Yeesh

So how about them Summer Olympics? They sure aren't what they used to be. Every competitor naked and men only.

Seriously though, I'm watching the men's gymnastics portion of the show right now, and the rules that these people have is crazy. Elonzo Boden (of Last Comic Standing fame) was right: If you bounce when you land, you lose!

My question to the people that make the rules of gymnastics: Doesn't it show how pointless gymnatics is when you have to add weird rules that nobody understands except the people that are in gymnastics? Same question goes for the figure skating in the winter Olymps.

Case in point: You can watch an entire gymnastic set with the volume off, and be amazed at all of those flip-de-loops and twirls they do on the bars, the horses, and the beams. You turn up the volume to hear all of the rules and mistakes they're making, and you just want to barf out of puzzlement: "Why does that matter?"

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy watching this stuff (I just saw a guy dislocate his finger, it was almost sticking all the way up! Gross!) but you wonder how it fits into the grand scheme of things. When you think about it, gymnastics (along with sync swimming) is a freak event in the overall scheme of things.

to illustrate the point, look at all the normal events. Who can run/swim the fastest? Who can jump the highest/farthest? Who can throw a really heavy object the farthest?
Now to Gymnastics: Who can twirl around really quick while keeping his legs together and unbent and then land in one spot without bouncing? My answer: Who cares?

Before I continue, let me state this: gymnastics is hard. If I tried to run and do those flip and handstands on the mat, I would've needed a skin graft for my whole body, if I didn't break my neck and kill myself.

However, just because something is hard doesn't mean I should care. Driving a pick ax through your head and walkng away living is hard, but in the end it isn't a good skill to have.

Just because someone can play guitar while having a dynamic time scale and playing notes fast doesn't mean I should like it. I do appriciate it, that is a really neat skill, however, if it doesn't actually sound good, then forget it. Whoopee.

The ultimate point I'm trying to make is this: Yes, it IS true that anything worth doing is hard. However, something that is hard to do isn't always worth doing.