One Big Olympic Hangover

I am going to need at least a week to recover from the last two weeks of staying up until 11pm or midnight to catch all the excitement from Beijing. Jeff and I have always been huge Olympic fans, and this year we had the convenience of a DVR to capture every moment aired on NBC. And I have to tell you, we pretty much watched all the events covered on NBC, just some of them were in fast motion speeds! Even Nathaniel got into the fun, and began requesting "Oh-Ick-Picks" every night, probably in the hopes to postpone bedtime!

The top highlights for us were of course, Michael Phelp's 8 gold medal accomplishments, all the gymnastics, the indoor men's Volleyball gold, women's beach volleyball gold, the men's marathon, and the 4X100 swimming medley where the U.S. came from behind to win at the last moment. Jeff even logged onto NBC and watched the Archery competition. He has a strange love for Archery, and one of these years I will remember to get him lessons for his birthday. He has a tendency to get very excited about certain sports after watching the Olympics, and actually enrolled in speed skating lessons after the Winter 02 games. I think he's a lot cuter than Apollo Anton Ohno, myself!

One of the most exciting aspects of these games was how the U.S. actually felt like the underdog at times. When does that usually happen? The Chinese really dominated the performances and so it was some extra nail biting for us as we cheered on the althetes from the home team! It made hearing our national anthem that much more emotional and exciting.

The Opening and Closing Ceremonies were unlike anything I've ever seen. It was hard to take our eyes off the screen. (Although Jeff did wimp out last night and fall asleep towards the end).

One thing's for sure... I will miss the late nights of August of 2008 and witnessing the great feats of those who have been working so hard to achieve the nearly impossible. And I look forward to the summer of 2024 when Nathaniel tries for Michael Phelps medal record as he both swims (his favorite activity in the whole wide world) and runs (he sure is fast enough already, I can barely catch him!) We just have to figure out what sport Mary will be the best at. So far she's the champion of cuteness in our household. Maybe that will be an international event by the time she is 16!

Catch some Olympic highlights here if you missed anything!