It seems like I’ve heard of Crouch End somewhere in life, but have no clue where it is (sumwhere in’t bloody sowth, innit?) or in what context I might have heard of it.
No matter. Elaine was good enough to email me some snapshots she took of the hoopla surrounding the Olympic flame passing through Crouch End. This whole Olympic thing seems so remote to me here, naturally enough I suppose, since the only real-time window on the wider world at this house is the internet, and I don’t peruse the sports sections at all.
Still, I’d bet if the Olympics were held here in the Crystal River Valley, I’d be out there in a toga too.
So here’s some of the pics, captioned in Elaine’s own words. I hope I haven’t mangled the sequence too badly.
And here’s hoping Mrs. Romney’s dressage horse bites Willard in the nuts. On film.
Crowds start gathering.
Waiting in suspense.
We cheered at anything that moved including the Cola wagon and the Bizzies, but booed heartily at the Lloyds Bank Party Bus !
The 100 meter dash past – My son Louis who was dressed for the occasion … captured the moment.
The heroes wearily retreat to Mount Olympus for a bucket of Pimms. (the drink of champions)… dreaming of what might have been…
Thanks Elaine, that was fun.
Crouch End is the neighborhood that i fell in love with and wanted to live in Norf London. Next to Alexandra Park.
Thanks, Gunny and Franny!
@Pornstar
-You would have loved it Amy – Pictures are from the corner of Priory Park,literally at the the top of the road.Great atmosphere,pretend torches but not a pitchfork in sight.
….the Bizzies
Looks fabulous. I can’t imagine the denizens of my little town doing something like this, but, hey, who knows. Enjoy the games.
It’s all about style and fun. . .which Romney didn’t (wouldn’t?) get at all. My god, those pins are so cheap and trashy. How on earth did the IOC let him get away with that crap?
Dunno what you’ll get to see over the Pond, but I hope they show you the (hilarious) bit of the top of the torch weaving its way through the Hampton Court Maze — who gave them a map, that’s cheating? — and off down the Thames on the Gloriana. Thousands of people watching.
(So, Mitt? We won’t be getting behind this little jolly, then? Where were you? Totalling up the cheques from last night? Down the post office buying the stamps to send them to the Cayman Islands?)
And the bells this morning . . .totally mad. I really don’t give a damn about sport, but I’m really looking forward to the show tonight*. I’ll stay at home rather than go off to Hyde Park to watch — don’t want to push my spine unnecessarily after my celebratory expedition yesterday, but there’ll be thousands and thousands picknicking and watching the big screens, I’m sure.
*Even Jacques Rogge got in on the Romneyshambles act. . .heard him saying this morning on the wireless that apparently Mitt is going to get a short lesson on er, ‘anglo-saxon values’ and Brit history. . .Sheep (?!); Maypoles (!?!!) . . .maybe even traditional clog-dancing from Penwortham** to remind him of the simple pleasures his ancestors left behind?
** Said Preston before; apparently it was Penwortham, not far away.
Who, I wonder, will be the first to grab Mitt and ask “How was it for you, then?”
On a serious note. They are showing footage of the torches progress through GB. Millions have turned out to watch or take part, but my cynicism over the political and capitalist bent of the games took a serious knock when they showed a solder who had suffered terrible wounds in Afghanistan, including losing both his legs, stand up and with a friend on each side supporting him on his obviously painful new legs, ‘walk’ with the torch. It took him an hour. But he made it. Humbling to watch and reduced me to tears. [which takes some doing]
If you cut away all the hype and hypocrisy until all that is left is hopes, aspirations, guts, and sheer bloody mindedness, then I have to say London 2012 is going to be worth it.
Hey, the games themselves are always worth it. I love sports.
Di – sometimes a little capitalist hype is just plain, old fashioned fun.
I mean, I watch the Oscars every single year. Even the red carpet bit.
I like the games too. And the Opening Ceremony. I’m just a sucker for “occasions”, what can I say.
Well, I think it might well be. Mittens was wrong in a way; it’s not just about the athletes in the end. or in a way for them. It’s now a way of saying “Hi World, lots of shit out there, but it can look better!” (And we haven’t really had a chance to say “Hi, all you x billion folks” of late, and Afghanistan and Iraq weren’t really a terrific advert, and probably won’t again for a very long time.) I’m really pleased with the amount of attention the Paralympics has been — and will be — getting too. The London one is really not going to be a forgotten slightly embarrassing off-stage sideshow, I think.
Noticed that Londoners seem to be being very nice to everybody, helpful and pretty smiley. (You tend to get quite sensitised to moods like that when you’re a cripple.) Don’t know whether it’s the Olympics effect — a kind of anti-Romney particle/wave he’s set off? I mean something’s that got people subconsciously thinking, “Oh, bloody hell, they might be foreign, don’t want to upset them” — or just the week’s good weather . . .
Just been watching the opening: that was just WICKED! Totally unexpected.
(Especially the ‘arrival’ of HM. . . and then Mr Bean. . .I had tears rolling down my cheeks. Couldn’t stop laughing.)
French friend phoned from the South, where she is still, who loved it too; said she was trying to find out from French TV what they thought of it . . .I suspect it’ll just confirm what a lot of people think already, that the Brits are a bit strange, have a very peculiar sense of humour, and can’t really take anything as seriously as they ought to . . .
(I mean, we make a huge joke out of our head of state . . . and she actually joins in! Bet Mitt was dumbfounded . . )
Just watched it rebroadcast on NBC – Cool Britannia – everyone was having fun – and first time that I’ve stayed awake until midnight in a while
@expat
British history shown through the medium of expressive dance! Who wouldn’t love that?
(Although they severely understated the scale of the fight between Mary Poppins and
Voldemort.)
& Beatles,Becks,Mr.Bean and Bond and the Baked Bean jumping from a helicopter ; )
Looks as though NBC really fucked up. I saw somewhere they were interrupting their (delayed — why, oh why?) — broadcast every few minutes with commercials.
That show was so fast I imagine a lot of people in he US would have been totally mystified, since they’d have missed about half of what was going on.
Bill Plaschke in the LA Times (who must have seen the whole thing, not an NBC emasculation) got it just tight, I think:
But I really am getting thoroughly pissed off by the apparently obligatory mention in (it seems) every US media report that there should have been a remembrance of Munich. There was. For everyone around the world who the ‘Olympic truce’ has — inevitably –failed. FFS, one of the Ruandan team alone lost six of his family in the genocide.
I think everyone in the stadium, and most people watching here at least, got that point.
Squirrel – I think the whole point of a specific remembrance of Munich is that that happened to athletes at the Olympics venue during the Games. Most people seem to be missing that point.
Mind you, I don’t give a shit whether there’s a remembrance or not. It just thoroughly pisses me off that people seem to be deliberately not getting the difference between 11 athletes murdered during and at the Olympics and, for example, an athlete who lost six family members during a totally-unrelated-to-the-Olympics genocide.
Something one of the commenters in the Graun mentioned that i had totally forgotten about – the UK press savaged the Vancouver Olympics. Graun too, i remember being shocked at the rudeness. Just did a search to check, and yep, it’s all there.
It ran from 7:30 to near midnight here Squirrel so I think they stretched it out to fit in the ads. We didn’t seem to miss much – and NBC need to earn their keep some how
Tanya Gold has a good article up. Used to be that i couldn’t stand her articles, but she has been getting better and better.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/27/london-2012-idiot-games-leaders