London Paralympics 2012

It's 8am on Thursday (I think) and I'm writing today about yesterday because it was such a long busy day that by the time I got back, I was too tired to write anything down. Our day began around 9:30 and we didn't get in until around midnight. We started with a bus tour of London and got to see lots of great places -- Big Ben (named after the well-liked man who was in charge of the building project, Benjamin something), Westminster Abbey, St. Paul's Cathedral, and of course, Buckingham Palace. We didn't get to go into any of these landmarks, but we took pictures from the outside. We ate lunch in one of the beautiful parks/gardens on the lawn, in the sun. It was an absolutely gorgeous day. Bright, sunny and about 80 degrees with a wonderful cool breeze.

Following the tour, we headed straight over to Olympic Park and watched the Gold medal men's double wheelchair tennis match between the USA and Great Britain. Needless to say, the USA fans were outnumbered by about 100 to 1, but it was so much fun anyway. We had a rowdy group of Brits in front of us and they had all kinds of fun songs and chants they sang (yelled) and all we had was "U.S.A.!!!" We answered their loud calls a few times with that, but I'm really quite disappointed that the U.S. hasn't come up with something else for us to use. It's my mission now to come up with something creative that we can chant and cheer during exciting games like that.

The U.S. team ended up winning Gold and it came down to the 3rd and final match. GB was seeded first, so it was really exciting to get to experience the "underdog" win first place. One of the guys that played had an electric wheelchair, which you'd think wouldn't be fair. But he only has partial use of his arms - neither had full range of motion functionality. He held the racket in one hand, controlled his chair with one hand, and actually tossed the ball to serve with his FEET!!!! So inspiring. It makes me think.....what the heck have I done with my life?! LOL!

I had my first pin-trading experience during the tennis match. Hartford gave us three pins to trade while we're here (pin-trading is a big thing at the Olympics) and one of them is the official Team USA pin. The nice British boy, Tim Jones, who works for the Int'l Tennis Federation, and I started talking about the pins. He said he wanted my Team USA pin. I didn't know, until later, that it's a pretty valuable pin. He "traded" me for his ITF pin. I was kinda excited about my first trade. Then he turned around and burst my bubble in a hurry - he had a pocketful of those pins and he just gave them out to other people around me. Are you kidding me?! I totally got ripped off. The more I thought about it throughout the day, the more upset I got. So, I'm on a mission today to find Mr. Tim Jones, and if I do, he owes me. Big time!!

Me and Tim Jones, the pin-thief :)

Afterwards, we headed over to the Holiday Inn where the US Olympic Committee is staying and enjoyed dinner there. A quick dinner. Then headed over to watch Track & Field (or as the Olympians call it, "Athletics"). That was so amazing. Seriously don't even know how to put it into words. I'm sure at some point in these athletes' lives, they were told they'd never be able to run or play a certain sport, etc, and here they are --- in the Olympics, in an arena full of 80,000 fans screaming for them, competing for the title of "Best in the World." I was so emotional. Every time someone would win, my eyes would fill up with tears. It was just so moving. We stayed until the last race, then headed back to the hotel and got into bed a little after midnight.....then up at 6:30 for another fun-filled day. Here we go!!!