duck-shaped pain

The Olympic torch passed about a half-mile from the house, so my dad and I walked down to watch the relay. It was amazingly cold -- about 20 degrees or so, making the walk down there kind of unpleasant. We got there at a good time -- about 15 minutes before the runner passed by. There were many more people there than I expected. By the time the torch showed up, both sides of the street (and this is a wide, five-lane street) were filled with spectators. I had thought about going downtown for the ceremonies that were going to be held there (the torch's appearance in my town was a mildly big deal, since it's the last stop for it in a state that is not Utah -- lots of media are in town to document its crossing of the Colorado/Utah state line tomorrow morning), but the thought of shivering in a tiny plaza with 10,000 of my fellow townspeople did sound nearly as appealing after I stood out in the cold for a short while.

Anyway, the entire thing was very brief. We lucked out -- our randomly selected viewing spot happened to be right where they switched runners, so we got to see two runners, and the whole process of switching between them.

Seeing the torch go by made me briefly choke up -- this is because the Winter Olympics is one of the few things in the world [1] that can turn me into a total sap. I don't know why this is. I don't know if analyzing this feeling would amount to much. I don't know if there's a real reason, just a reaction.

Anyway� photos. Click on the image for a larger version (recommended).

Here are people milling about, waiting for something to happen. Traffic was still flowing down the street at this point, so I watched a lot of people being dumb by standing out in the street with cars on-coming. Lots of near-accidents, examples of natural selection in progress. The Grand Mesa sits stoically in the distance, oblivious to what people are doing in the street.

It's not terribly clear from the photo, but this is where the runners were being changed. The person in white is the new runner, and right behind her (barely visible in the photo) is the old one. The back of this van was full of many, many camerapeople, with flashbulbs flickering away.

Torch lady. I knew a few of the local torch bearers, but I don't know who this is.

Torch lady, side view.

[1] The only other thing that comes to mind that has the same effect would be Hero Dogs -- dogs that pull their owners out of burning buildings or something like that.

previous | next