NBC SUCKS at covering the Olympics.

So I'm watching a bit of the Olympics, or at least parts of it. I have to say, I'm a little disappointed in the coverage. Why?

1. They pump up the big ratings sports - swimming, gymnastics, diving, etc. So you tune in to watch the sport, only to find that they're running ten million little things like interviews with Michael Phelps' mom, maybe ten minutes of "filler" sports (which basically consists of showing the LAST performance of the gold medal winner, if they were a US athlete or a superstar in some way) and MAYBE five minutes of the thing you tuned in for to begin with! I just found out that the women's gymnastics isn't on until 10:30! And they've been pumping this up for "prime time coverage" for TWO days, according to my friend Kelly who is coming over to watch it - she's taking her time because it's not on for a while.

2. They cover all these asinine stories of the athletes but don't show their medal ceremonies. I'd be ticked off if I were the mother of some swimmer who won the gold medal whose last name WASN'T Phelps.

3. The only female sports they show are ones in which they wear skimpy outfits. Seriously, haven't seen one other sport. Maybe five minutes of soccer, but for the large part, its all gymnastics, swimming, water polo, diving, synchronized diving, and beach volleyball - no regular volleyball, mind you. NBC apparently thinks that if they show women's fencing, they'll lose that all-important segment of the target market that we call "perverts".

4. I realize that the Olympics are still making up for taking a huge loss in both Sydney and Athens as ticket sales and sponsorships STUNK there, (really, you could have WALKED into any event you wanted in Athens except swimming or beach volleyball. I was there, and I was really ticked that I had paid 250 Euros for a ticket I could have walked into for free), but I have literally seen commercial minutes to programming minutes at a ratio of 3:2. Yes, there's more commercials than actual programming.

5. Even the events I WANT to watch aren't complete. I'm a little cranky that I can't see the entire gymnastics competition, and I have to say - you know what? Those Australian, French, German and Ukranian girls work just as hard. They deserve some coverage too, even though they probably won't win a gold medal.

SO. I'm DVR'ing and then just fast forwarding. I'm already slightly breaking the boycott rules by having watched the opening ceremonies (which were, in fact, gorgeous), so I figure by doing this, I'm sticking one to the man.

Take that, man.