Slightly Askew

Weekend is a glossy magazine that comes with Saturday’s Guardian. It’s a great read - especially Craig Taylor’s One Million Tiny Plays About Britain. But that’s not what I’m going to babble on about today.

Because Lucy Mangan’s column was hilariously ill-timed.

The topic of her concern was the Olympic Games, which she described as:

A bloated extravaganza designed to bring countries together for a fortnight by sublimating their vicious geopolitical rivalries into displays of native talents in the most jingoistic, neo-Nietzschean fashion possible.

Er… yeah. Right.

Mangan has, however, watched enough socially acceptable warfare amongst mental nationalists (or sport, as I prefer) to know that world records don’t come easy. She’s not particularly impressed by them though.

And how excited can you truly become now that records are broken in barely detectable increments? … Gold medallists now become so by hundredths of a second. That’s the kind of victory that depends on how many ounces less your hair weighs than the other guy’s. The barbers should get the glory.

And as I was reading it, I sort of nodded in agreement.

But a few hours later, this happened.

Either Usain Bolt’s barber is going to get a whole lot more business, or Lucy Mangan should hold her hands up and admit that Bolt’s performance was pure entertainment.

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