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Went with Haiyan’s family and friends to Lake Tahoe between 12/23-28 and skiied there for three days. I have to say these were the best skiing days ever.

Skiing is a sport that has heavy overhead and sunk-cost: before ever hitting the snow, one has to collect all the gears: helmet, goggle, gloves, pants, jackets, hats, poles, skis, boots, cell phone, and/or walkie-talkie, … what else I am missing here? Then driving hours on the road, then change, walking on boots with skis on shoulder for quarter a mile to buy tickets that cost hundreds of dollars. A good set of skis with boots and binding could easily go above a grand.

Learning skiing is also pretty tricky: the learning area (the green runs) are mostly in the lower part of the mountain where snow is either too thin or too slashy–either one could be a show stopper for a beginner.

So why do I ski?

A friend (Robinette? o bro where art thou) told me once, almost apologetically, “I know it is something I should do, but I never picked it up”. It certainly is a symbol of coolness. At least that is what drove me into it, against every thing I hold dear. The ice-rink-like runs in MD/PA/WV almost killed me many times over. I only started somewhat seriously when Song brought me to WA in 98, the year NW had record snow.

After Tahoe, however, I am a true skiier–skiing for skiing’s sake. Thanks a lot to YP and LS: their reputation as skilled and diehard skiiers preceded our acquaintance. They brought me to the back side of the Northstar, and I never looked back.

We spend the first day in Squaw, which was already very good. After two day’s of white-out snowing, the third day was heaven. Every wintery color was in its purest state under a bright sun shining through the thin air over Sierra Nevada. The contrast of colors is so strong that it physically hurts naked eye. When a breeze blows by, the snow flakes fly off the trees and sparkle like bullions of tiny crystals permeating the space around me.

Coming off the lift, standing at the top of the freshly groomed runs, I felt the calling. That sealed it for me.

Too bad that I didn’t explore Squaw more and didn’t go to Kirkwood as YP and LS recommended. But I gave it all on the last day.

 Beijing Olympics is over today. I think many people I know are letting out a sigh of relief. Given so many misfortunes and unrests happened earlier this year, the summer Olympics once felt like a giant bubble ready to pop. Now it is over, all of a sudden, it dawned on me that 2008 was the best Olympics in my life time. 

Not that I wish it happens again any time soon. Like the Pyramids, and many other human spectacles in history, the success of Olympics is built on the sacrifices and sufferings of counterless unnamed. If Acropolis is a reminder of Athenian democracy, and the Great Wall determined national defense, what is being immortalized by the statdiums? Prosperity? At $2000 per capita, that is a stretch.

Here are some of the good and the bad as I saw them:

The Good:

The competitions! Really a treat for a sports fan. In the States, I missed watching volleyball, handball and track/field. Bu now I have them all together. Badminton is always fun (watching the top players play gives me a sensation of watching human pin-balls). The marathon run around the city and the road bike race to the Great Wall were very photogenic. Although I don’t care for diving or gymnastics, they are surprisingly competitive even to my layman’s eye.

The soccer match between the Nigeria and Belgium is one of the most memorable in my life time. Had there not been so much Michael Phelps (over) coverage, I would have enjoyed swimming even more.

Track is perhaps the most exciting. I played so many ball games in my life, but I don’t always feel an adrenaline surge before every match. Track is different. I can always recall how hard my heart pumped every time I stood behind the starting line. The sensation of turning the last curve and seeing the finish line at the end of the track is beyond words. It is fair to say I play balls for fun but run for the adrenaline.

Yesterday, watched the marathon live on NBC. When the Kenyan runner (he was just so graceful) entered the stadium, the first shot was from his back with the bright light at the end of the tunnel in front of him. Immediately, the view switched to another camera that panned in half the stadium. When the dimunitive runner figure emerged from the tunnel, I could see the stadium erupted in cheers. I trembled. Good God.

The Bad:

I will save it for another day.

