Olympics Closing Ceremony

Did anyone watch the Olympics Closing Ceremony last night? I did. Wouldn't have missed it for anything. Well, OK, so I had to miss the beginning of it, dealing with kids and dinner and grocery shopping and laundry, but I caught that part later on the replay.

I loved it. My husband said it was "boring."

There was, of course, some ceremonial pomp and circumstance, with the athletes entering the stadium, the Olympic flag-lowering ceremony, the passing of the flag to the IOC president, who gave it to the mayor of Sochi, Russia, as the host of the 2014 Winter Games.

There was a choir singing, and a tribute to the Olympic Luge contestant who died in a horrible accident on the first day of the Olympics.

All of that was necessary, moving even, but perhaps not "entertaining" in the usual sense of the word. But in addition to the necessary ceremonial duties, Canada put on quite a show.

First, I must say, those Canadians cracked me up. They did a skit making fun of the now-famous glitch in the opening ceremony when one of the cauldron's pillars did not emerge from the floor and left their former gold medal speedskater Catriona Le May Doan standing awkwardly holding a torch, with nothing to light. In the end, she got to light the cauldron for the closing ceremony.

Can you imagine if the Chinese had a glitch like that one in their opening ceremony? I doubt there would have been a closing ceremony making fun of it; instead, it would have been an embarassment, hush-hushed, no one allowed to talk about it. Those Canadians, though - like the good hosts and good sports that they are - they brought it right back out into the limelight and encouraged us to laugh along with them at their misfortune. And gave Catriona Le May Doan her chance to light the cauldron after all. I love that!

Canadian-born actors William Shatner (Captain Kirk of Star Trek, Denny Crane of The Practice and Boston Legal), Catherine Anne O'Hara (Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman), and Michael J. Fox (Family Ties, Back to the Future, Spin City), also made me laugh a few times with their humorous monologues.

Michael J. Fox looked better than I've seen him look in a while. His Parkinson's tremor wasn't as noticeable as it sometimes is, and he looked stronger than he has looked in the past couple of years.

And you had to love the very tongue-in-cheek performance by Michael Buble, dressed in Mountie gear, complete with giant inflatable beavers and moose, giant cardboard cutout table-hockey players and a kid wearing what looked like a giant tire starring as the hockey puck.

And there were great performances by a huge variety of performer such as Neil Young, Nickelback, Alanis Morissette, and more.

The whole closing ceremony was a good mix of ceremony, humor, music, and a beautiful light show. Were there some parts that didn't make me go "wow"? Sure. But overall, I thought it was spectacular and fun and a fitting end to the games.

I loved it.