I love the closing ceremony - especially christina aguilera and those pants! and charlotte church and that boy have nice voices... bon jovi, earth wind and fire, and moby were great too!

the fireworks were great, the Games were declared "superb" and Mitt Romney was looking happy with his gold Olympic necklace...

it was great to see pelletier (canada) and shimer (usa) carrying their respective nations' flags as well.

of course, there's the tinge of sadness of having another Olympics pass us by...

[ February 25, 2002: Message edited by: Jay ]

Hey, it was better in person! As a volunteer, we were told on Thursday that some would get tickets to the Closing Ceremony. We just had to work all day Sunday getting the stadium ready. "That boy" with Charlotte Church is Josh Groban, who is incredible and has a CD out. He's also been on Ally MacBeal a couple of times.

I reviewed the tape of NBC's coverage of the Closing Ceremonies and they cut to commercials at some of the best parts! They also left some of the less spectacular stuff in. What's up with that? Don't they have anybody at the rehearsals planning out when to cut to commercials?

One more day of volunteering and I'm done. I'm working at the Athlete's Village today helping everybody get packed up and out of town.

It has been an incredible thrill to be associated with all that has happened. I am somewhat of a cynic when it comes to overblown, overhyped events, but the TOTAL experience has been good. I'm tired, the house is in a bit of a shambles, and the folks at work are a bit pissed. But I don't care. It has been a lot of fun, a lot of work and I am very proud to have been a part of it.

I'm also proud of the job the USA (including the military), Utah and Salt Lake City have done in putting on the games. I think we did pretty good for a backward, poor, opressive, boring, theocractic, un-party town!

I'm relieved that the games are over with no major safety incidents, and saddened to realize it's all done, except for the Paralympics, of course! It's been a real thrill and I would encourage anyone to be a volunteer for something like this if you ever get the chance. Last night was a little emotional and I did fine until they showed that little Italian girl skate away with the lantern and then it really hit me that it was over and I admit I shed a couple of tears.

I'm off to the village in a couple of hours and will spend the rest of the day taking it all in one more time. Fulfilling and sad....


P.S. Think Andre Lange can fit me in his suitcase?

[ February 25, 2002: Message edited by: utahman4u ]

I just wish NBC's announcers would shut up when people were singing. It was really annoying.

Salt Lake City should be extremely proud of how well the games went off. Who says that only the "big" cities can pull of something as big as this? After seeing how well SLC did I can see no reason what so ever that my city, Spokane couldn't have done the same outstanding job. After all we had one of the most successful World Fairs ever (1974). Job well done SLC!!!

Hey Puckman!
I don't know if you realize it or not, but SLC was the largest city to hold a winter olympics. And Torino will be the new Largest when they hold it. Just a bit of triva I heard somewhere. I think I'm correct, if not, I was miss informed.

[ January 03, 2003: Message edited by: Ump25 ]

I swear Mary Carillo is a man in disguise.

Just coming back from the Games myself, I have to admit these were by far the best organized I have been to out of the 4 that I have attended. Utahman, kudos to you and the rest of the volunteer staff. You guys were all incredible, friendly and informative. It was you volunteers presence that helped make these Games awesome. Thanks!!!

Utahman, let me echo the sentiments of Puckman45 and Olympicnut. Salt Lake did an excellent job of hosting the Games. Both opening and closing ceremonies were fantastic, and security was top-notch. From what I've heard, the Mormons were enthusiastic supporters, and to their credit, did not use the Olympics as a forum to promote their religion. I can certainly relate to your sense of pride because I live in Calgary, which hosted the 1988 Winter Games. It was certainly a memorable event which put us on the map.

MSUBobcat, I don't want to nit-pick, but I think Calgary is slightly larger than Salt Lake City. Our current population is nearly 900,000 (excluding nearby towns). Mind you, in '88 it was probably around 750,000. The info I was able to find on the Web showed SLC to have only 170,000 in its 'city proper' but jumps to 800,000 when you include the whole region. I guess it all depends on the definition of city limits.

I was actually interested in these Olympics. Which is quite an accomplishment.

And don't be saying anything negative about Mary Carillo. She's smart, witty, intelligent, gay friendly, tart-tounged. and an excellent commentator (didn't watch the closing ceremonies though).

Anyone who says anything slightly negative about Mary Carillo, will be forced to sit through an entire Grand Slam tournament with Tracy Austin and Chris Evert as their announcers.

Considering the strides the IOC has made to reach a younger audience with some of the newer X Games type sports, I was pretty amazed at how lame the entertainment was. Earth, Wind and Fire? KISS? Donny and Marie? *NSYNC and Christina Aguiliera are young, but even they are passe, at least to the young male audience.

And while I certainly don't want to start World War III here, if somebody made comments about a male announcer who "was a woman in disguise", I have a feeling many more people would be a bit put off. Mary Carillo is one of the best in the world at what she does. On top of that, she is one of the smartest and nicest people as well. What the heck do her looks matter? Give me Mary on TV over these know-nothings patrolling the sidelines at NFL games like Jill Arrington!

[ February 25, 2002: Message edited by: George_vikingfan ]

Give Mary Carillo some credit, at least she's a genuine sports fan. During one of her tennis telecasts, she confessed that growing up, she watched almost every single Mets game because she honestly believed the Mets could not win unless **she** was watching. Now that's a true sports fan. I'd much rather have Mary as a sportscaster than one of those bimbo-come-lately's.

I don't watch much tennis, but I like Mary Carillo.

And 'N Sync did a very fine job with the national anthem.

[quote]Originally posted by Marc:
MSUBobcat, I don't want to nit-pick, but I think Calgary is slightly larger than Salt Lake City. Our current population is nearly 900,000 (excluding nearby towns). Mind you, in '88 it was probably around 750,000. The info I was able to find on the Web showed SLC to have only 170,000 in its 'city proper' but jumps to 800,000 when you include the whole region. I guess it all depends on the definition of city limits.

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SLC "proper" is quite small geographically and not to further nit-pick, but if you throw in the rest of the suburban venue areas (West Valley City, Provo, Ogden, and Park City -- all within 40 miles of the airport) the population jumps to about 1.8 million. When they say "biggest city" I think that is what they are referring to.


Further note: Knowing how tacky and silly some of the things in the ceremonies can be, I was just relieved that the "Torino Segment" didn't include anything in a shroud! (In case you don't get this, Torino is the city that most of the rest of the world refers to as Turin.)

[ February 26, 2002: Message edited by: utahman4u ]

T.G. It's over - YAWN - the only thing not boring was the figure skating; second best was men's hockey but too bad they choked in the finals.

Does Bob Costas really think every single word he says is unique and funny ??

Bring on ncaa hoops tourney and nba playoffs !

[quote]Originally posted by osufan:
T.G. It's over - YAWN -

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But obviously interesting enough that you accessed the discussion, chose the topic, then the thread, read the posts and paged down all the way to the bottom...