Pick up rowing at Carrie P’s recommendation. Really enjoyed the sport and the Lake Union Crew.

Monday was the first good day on water. I started to get a sense of how to row. The hardest part was to unlearn what I had been used to. And always pay attention to the rhythm! From breathing to rowing, I have to control and constrain in order to go fast and go far.

Also, now I can attest why it is an ultimate team sport. In our very first session on water, the boat was too tippy as people were not in sync and didn’t know how to set it even. At times, lifting the oar out of the water was a true test of patience.

The instructor said that rowers can pull a water skier. I didn’t believe it until I saw this video on YouTube - .

I know I should have worked on school works, finding a job or event catching up with blogs … but not. I spent much of the weekend fixated in front of TV (very bad behavior, I know).

But this weekend’s NFL playoff games were really good, really entertaining. If Sat. day was all about worthiness and the display of power, today (Sun.) is about redemption and will. First the Chargers upset a listless Colts team with a group of subs, then the Giants spilled their guts to beat the Cowboys.

After the game, the Giants defensive guys said they were so tired they could barely left the locker room. And I believe that. Seeing the front group chasing Romo like a chicken in the second half, I wondered how long they could last.

The most memorable moment came in the final 50 seconds of the game when Romo marched the Boys down to the 25 yard line. The crowd was getting restless and anxious. Then there was an injury timeout. I could see the Giants players standing on the field as if ready to collapse at any moment.

As the game was about to resume, the stadium started to blast music–forgot what it was but sounded like the theme song in “Chariot of Fire”: it was the kind of uplifting and pumping piece. I saw the Cowboys getting ready, but the Giants guys were still standing there motionless! Their hands on waists and heads on chests. It was really a weird scene. I thought they would be done for for sure. But somehow they willed themself into a victory.

Awesome games!

Sean Taylor died this morning. I was awaken by the news on the radio, didn’t know what to make of it the whole day. Then, as I am watching a TiVoed Bears-Broncos’ game, the news suddenly sinks in.

It is now, at this moment, the game ceases to be a game, but something very personal. I will miss the speedy figure, in burgandy and white, roaming in the backfields on Sunday afternoons. It is not because he retired, or is injured. He is dead.

It is strange because I can’t think of anything good to say about Taylor as a person. I don’t know him nor have I heard anything examplary about him. As the Skins struggled year after year, Taylor mostly appeared in highlight reels chasing the offensive player’s tail.

Yet he is the last one I would associate with death. He’s young. He has a thuggish spirit that is violent, mean, intimidating, and above all, adolescent. When he hits, he hit as if he wants to kill but can never be killed. While it was exhilarating to watch, now the image becomes chilling to recall.

He embodied life and peronified vigor when he was alive. Now he is dead, mortality looms larger than usual. I will miss him.

About Tour de France: now Vinokourov and his team were kicked out. La Tour is getting crazier by the year. It is almost a crapshoot today to call someone a top rider since you don’t know what will happen to him next.

I enjoy watching the Tour every year. Not that I like to watch a bunch of sweaty white guys (talking about the whitest sport, cycling beats out golf AND hockey) wildly shaking their skinny asses on the road. But there is this deeper, almost religious sense of self-torture-till-redemption that has a meta-physical appeal to me.

But endurance cycling has changed a lot from the days when riders shared a cigarette on their way to Champs-Élysées. Today, any tour rider appears to me as a human-bot riding on a sleek machine. I could never forget the image of Jan Ullrich sprinting in the first time trial in 2003 when he beat Lance by more than a minute. That guy looked like a Terminator on a mission.

I suspect La Tour, as the way it is, is no longer sustainable (hijacking a popular term). The challenge it poses to the riders and the hype around it is too much for any human to handle. The fact that a diverse group of riders are using drugs year after year tells me this is a systematic problem not a random one.

If the Tour is serious about solving the doping issue, it has to use a systematic solution as well. I’d propose the following: shift the emphasis on team standing instead of individual ones and adopt a more liberal snitching system.

