Gold medal for commercialism

Ah Sydney, the stuff of dreams.\nNo, it's not just a place where you can say "fair dinkum" without worrying that nobody will understand what the hell you mean. Well, I don't actually know what "fair dinkum" means myself, but it just rolls off the tongue.\nBut Sydney is the culmination of so much sweat and grit, so much strain and commitment.\nOnce upon a time, a little boy set his sights on the Olympic dream.\n(Cut to fuzzy shot of a little boy on a dew-soaked field kicking around a ball at the break of dawn.)\nEvery day after practice, he would stick around the soccer field, long after all the other kids left. He would skip classes and lunch periods, put off friends and worry his poor mother to no end -- all for his dedication and passion.\nThat starry-eyed little boy was me. Imagine my chagrin when I discovered that the short-sighted Olympic Committee did not schedule an event in my specialty -- freestyle chain smoking. Nor was there any sport in the field that involved seeing how many issues of the Atlantic Monthly you can get before paying for the subscription.\nAnd so all my hard work and dedication went to seed. \nImagine my disappointment. Imagine how embittered I've become with the Olympics, the great height of amateur athleticism as brought to you by Mastercard, Nike, FedEx, GE, Panasonic and, of course, NBC. \nAs I mull over my sad fate, I frequently head outside the confines of my room to smoke a Camel cigarette, the official Turkish blend cigarette of the summer Olympic games. Well, maybe the tobacco industry hasn't actually bought up official sponsorship of the Olympics yet, but it really wouldn't be a stretch.\nMichael Johnson, a gazelle if there ever was one, just won yet another gold medal in the 400-meter dash Monday. For the love of all that is good and holy, the guy probably has more of that precious medal than the federal reserve. If the currency suddenly crashes, we'll know who to turn to.\nBut I honestly just don't see him training on a diet of Snickers or McDonald's. Nor can I really see him laying about on the couch watching a procession of ads on NBC.\nIt's little wonder that the ratings have been at a historic low. When you cut to a commercial break every two minutes, people are bound to lose interest. That, and pole vaulting isn't really that enthralling in and of itself, particularly when you've only seen today's "ESPN's Baseball Tonight" twice.\nSure, the Orioles don't have a hope in Hades of making it to the playoffs, but that Mike Mussina's got a wicked slider. Plus, Major League Baseball has no pretensions.\nWidespread apathy aside, I don't even know why there are still appeals to patriotism in the Olympics. Vince Carter didn't prove the supremacy of our country over France with that phenomenal dunk -- he proved the supremacy of Nike. That is, if anything was proven. It's surprising that France even managed to round up enough guys to fill out a starting lineup.\nTruth be told, the Olympics has just degenerated into a meaningless commercial spectacle, with the once dignified opening ceremonies now rivaling the inanity of the bloated Super Bowl halftime shows.\nWhen I light up my next Camel, I won't need a flaming arrow. The sky won't be suffused with streaking pyrotechnics. All I need is my handy Zippo, the official refillable lighter of the Olympic games.