Two weeks of sports you haven't seen in 4 years and won't see for another 4.

The Winter Olympics. Or, as the snobs would say: The Games of the XXI Olympiad. Great, another sport with Roman numerals. That's 21 I think.

It's cold in some parts of the world (and some parts of the United States) and there are people who know exactly how to ski and fire a weapon or how to jump off a big ramp wearing skis or to waddle cross-country on ... skis. Here, not so much. Our skiing is limited to going on expensive vacations, going downhill on something they call a "black diamond course" and retiring to the chalet for beers and medical attention.

We wouldn't know a luge if it crashed into us, and now everybody will know what a luge is. Imagine lying face-up on a sled being pulled by a car at a high rate of speed and randomly tossed from side to side and the only way you can stop yourself is to hit something or continue sliding until you come to a stop. It sounds like something you'd give a kid for his birthday if you really hated the kid.

Nodar Kumaritashvili, a Georgian (no, not Ray Charles' Georgia, the one Paul McCartney sang about) was killed during luge practice. Practice. Now, luge experts are coming out of the woodwork (icework?) to tell us how dangerous luging is and how this track is way too fast. Duh. It's a solid sheet of ice with ramps and banking and gravity. You tend to pick up speed. That's why there is no "Uphill Luge" event. It would suck.

Now, for the next three days your friends will be asking, "Hey, did you hear about that guy on the luge?" Or, "How about that guy on the luge, huh?" You should reply, "Oh, you mean Nodar Kumaritashvili? Yeah, shame. Big fan."

The luge event on NBC will get boffo ratings. One thing it will not encourage is the sales of luges. It might be a bad time to be in the luge-making business, as if there ever was a good time to be in the luge-making business.

Poor guy. All he wanted to do was slide on an icy track lying on his back at 90 miles per hour with no protective gear and nothing but a flimsy helmet and a spandex suit. Meanwhile, I can't go to the grocery store in my car without fastening my seat belt.

Life is strange.