We're happy because NZ is topping those alternative medal tables. We're not quite so happy because two soldiers were killed in Afghanistan today.

I am a little disappointed that the girl from San Marino didn't get a medal in the claybird shooting. I like to see little countries getting medals. She was in a shootout for second or third.

Well I'm unhappy because the synchronised swimming started today, feet flapping around above the water does not a sport make.

I don't know what the 'alternative medals table' is, can someone tell me please?

I had to look it up myself. Seems it's a way for small and/or poor countries to feel better about themselves by working out their medal haul per capita and after factoring in how little money they spend on it all. New Zealand are presently right up near the top, just tucked in behind Andorra and Pogoland. Since Pogoland's population is comprised completely of puffins this means the NZers are the only ones likely to catch them (unless Wales declare UDI in the next week of course).

In 1900 Britain won a gold medal in the live pigeon shooting event. Pogoland didn't dare enter in those days.

Don't have to look it up here! We know very well here what it means. It means we are top! (Or were: it seems unwise to check any more.) Though of course there is innate unfairness in this method too - larger countries can't score highly on, since there is only one gold they can get per event. My husband didn't support the girl from San Marino - it is a very tiny country, and one bronze might be enough. Slovenia are well up on this judging. They might be Pogoland in drag.

Cynical people want a scale where medals are judged on per millions of pounds/dollars spent.

Is length of national anthem included in the equation? You can make a cup of tea during the South African one - you can too - try it..... and Dominican - that is the one when the gold medal winner gradually broke down and had more than enough time for total recovery and convalesence. Pleas to save our queen are brief and long enough - I like to think that Sean Connery used to plea for the queen to be saved long enough to give him a knighthood. Our footballers don't all sing it as they can't learn the right words that come after 'God save.' But spend no time on that - better to invest in electronic arrows that point to the goal, perhaps. (Marked 'Theirs,' of course.)

I just wish someone would hurry up and save the darn Queen, everytime I hear it I feel I should be standing up. I'm exhausted already and there is still this week to go, strange how childhood conditioning can stay quietly buried, but ever ready to jump to the fore at the least unexpected times.

Islanddawn wrote:

Well I'm unhappy because the synchronised swimming started today, feet flapping around above the water does not a sport make.

I love the synchronised swimming - it's like watching the corps de ballet drowning.

All you ever wanted to know about the Olympics

http://ancientandmodernolympics.wordpress.com/page/3/

This should bring you to the first page, if you click on 'newer posts', bottom right, there's several more pages on different topics and a new post is added every Friday. I must confess, I haven't done more than skim through it as I've only just been sent the link but, by golly, it's comprehensive!

The Olympics are almost done and dusted for another 4 years. All those years of work, fuss, squabbling, whinging and whining in the lead up and it is over in the blink of an eye. And will be forgotten just as quickly, so was 2 weeks of entertainment (and feeling all warm and fuzzy) worth all those squillions of pounds the UK has spent and has still yet to pay?

PS. I note the Beeb are already bashing Rio's effort in preparing for the next, the same old mantra of it won't be ready in time. Hey ho, here we go again.

I would say yes; money is not the be-all-and-end-all of everything. Celebration and entertainment is really quite important, as are keeping cities renewed and revitalised. (British cities were a revelation to us, with so much money spent on them, thanks to EU socialised money apparently, and looking so good and operating so efficiently.)

I don't know why people don't learn that these events will always be ready when the time comes.

Islanddawn wrote:

All those years of work, fuss, squabbling, whinging and whining...and it is over in the blink of an eye. And will be forgotten just as quickly...

Sounds just like my life, ID. I don't know if a quick burst of "My Favourite Things" or "My Way" (Frank Sinatra, not Sid Vicious version) is appropriate here.

I don't feel warm and fuzzy anymore. They've just been revealing the Truth about water polo on BBC Breakfast - appalling. Apparently it's a horribly brutal sport, and all sorts of dreadful things go on underwater: people kick and punch and grab - and there are even things called "water wedgies" which sound very nasty indeed. (I shall leave it to others to make jokes about the horses, if so desired).

Seriously, I agree entirely with Caro - it's all been fun and let's hope the good spirit and benefits to the community continue. They probably won't, but you have to keep on dreaming. I'm sure Rio will be brilliant, and the gentlemen will love all the Samba and beachvolleyball ladies there are bound to be. I wonder what we will all be doing - if anything - by 2016?

Off to Cornwall now - and of course it's going to rain by this evening. Typical.

PS Caro - thank you everso much for the PM. Got to dash now, but will respond properly when I get back.

Money isn't everything is always easy to say Caro when it is someone else's being spent. But as Europe is in the middle of a recession with industry closing down, people losing jobs and houses, government cuts and endless nagging for everyone to tighten their belts because we are all in this together, it is a relevant question to ask those in the UK.

