Try not to think about these games

Posted: Wed February 11, 1998 at 12:49 PM ET

I watch women from Kazakhstan and Belarus ski across the Japanese mountains on my television screen, then fall down in the snow and begin firing rifles. A little insert in the corner of the screen tells me whether each shot is good or not.

"How about this?" I say, "We bring a few more sports into the Winter Olympics."

I watch Germans hurtle down a tunnel of ice on their little sleds in the luge. I suppose these are Germans from the Eastern part of the country. The east Germans traditionally have been a very good at hurtling down this tunnel of ice on their little sleds.

"I don't mean new sports,", I say, "I mean different sports. I mean...let's take a few sports from the Summer Olympics and put them into the Winter Olympics."

I watch Dutch men skate very fast on a large artificial rink. The announcer says they are using the new clap skate. Sounds like an invention for late-night television. Wins a gold medal and turns on the living room lights at the same time. The clap skate.

"I mean boxing," I say. "We take boxing from the summer and put it in the winter. Boxing isn't a summer sport. It doesn't belong to any season. With every succeeding Summer Olympics, boxing seems to get less and less attention. In the Winter Olympics, boxing would be a star attraction. Or maybe wrestling could move. Or weighlifting. Or fencing..."

I watch Canadian women vigorously sweep a stretch of ice to clear a path for a large round stone toward a bullseye. I watch slender men from Finland ski down a chute and fly. I watch Russian men and women skate together in pairs, skate very well.

"Maybe volleyball," I say. "That would be a bigger attraction in the Winter. Team handball. Or judo. What about that? Judo. Wouldn't that have been a great attraction this time?"

The thoughts come into my mind -- a billion crazy thoughts -- as I watch the Winter Olympics. There seems to be time for thinking. Do you know what I mean?