The Friday Five: Olympics, Inspiration, and a Dash of Insanity

Aloha Friday!  FriYAY!  Whatever you want to call it, thank everything it's the end of another week and we can go onto the next one.  I know I'd like to forget this past week (hell, the entire month can be fired for all I care and 2016 is drunk so it needs to go home) but let's see if we can't find something good here.

1. Considering that some of us (I know I do) need coffee to survive, here's what coffee actually does to your body (Huffington Post).  With the coffee and insomnia link, I do need to stop drinking coffee around 4 or 5 pm.  However, drinking any sort of black tea doesn't cause insomnia, so I dunno what's happening there.

2. Onion Ring distribution system and sweaters covered in cat hair: 7 great things about being a writer! - because, really, sometimes we all need a pick me up about being a writer.  And yes, that's from Jan Markley's blog and I might need to go pick up one or more of her books.

3. The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore ended last night, possibly due to Comedy Central thinking that it could fill the Colbert Show's big shoes (it did in it's own ways), but not in the ways that mattered to the network behind it.  Here's Washington Post's Michael Cavna on what I learned about comic writing from Larry Wilmore.  There's a lot of good advice in there, including to make sure that you are keeping it 100 (real) and trying not to make too many pop culture references.

4. The Olympics closing ceremony is Sunday and, while it's been fun, I think I'm ready for it to be over.  According to TV by the numbers, ratings are down for the first week of the games and... honestly, I'm not surprised.  NBC needs to stop focusing on the fluff pieces, get better commentators (I'm looking at you, gymnastics), and air all of it no matter where the US team falls in the standings.  It doesn't help that there was a lot of negative stories about how Rio wasn't ready to host the games due to Zika and the village not being ready, so I don't think a lot of people wanted to watch.  Add in the fact that the crowds are being rude - I consider booing a silver medalist while receiving his medal to get a gold medal in rudeness and they're throwing opponents off their game - that people just stop watching.  I know that I haven't been watching the Olympics live as I'm either streaming or watching via DVR with fast forwarding and I'm not the only one.

5. Okay, not really a dash of insanity, but here's the Daily Show's What the Actual Fact - Donald Trump's Anti-Terrorism Policies.

Okay, that's it for this Friday Five!  Have a good weekend, everyone.

Friday Five: Olympics!

Who's excited?!

1. Full Schedule of all Olympic events and how to watch them.  I'm looking forward to fencing - it's my outside of the mainstream event that I love (curling in winter Olympics) - and the more mainstream like swimming and gymnastics.  I'll be watching as much as I can, to be honest.

2. For all the talk about the Zika virus and the Olympics, it turns out there's not that big of a risk anymore.  To be fair, Rio's going into winter, so of course it's down.  Bugs usually go away in winter after all.

3. Here's the feeling old part of the Friday Five - it's been 20 years since the Magnificent Seven.  For everyone who doesn't know, they were the first team to win gold for the US in gymnastics.  That team was Amanda Borden, Amy Chow, Dominique Dawes, Shannon Miller, Dominique Moceanu, Jaycie Phelps, and Kerri Strug.  Of all seven, if you remember them, you probably remember Kerri Strug's vault the most.  Here's a refresher if you don't: 

4. Here's some heroes in waiting that could win a first time medal for their countries.  My money is on Salome Nyirarukundo from Rwanda for the 10,000m race that'll run on August 12th.  I'll be watching or streaming.

5. Also, it's not just August that has the Olympic games.  Paraolympics start up September 7th to 18th - opening wheelchair rugby has Australia vs Great Britain.

Bonus: This is why you should always double check if you'll be roaming or not, even if you're gold medal Olympic gymnast Kohei Uchimura.  At least his phone company was nice enough to cut it down to $30 instead of what it was.