Ha Temp, do you think BBC Breakfast read Res His then? I said exactly the same about water polo at the beginning of this thread. It was revealed here first!

PS Watching some of the strange walking around and around Buck House today, I became quite concerned about the purple witch hats marking the course. A sign of boredom perhaps but there are so many of them, will they ever be used again or left to gather dust in storage somewhere?

Captain Dover's Olympick Games in the Cotswalds cost a fraction of the modern version, even allowing for intervening inflation over the last 400 years. We are fortunate to still have the official brochure and a breakdown of the major events.




The brochure.

The events as depicted:


Blowing Notes Up Ladies' Petticoats. France held the Olympick record throughout the entire first half of the 17th century until a far-sighted Cromwell invested millions of taxpayers' groats into improving the English sense of direction. The image depicts Britain's first gold-medallist, Swineherd Christie, demonstrating the stealth technique which earned him three world records and a later hanging at Tyburn.


Castle Balancing. Not as easy as it looks and a sport which became even more difficult in Cromwellian times due to most of them being pulverised to rubble in the interests of creating common wealth (where all the money is owned by all the people but looked after and used on their behalf by five rich geezers). It was eventually banned as an Olympick sport after the USA complained that they didn't have any.


Speed Fencing. It's a wonder this one hasn't survived into the modern era. Participants, to save time, used a sword in each hand with no protective gear. Points were awarded for lasting longer than three seconds. After it was reckoned that the French record of one point achieved in 1636 would never be surpassed the posthumous winner, Cont'd'Ouvrelif, was allowed hold the medal in perpetuity (or at least his widow was).


Giant Rabbit Chasing. A strange sport involving genetically modified rabbits and dogs purposefully stretched on racks for the occasion, believed to be based on an old Scottish folk song "Och, Mae Wee Rover, Mynd Tha Mowpie!". The only gold medal recorded went to a Mrs Buntington of Cheddarfield Grove, East Chipling, Hants, who allegedly was also the Olympick Games' first accredited caterer.


The Hop, Step and Shin-kick. A forerunner of the modern event "Get Past The Bouncer", success in this sport was the preserve of Geordies for many years. Its most decorated participant, Steve "The Gouger" Cram, attributed his prowess completely to performance-enhancing beverages brewed in and around the Tyne. His assertion was never contradicted as everyone knew what was good for them.


The Blood to Head Thingy. The nearest the Olympicks ever got to Australian participation. This was not really an approved event at all. It was just no one in the Olympick Council liked Ian the Thorpedo very much and they pretended it was an endurance event to which he was admirably suited. Seven years after the last Olympick Games some locals eventually took pity on him and removed the washing line.


Eating Oneself Into An Early Grave. This sport involved sitting around a table in the open air and eating, the combined weight of the participants eventually leading to subsidence of the ground beneath them. The winners (usually the French) being the first to have arrived a depth and suitable degree of death to be then covered over with earth. No medals were ever awarded for this one. What was the point?


Riding with Big Sticks. An early form of equestrian dressage with movement this involved riding around waving big sticks. English gentry were exceptionally good at this given their experience in Ireland. The sport was eventually withdrawn after Irish objections to being used as pacemakers. Since Tasmanians hadn't been discovered yet this pretty much was the end of it (until resurrected two hundred years later by the USA "pioneers").


Giant Rabbit Chasing By Dogs With Beaks. A variant of the sport cited above. Self explanatory.


Irish Javelin Throwing. Another short-lived event after the entire field of contestants was wiped out in the first heat in 1640. A Scottish contestant's attempt to persuade them that it would be less dangerous to throw the javelins forward rather than straight up in the air proved to be incorrect, at least for the Scotsman who was standing forward at the time.


Giant Pencil Balancing. An early form of rhythmic gymnastics involving balancing a giant pencil on the instep and jiggling it about for a bit. The acknowledged supremos in the team event, Sebastian & Co (pictured above), were so renowned for their jiggling that they ended up on the same scaffold as Swineherd Christie (see above).


Clubbing Pigeons. Not quite an official event but one beloved of bored spectators at the Eating Oneself Into An Early Grave competition (see above). The trick was to stun them with the first blow and then stand threateningly over them a-la Basil Fawlty and promise to thrash them to within an inch of their lives. This later evolved into amateur boxing as practised by Cassius Clay in 1960.


Gay Hammer Throwing. An event that lost popularity during Puritan times (up to about 1985) this involved making one's own hammers from things found around the house and then waving them decoratively in the air before hurling them in a hissy fit and flouncing off. The undisputed champion of all time, Chris Hoy There (Sailor), was also the first Olympickian to fail a sex test when he giggled during the Blowing Notes Under Ladies' Petticoats event in 1632 and gave the game away.


Sticking Giant Hat Pins Into Horses While Sitting On Them. A stupid event.

LOL.... Thanks for that Nordmann, lurved it!

