SOCHI! This past weekend, the first weekend of the Winter Olympics 2014, has been total excitement for Olympians and Olympic viewers alike. Ice skating and slopestyle competitions were broadcast Friday into Saturday, Saturday night, and Sunday during the day on NBC. If you prefer to watch it live, like myself, roll on over to NBC’s livecast on their main website. You have to say that you’re subscribed to one of the cable providers that NBC supports, but other than that it’s completely free.

Opening Ceremony 2014:

The opening ceremony was absolutely gorgeous, of course the London Olympics’ opening and closing ceremonies will always be my favorite. I had really high standards from there on out. (Who doesn’t love watching the Queen of England interact with THE James Bond- who doesn’t love that!?) The Russian alphabet being displayed was probably the thing I loved the most. Their culture is so traditional. It was certainly interesting watching the countries coming out during The Parade of Nations. The ice women escorting the Olympians out reminded me of Queen Elsa from Frozen. One of the Olympians from Austria wiped out and his fellow teammates didn’t notice until they, themselves almost fell over him. The only Olympian representing Venezuela danced his little heart out and I couldn’t stop laughing because of it. He would honestly be me if I ever became an Olympian. The man reminded me of a Ferris Bueller sort of dancing in his own little world. He really made up for the enthusiasm that some Olympic countries lacked. I kept forgetting that the order of the teams was going by the Cyrillic Alphabet, so I waited, and waited, and waited for Team Canada to show up. Then after they came, Uzbekistan and every other country and their mother came on before I saw Team USA. I have to admit, I fangirled a bit when I saw the white and red of Canada.

I’m not even Canadian, and I probably have the most Canadian Pride, don’t tell my mother.

After the torch was lit, It was officially time for the games to start.

Slopestyle is a brand new event dealing with ramps and rails. Each run is scored out of 100. The crowd favorite (and my personal favorite) Mark McMorris took bronze in slopestyle after sweeping the boards with 33.75 points on his first run to a whopping 88.75 on his last run in the finals. His final score landed him in third, with a bronze- the first bronze medal awarded to Team Canada. The poor kid barely broke 90 on all of his runs from prelims to the final.

In my opinion, he should have scored higher on his second run in the semifinals. His triple cork was on point and he had an all over smooth run. These judges are known to, well, judge harshly, but I felt that he had points taken away where they should have been. The 20 year old had a broken rib and still managed to make it down not only in one piece, but with his best tricks.

Sage Kotsenburg, placed first with a gold, pulled out an astounding new trick that he never had tried before previously. I swear that some of these snowboarders are borderline psychotic! He said that he had “blacked out” in the middle of it, so he didn’t know how he landed it or even attempted it. He took home the very first gold medal for Team USA.

In retrospect, some controversy happened with Slopestyle runners earlier in the week. Sebastian Toutant and Max Parrot, both Canadian, had thrown shade at fellow boarder, Shaun White. They felt that White was scared and feared losing to them, when in the finals, they themselves didn’t place and were beaten by an American! Oh, how the tables have turned.

Then, Jamie Anderson smacked all sexist comments about women snowboarders in the face with another gold medal for Team USA. Her 95.25 points beat her closest opponent Enni Rukajarvi ( 92.50.)

All in all, I have a feeling that this will either be the best and or worst Olympics that has yet to come. Putin still scares the daylights out of me and his creepy smile after Julia won gold only made me want to crawl into the deepest parts of a dark and lonesome pit. The LGBT community is getting crushed by Russia’s anti-gay laws, which is absolutely ridiculous. The IOC President’s anti-discrimination part of his speech was mysteriously cut by NBC. This was extremely annoying and odd because they kept promoting unity and how basically how unacceptable it was that Russia discriminated it’s people, but yet they cut the most important part of the speech? I don’t understand it one bit.

BRONZE FOR TRYING- #SOCHIFAILS

On a lighter note, the Olympians have been dealing with Russian conditions and non-finished hotel rooms. The hashtag #SochiFails and #SochiProblems have been going around twitter. A small child has been quoted by an American Olympian saying, “In Russia, we don’t have problems, we have adventures.” And oh boy, the Olympians have had some adventures worth noting. Bathrooms have no walls, fixtures are falling in the middle of the night, doorknobs are falling off doors from the inside, locks are being changed without the knowledge of the Olympians staying in the room; grass is being painted onto brown grass, roofs are just being put on, wifi routers are hanging from ceilings, toilet paper is to be thrown into a wastebasket, not a toilet; toilets are disconnected, firehoses are equipped next to the toilets, you know just incase you needed to put out a dangerous fire while sitting on the throne after a long day; wires are dangerously hanging in showers- yes, I said IN the showers. Toilet bowl’s lids are on backwards, water is not useable in the bathrooms- called “dangerous face water”, the Olympic rings not lighting up during the opening ceremony, and the best thing that has happened yet: Johnny Quinn, bobsledder for America, had to break down his bathroom door because for some reason, it wouldn’t open. Then as of yesterday morning, he got stuck in his hotel’s elevator. I feel terrible for laughing, but it’s absolutely hysterical.

Tune in Wednesday to see my take on Shaun White, the Halfpipe, and hopefully more #SochiFails.

Happy Olympics!