Ring of Fire

It’s no secret that Mother Nature clearly hasn’t taken her meds in months. She’s a crazy, bipolar mess. How is it that the current temperature in Sochi Russia, the host of the2014 winter Olympics, is 60 degrees and I am snowed in my apartment in Washington, DC where it’s a freezing 30 degrees?

Maybe all my sports excitement has been frozen because I’m just not as into these winter Olympic games. And I don’t think I’m the only American sports fan who feels this way.

Going into the winter games I was excited to watch three athletes; Shaun White, Lindsey Vonn, and Lolo Jones. White placed 4^th, FOURTH! And was unable to make a three-peat for gold in the men’s halfpipe event. Vonn announced a week before the games started that she would not be able to compete do to a recurring knee issue.  Jones doesn’t compete until the 19^th.

Let’s be honest, we’ve heard more coverage on how embarrassing the facilities and overall operations of Sochi have been less than impressive than we’ve heard on the actual games. How does a host city and the Olympic committee let this happen?

I’m starting to wonder if Sochi was a real place before or did Russia just make it up to host the Olympics? Seriously, according to my 1998 World Atlas, Sochi doesn’t exist.

You don’t need a Russian Spy to find out that snow is required for most of the winter events. American snowboarder, Hannah Teter described Sochi as “the worst pipe I’d ever ridden in my life.” Mark Adams, a spokesman for the International Olympic Committee insisted that on last Wednesday it was “a little bit premature” to be worrying about the weather conditions. “It doesn’t seem to be an issue.” Isn’t it the IOC’s job to worry about weather conditions?

There have been numerous reports of the massive amount of stray dogs that are just roaming around the city of Sochi. Athletes are even trying to rescue the canines from being killed by city contractors. American slopestyle skier, Gus Kenworthy, is bringing home a silver medal and four stray puppies!

The five Olympic rings were supposed to transform from snowflakes to the Olympic rings and then into fireworks. However, the top right snowflake never altered into a ring, and the pyrotechnics never happened. The man responsible for technical issues, Boris Avdeyev, was found dead in his hotel room with multiple stab wounds the next day. But, in typical Vladimir Putin fashion the mistake was not shown on Russian television and the cause of death has been listed as “accidental.”

I have no idea how much it cost to host the Olympics, or if it is really a financial gain to host the games, but when I see counting mistakes in basic math like this, (see image below) I have major concerns for the accuracy of those in Russia’s accounting and treasury departments.