What is the Point of Mogul Skiing?

Other than providing an extremely lucrative career for knee surgeons (and other than distracting me from blogging yesterday), I don't think there is much point to the mogul ski event. But wow - did I get sucked into watching it. My Very Best Girlfriend tempted me into turning on my TV by telling me speed skating was on. (Side note: I am amazed by speed skating. A-freakin-mazed. I can't actually make a case for it having more of a point than the ski events, but if there were a Speed Skating Channel I would want it. ALL SPEED SKATING ALL THE TIME!) As it was, I had to sit through, like, 3 hours of mogul craziness before I got to see any speed skating but I couldn't stop watching because I didn't want to miss my event. Sure they have that handy little countdown clock that tells you something like "19 minutes: Apolo Anton Ohno, Men's 1000m" but leave the room for a necessary minute to pee and you come back to find you just missed the women's short track semi finals and they're cutting back to more moguls! Grrrr.
After hours of the mogul stuff I
-finally squashed the urge to reach for ibuprofen in sympathy with their knees
-decided that Jeremy Bloom is a cool (and well-spoken) frood who should become an announcer if he doesn't make the NFL
-cheered for Toby Dawson because his mother was SOOOOOO into cheering for her son and he was so cute turning straight to her when he realized that he was going to get a medal no matter what
-figured out that a 720 is two 360's in a row (although what 'off axis' means or what the letter 'D' refers to I still dunno)
-realized that if I'd had TiVo I would have skipped all of that and missed out on my new appreciation for mogul freestyle skiing (of course I have to point out that if I'd had TiVo I would have seen all of the speed skating and blogged so maybe that's a wash)

In other Olympic news (aka My Brush With Fame):
I had the coolest thing happen yesterday. I was in the car coming home from a coffee outing with a dear friend that I never get to see enough of and I was listening to Talk of the Nation on NPR. I listen to a lot of NPR but TOTN comes on when my kids are getting home from school so I never get to hear it. I tuned in during the middle of a discussion between the host and a sports commentator. (On a side note - it was a surprisingly interesting and humorous discussion. The sports commentator was giving an inside look at behind the scenes Olympic life. He talked about how the press folks there don't get the NBC feed so they have NO IDEA what we're seeing or what's being said about what's going out. He gave the example of Bode Miller straggling in at the very tail end of the opening procession and being the only one not to wear a hat. There was big discussion between the sports writers there about whether or not they should mention it. They had no idea if folks in America would be able to see it, if it would be an incident, or what. In answer to the question of whether Johnny Weir was America's Darling now that Michelle Kwan was out, the sports guy said JW makes no bones about wanting that title. He then talked about the politics of being an athlete and staying in the Olympic Village. Johnny Weir, in an apparently charming but direct way, stated that he would NOT be staying in the Olympic Village because he didn't like to carry his own luggage or climb stairs or sleep on uncomfortable mattresses. He said that he was princessy when it came to travel. He stated that he was not a 'Village' person. THE HOST OF TOTN then said - so it sounds like he IS a Village Person but not a Village person. You could hear the sports guy gulp and he said something like "Uh, what you said." The sports writer went on to say that he did think that Johnny Weir was likely the only American male athlete to ever describe himself as 'princessy' and then they segued into more about what a fantastic athlete he is. It was all very amusing. Maybe it sounds snarky the way I've written it out - but it wasn't on the air.) ANYWAY - the whole point before I got sidetracked was to tell you that when I first tuned in I thought the sports guy's voice sounded familiar (but it wasn't Chris Berman or Frank Deford). Then the TOTN host said "We're speaking with ......... a sports columnist for the ................." and I know him! I mean not like I know Frank Deford 'cause I hear him on the radio but like, he's married to a good friend of mine! A friend I've had since I was 11 (although she didn't marry the sports guy until she was 20-something) and so the sports guy's voice should sound familiar because we go to dinner parties and such with them!! (An example of "such" from that last sentence is line dancing like uncoordinated fools in a country/western bar in Anniston Alabama.) Woo hoo! I know someone famous! Errr, I bet my sports guy friend knows Kevin Bacon - and that's only two degrees of separation and I am fairly certain that entitles me to a free margarita somewhere!!!!! (Um, but if you please - not a margarita at that bar in Anniston because those line dancers are crazy!)
OK - well that's all my olympic news today. I must go now and take the pup to the new groomer. (Eeeeeep. Please cross your fingers and hope for the best. No furry pantaloons, no furry pantaloons, no furry pantaloons!)
Peace.