Finally! Canada Gets Some Hardware in China

It's taken a while, but we (meaning Canada) finally has some medals at the Olympics. After falling a couple of hundredths of a second short in the pool, one centimeter short in the shot putt and way off in the gym, Canada took home the rainbow winning a gold and a bronze in women's wrestling, as well as a silver in men's pairs rowing. Yay!

It's been a disappointing Olympics thus far for Canada, given our size and the fact that the next Olympics are in Vancouver in 2010 (albeit the winter games where we get to take advantage of our perennial cold weather). For a bit of a background, Canada's athlete's don't get a lot of funding. Many work full-time jobs while training and, in many cases, going to university. There's more money for many than there has been in the past, but lots still struggle to make ends meet. My wife and I were pondering a few days ago what would happen if we got totally shut out in China. Would more funding come in? And if so, is it a good way to spend the cash. Sure, athletics are an important part of our identity and a lot of good comes from being healthy and promoting a healthy lifestyle, but are these a bigger priority than other issues such as health care, education and battling homelessness?

That's pretty deep thinking for this Saturday morning. So in honour of our wins - even if that Michael Phelps guy has more than double the number of medals as our entire country - here's another great Canadian, Alanis Morissette singing Oh, Canada:



On a side note, the mystery of who Morissette was singing about in You Oughta Know has finally been revealed: David Coulier, or uber dorky Uncle Joey from Full House. Huh? Talk about disappointment and kinda gross considering their 15-year age difference, which may not seem that gross now but their relationship was something like 15 years ago when Morrisette was around 19-years-old.