I don't care about figure skating or skate dancing competition. Or, rather, I care too much about it so I choose not to watch it. It's too metaphorical.

All they do is fall. It's all about the fall.

I seem to remember a time when if a skater fell it was a rarity and they were pretty much out of the competition for a medal. Now, I guess, if you don't injure a specator with your blade when you fly into the stands you have a chance for the Gold. I don't get it. Four years ago I couldn't watch it and the incidents have only increased since then.

"It's because now they require a triple instead of a double and you have to go much faster to do a triple," a friend explained last night at the bar after we watched another one hit the ice ... with her face. If competitors can't do a triple without falling, why require it? I thought the Olympics were about lifting up the human race, honoring the physical form, rewarding excellence, reveling in clean competition. It doesn't appear to be anymore. Even if skaters don't fall, they'll have, at the ready, a video clip showing them falling last year. What is this? American Idol?

Apparently. I can't watch that, either.