I barely paid attention to the Olympics this time around, which is a really unusual position to be in. In fact, I wasn't much into them in 2004 either, and had to check just now as to where those games were even held (Athens). Contrast this with 2002, where I was obsessively dedicated to our drive for hockey gold, even watching for the first (and last) time a women's game, and getting damned excited when the ladies beat the American team and their referee. Or other years past, such as 1976, when I left the house maybe twice in two weeks (how fortunate to be an unemployed child of 12).

I'm guessing the change is because I have less interest in sports than ever before, although my wife might offer a dissenting opinion. There is no clear reason for this, no they-make-too-much-damned-money or they-took-my-team conspiracy theories (although they do make too much money and the bastards did take my team). It's more about time - I don't really have any. My favourite sports to watch are football and basketball. But I might have watched one game all the way through before the NFL playoffs this past season, and I don't think I've even done that for my Raptors this year. Instead, there was a lot of dipping in and out, a half hour on the chesterfield before running off to another dance class, or giving up on a game at 10:00 p.m. because of my habitual 5:00 a.m. wakeup call. In the past, lack of sleep would not have kept me from "the game". Now, I don't even consider this an excuse: it's just the way things are.

So, the lunatic running up and down the halls of a Vancouver hotel during the Habs win in '79, the superstitious fool who wouldn't shake the ash off his cigarette as long as the Expos were at bat in '81, the maniac who threw his roommate's remote control against the wall when the Jays blew a close one in '85, the laryngytic drunk from the Jays '93 win, the idiot who rushed through sex to get back to the Bills' attempt to knock off the Cowboys in '94 - these guys are all long gone, visited only occasionally by the sociopath who screamed so loud he thought his neighbours would call security when the Polamalu interception was overturned in '06. It's a kinder, gentler time to be me. At least, that is, until March Madness starts on the 16th.