By becoming a team sport, the Tour can reduce the pressure on individuals and making cheating more difficult to carry out or remain secret. The snitch idea is to borrow the prisoner’s delimma in Game Theory, although this is probably not a very “Frenchy” idea.

Heard the rumor that the Skins are trying to get Briggs from the Bears. Hopefully the deal will fall through. Danny boy is like an addict (a very contagious one I might add): you just can’t count on him to stop doing the same stupid thing over and again. I never really paid attention to Brigg’s play but the way he blew off Chicago after being tagged told me something about this person: lack of tack, egocentric and possibly spoiled. He is at his prime, just came of a SB run.: sure, that is all good. Now he has more to dis-prove than to prove. Why would you lock up someone like that with $50 million for 6 years? (he’s got 7.2 for one year so I guess a long term is worth about 6-50)

On the other hand, Danny boy certainly brings a lot excitement into this otherwise absolutely miserable Skins tale. I can’t imagine what a life it would be for a Cardinals’ fun, if there is such a person.

Too bad the whole vortex (Danny’s good and Danny’s bad) sucks down a good man in Joe Gibbs. If he retires today, his second coaching stint looks like a deer caught in the headlight. He has yet to be a leader, a creative force in the game of football like he was before.

Money corrupts and Danny’s money corrupts absolutely.

It was kind of funny that I was posting an entry bitching soccer in the middle of the best game in this World Cup, Brazil vs. France.

It was a pure attack football: both sides launched beautiful attacks and counter-attacks, each only ended in the box area. Zidane was spectacular. The Brazilian dance wasn’t bad either. After watching the England/Portugal game, this game felt like a thunderstorm in a muggy summer afternoon.

I stayed up till 5am to finish watching, never once felt bored or sleepy. It was a déjà vu experience: 20 years ago, when I was in highschool, I woke up at 3am to watch the same teams played in a world cup quarter final which ended in the same: the favored Brazilians were eliminated by a heroic French team after a game of constant fast attacks.

I always questioned whether European sportsmen had the same kind of desire to win as those touted in America. Here is one glimpse:
?????????????????????????????????????“????????????……??????????[sic]???????????????????????????????????????????????????????”

I missed more than half of the games but I didn’t feel like I missed much.

Soccer is such an imprecise sport that a referee’s judgement plays a bigger role than it would in American football. In modernity where everything is measured, regression-tested and forecasted, soccer preserves the role of “fate” as if paying homage to Greek Mythology.

Watching the World Cup in China is painful: first of all, the time is not right. Secondly, having to listen to CCTV commentators doing live broadcasts amounts to being “Abu Ghraib”-ed. The commentators are, technically, central government employees. Although they often display a passion unseen in typical bureaucrats, almost everything else qualifies.

The commentators are pretentious and presumptuous, constantly speaking as if on behalf of the entire audiences, fans, players or referees–just as People’s Daily opines as if it represents “the people”. They are knowledgeable of their profession but at the same time are below the qualifications required for the position. Some of them made up the deficit by playing the passion card. After the Italians beat the Aussies at the last minute, the commentator screamed into the mike in such a high pitch that, if you hear it, you will understand the term “unisex” instantly.

Last but not least, they abuse the Chinese language. Before one game, a commentator remarked how peaceful the arean felt right before the game by saying, “?????????”.

It is known that government monopoly breeds rentier practice. But what the political economists didn’t capture is its effect on culture and language.

I did not know the role Mara played in NFL history until seeing the orbituaries in Washington Post and NYT.

I thought Revenue Sharing epitomized “capitalist vision”. Can’t imagine that in China. Absolutely no way.

According to the WP article, he was an incredibly kind person. History scholars seldom gave much thought to “agents” of history rather than “structures” (as in Structuralism). Without Mara, it seemed, Football wouldn’t be where it is today.