Random notes

[mariness]

Have just felt wiped the last few days. So, scattered comments:

1. I'm late on this, but the latest Freddy the Pig post is here.2. Watching Olympic swimming reminded me of an old Sprague de Camp story, which pitted a drunken mermaid versus a sea lion at a swim meet, with the moral that sea lions are not exactly good at following swim meet rules,

Comments

[dsgood]

If I recall correctly, the De Camp story was "Nothing in the Rules."

[mariness]

Yeah -- it was reprinted in the Mermaids collection that Jack Dann and Gardner Dozois put together years back, which is where I encountered it. Amusing story, but it does mean that I keep picturing sea lions happily jumping in with all of these swimmers and divers into the pool.

Having actually seen people swim with trained sea lions is of course only reinforcing this perception.

[ada_hoffmann]

5. What I've seen of trampoline? TOTALLY FREAKING ME OUT. WHAT IF YOU MISS THE TRAMPOLINE ON THE WAY DOWN?

Actually YES. Sometimes they DO miss (and then their handlers are right there with a just-in-time mat for them to flop onto, but STILL). It has definitely been the sport with the most horrified shrieking of the ones my family and I have seen.

Speaking as a Canadian, though, I am INORDINATELY proud of our trampoline gold medal. :D

[mariness]

Congrats on the trampoline win!

I guess my thing is -- yes, obviously injuries are happening in the other events as well. I watched some of the runners fall down, and that marathon appeared to be hell on all of the women (of course they were also running in the rain) and I have to assume that after awhile that long jump and the shot put HURTS. And I'm very aware that sailing and horse jumping can be extremely dangerous.

But the ones that visually look the most terrifying so far have been the diving, where I am convinced someone is going to screw up a dive/hit the board or a platform, and the trampoline, followed by some of the gymnastics routines. So many of the vaulters were in obvious pain yesterday, although kudos to that 37 year old woman who was still vaulting along with everyone else and placed fifth.