Frankly I don't see very much difference from the current running around, jumping, spashing, flouncing, sulking, cheating and generally doing stupid things to waste money exercise. To me they all seem much like the above broken pencil balancing event.... pointless!

Btw: I think the "Giant Rabbit Chasing" also entailed genetically modified dogs... I'm sure the hound at furthest right has six legs!

Oh... and with two tails, so at least he was well happy!

You're looking at the picture slightly wrong, MM. In fact this was why they stopped Giant Rabbit Chasing as a mixed sex event in 1644.

On the same theme of forgotten Olympic events, there are a few amusing ones listed here http://www.toromagazine.com/culture/listed/7d429376-2e44-88a4-55cc-64f4d8131bcc/Forgotten-Olympic-Events/

Personally, I'm all for bringing back the live pigeon shooting and the hoplitodromos.

But I think you've got the Gay Hammer Throwing wrong... isn't that Tomme Thumbe, six times champioin of the 'Canape Lifting for Dwarves' event, in 1637 beating Thumbelina to a bronzy-goldish medal, when he hefted a mighty 12 ounce gherkin on a cocktail stick? He was of course disqualified because the regulation piece of cheddar had fallen off!

I'll check my sources on that one, but I'm nearly sure it is indeed the early version of the modern Gay Hammer event (1984 champion pictured below):

Sorry Nordmann but the pussie (not a mowpie) is normal sized, it's the dugs that are bred specially tiny for mistress Paisley Hilton. That's her in the middle, about to hoist her skirts aloft to facilitate the operation of the swineherd's nozzle.


The hoplitodromos could be a goer though!

Interesting!! where do they hold this race Ferval?

Oh come on Gran, you don't want to encourage such behaviour, their feet must be raw. Have you noticed, the one on the right has a very long dangly thing but the poor chap on the left has no dangler at all.

Quote :

Sorry Nordmann but the pussie (not a mowpie) is normal sized

Apologising for Scottish mowpie must be a full-time job!

Gran, this is not a race. This is the view from the overhead camera on Platform Nr 8 at Glasgow Central for the 09.20 to Neilston every morning.

Ah, would that were true. I'd be installed in the champagne bar in the Central Hotel with my binoculars.

I went to Neilston, by the Pad, on a Sunday school trip. The high spot of the day was when a dog lifted its leg against the teacher's back while we were sitting on grass eating our purvey.

It's still spoken about in Neilston, I hear. Put them on the map, as it were (though still in very low definition according to Google).

You had purvey on school trips? We had to bring our own biscuits!

And a tin mug on a string round your neck?

Only when in need of alms (which was every Sunday when I think about it).

Nor did we, that was considered to be the social equivalent of wearing black sandshoes outwith the gym hall or wellies when it wasn't raining, an infallible indicator of being a keelie.

Posh, then.

We aspired to keelieship - working class meant you had a job.

Ferval seems to have an unhealthy obsession with what she wore to school which I take to be some decades ago. Though perhaps it was really only yesterday. Her school dress was the subject of discussion elsewhere not at all long ago.

I am a little surprised that animal rights people objected to live pigeon shooting as far back as 1900. No one (much) objects here to live duck shooting - far from it, it is a major part of the male calendar - or Canada goose 'culling', and even native weka shooting by farmers is, if not tolerated, at least understood.

I think the tug of war would be a definite attraction - a counterpart to beach volleyball, perhaps. It's a little odd what's allowed and what's not. Ballroom dancing has been rejected, but synchronized swimming and interpretive gymnastics and ice skating is there. Some team sports but not others. Wouldn't hurling add a little something, for instance? or tossing the caber?

It might have changed since the financial crisis, but governments seem very keen to host these large tournaments and they tend to keep a fair eye on treasury accounts, so presumably they think the long-term advantages outweigh any immediate (and on-going) costs. At any rate surely no one wants an entirely dour life where the cost of everything is all that matters. Sounds very much like our National government, if so.

Edited because for some reason I'm not allowed to delete my own posts.

Fascinating insight to early sports..... and the internal workings of certain people's minds. The hopthng people sensibly wear crash helmets and regulation volley ball bikini thongs so I guess this is about an even more modern pentathlon event. When - and how do they stop to kill someone after they got the next bus?

So it's back to switching off the football time again.

The Olympics have finally finished here. On Wednesday NZ's last gold medal was presented. At the time the women's shot put was won by a Belarussian woman, but she was put out for drug-taking, and it has taken a while for the medal to come back and be able to be presented to Valerie Adams, who was bitterly disappointed not to have her moment in the sun and the national anthem played for her.

But now the Tongan royal family have been here and there were fireworks, and governor-general speeches (too long for me; I wandered off before we got to the medal ceremony), lots of people and general emotion.

So we only have to wait three years and 11 months for the next hoo-ha. (Not counting the Winter Olympics, and the Commonwealth Games, and the World Championships, and the Football World Cup, and the Rugby World Cup, and half a dozen Cricket World Cups and...)