Somehow, I lucked out and saw the 8 Canadian minutes during the Olympics closing ceremonies. It was kinda meh. I was expecting great things. I don't know why, except that I'd heard that Cirque du Soleil was involved. That turned out to be a miscommunication (refer to the article for Diana's class if you don't know what that means). It started stereotypically, with today's white man expressing his guilt for screwing the native folks out of all the land hundreds of years ago. Will the penance ever end? So, yes, it started with representatives from first nations peoples inviting the world to come to Canada and "come play with us". The fact that this slogan is temporary was repeated many times over. It's temporariness is too bad...I don't mind it, and I'm pretty sure that I'm going to hate whatever pc bullshit they do come up with. Just like the logo. I liked the temporary logo better than this one. And don't call me racist, jnadiger. I just don't like it. I think that it looks like a mascot, not a logo for the Olympic games. Then some guy ski-dooed into the arena, did a headstand on the handlebars, and then proceeded to break the ice (nice metaphor) for ice fishing (annoying stereotype). This brought on some frenzied, ill-lit shenanigans which were vaguely associated with winter sports. Circus school kids (not Cirque du Soleil) built a life-sized, styrofoam logoman, Avril Lavigne (still shiny from the designer's house) semi-screeched some vapid new single. And then it was all over. Oh, wait, then they played some horribly, artlessly mashed-together commercial for the Vancouver/Whistler Winter Games. If this is any indication, I think that I'll be somewhere else in 2010. Probably hanging my head in shame, especially if it's a warm spring and there's no damn snow.