Sad Day

Today marked the end of an era in my life, albeit a short one. It was our last day of work.

It's a shame the way things were laid out, because Olympic Mountain Biking could be one of the most boring events in the games. Just to give you an idea, I fell asleep today on accident. And, it was such a non-prioirty that all of us be there that, if I hadn't had woken up and decided to go down to the Mixed Zone, no one would have woken me up.

So, today we did a lot of sitting around and really felt like two days shoved into one. It honestly, to a lot of us, felt that we had a full day, took a long break, and had another, all the while not really doing much at all.

After work, we headed off to Tim's, this barbecue/Tex-Mex place we found here, with all of our staff. It was nice to have us all in one place, just like the Chinese restaurant a few weeks ago (even though it seems like FOREVER ago). We ate, drank, watched an Australian diver win the gold, watched the American relay teams win gold, and watched the American Women's Basketball team practically win gold. But, the entire time, there was a sort of sad feeling in me, because, even though we will most likely meet up with the ONS crew tomorrow night, tonight could have easily been the last time we see them.

I hope not. I hope that, in December of 2010, I'm in a paid position covering Curling at the Vancouver Olympics for ONS. Yeah, it's been discussed. I hope that I can, in the next year or so, make it to Australia and see Amy, as well as all of my new Aussie friends.

The memories of our weeks here came flying back at me. The time Ernst asked me and Chad to go interview a female Mountain Biker...who was a guy. The picture that hung up on our whiteboard of a Fuwa who had fallen down. The names we had given to various people in the mixed zone, like Pinky and Witchy...and VeloFred. The press conference today where, in translation, a man told us he had a cervical injury. That's right. He had a cervix.

These cannot be recreated and will never be duplicated. I hope that I can just take the most from this experience and move on.