and have raised serious money for cerebral palsy research. Lovely story.

A final (probably) word on the US costumes from the opening ceremony. Your sister (who is often as snarky as I am about these things) had a very insightful point of view. It didn’t bother her at all that the uniforms were awful (she didn’t argue that point). She just thought it was great that all the athletes were awful together. “It doesn’t matter that they’re bad. You can walk around in that and everyone will know you’re a US Olympian. How cool is that?”

She’s right.

Love, Mom

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Dear Kid,

Yesterday I toured a beer brewery.

It was even cooler than it sounds.

Social Media Cincinnati had a gathering. They frequently have Saturday afternoon get-togethers on dates and at times that are particularly inconvenient, so I was very happy that I could get to this one. Also it had been waaaaay too long since I’d seen some of those folks.

The Gathering was at MadTree which you have never been to, partly because I’d never heard of it before this event and partly because you are underage.

But let me back up to tell you about getting there.

Now, there is no one alive who is going to say that I am the best navigator on the planet. I’m not the worst mind you, but if there were an Olympic sport in navigation, I’m quite sure the selection committee would bypass our house without a thought.

Fortunately, I had printed out the directions.

I was driving down I71, paying close attention to the traffic and all traffic laws, when the traffic stopped. And by “stopped” I mean “stopped.” Red lights, not moving, out of nowhere stopped. The car in front of me fishtailed wildly (no, it did not look like fun). I slammed on my brakes.

The good news: I did not hit the car in front of me and the car behind me did not hit me. Big “whew.” The less good news: my purse went flying. And by “flying” I mean crashed to the floor and spilled the contents pretty much everywhere. Guess where the directions were? If you guessed “in your purse” give yourself an extra point.

The good news: I remembered which exit to take. The less good news: I had no idea what to do after that.

When I got off the highway, there was a Home Depot right in front of me. Yippee (I thought to myself) I’ll just pull into the parking lot and grab the directions.

There was a very (very) long red light before I could pull into the HDPL (Home Depot Parking Lot). So I put the car in park and tried to reach for the directions.

Have you ever noticed that I am a short person? With correspondingly short arms? I could not reach the directions while I was buckled in. Even when I made the “ooooo I’m reaching” sound. As it was a very (very, very) long red light, I grabbed the lint roller (in the car to remove Booker fur as necessary). It was just long enough and there was just enough sticky stuff left to grab the paper with the directions.

You’ll be glad to know I got to MadTree, no problem.

There were lots of lovely, fun people there who you don’t know, so I won’t list them out. (Hi, lovely, fun people—it was great seeing you!)

MadTree is not only a taproom (place that sells beer) but a craft brewery. And they gave us a tour (I am a sucker for a fun tour). It was very interesting. MadTree doesn’t bottle their beer, they can it. (Cans are kinder to the beer and to the environment—apparently people are more inclined to recycle cans than they are to recycle bottles.) The canning line is small—it fills four cans at a time, which translates to an amazing 2 cases a minute.

It was all very nice and—you will be glad to know—I made it home without any mishaps.

Hope your day was equally intoxicating (figuratively speaking).

Love, Mom

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