Touching gold

As editor/publisher of CUNewswire.com I get to do all kinds of neat things and meet neat people that I would never do or meet otherwise.

Right now I'm in Regina SK at a conference and one of the speakers was Brad Gushue, captain of the Canadian Olympic team that took the gold in Torino 2006. Now as a non-Canadian, I never quite understood curling, but then again I never understood baseball. Too much waiting around for nothing to happen on baseball, and in curling...well it's really nice that all those people are trying to keep the ice clean so fast.

Still listening to Gushue speak was a true pleasure. He admitted to being a sook (?) spelling probably best translated into his Newfoundland slang as a wimp and crying when his national anthem was played. And he gave an insight to the events behind the scenes that was fascinating such as they didn't realise the huge bird in the opening ceremonies was made up of human bodies until after it was all over.

He passed his medal through the audience and only a couple of times asked where it was. People touched it, put it around their necks, had their photos taken with it.

Even if I find the Olympics often too business driven, I admire all the athletes who worked so hard to get that to the stadiums and rinks. It always infuriates me when some announcer says, "Too bad he only took a silver (or a bronze)" Getting to the Olympics is such a major accomplishment in and of itself or as in my case yesterday, just being able to touch a gold medal.