Romance, Showmance?

I miss the Olympics. Every day while they were going on there was so much to watch, with lots of good stuff to think about and blog about. Without them I've gone blog-silent for a couple of days, but over the week-end several things have stuck me as blog-worthy, so here we go.

First, politico points out how physically fit all four of the presidential/vice presidential candidates are. Apparently youngest-of-the-four Paul Ryan is a former personal trainer who is still dedicated to extreme fitness and has a body fat percentage in the range of 6-8%. Wow. Even oldest-of-the four Joe Biden is fit and trim at the age of 69. Romney does the treadmill, Obama plays basketball, it's all very inspiring. Or maybe not. All this fitness puts these guys somewhat at odds with regular Americans, most of whom are getting fatter by the minute. And hey there, Chris Christie. If you have presidential dreams for 2016 or beyond, get yourself to the gym, post haste.

The Daily Beast has a fun story about how much travel has changed in the last 25 years. I've always been intrigued by the idea of the longest scheduled commercial airline flight, which in 1987 was from Sydney, Australia to San Francisco on a Pan Am 747SP, at 7,417 miles. Pan Am and the 747SP are both long gone now, of course, although United still flies the route in a 747-400, with the westbound flight scheduled for 14 hours/28 minutes. Today the longest flight is an 18 hour/40 minutes Singapore Airlines marathon from Newark to Singapore, flown in an Airbus A340 and coming in at 9,534 miles. That's a really long time to sit in an aluminum tube.

Speaking of the Olympics, Michael Phelps is apparently in some trouble with the IOC. He's appearing in a print ad for Louis Vuitton which could potentially cause him to be stripped of his medals. Why? The IOC forbids Olympic athletes from appearing in promotions for companies other than the official Olympic sponsors while the Olympics are going on and for a couple of weeks before and after. The LV ad leaked early and the IOC isn't happy. I can't imagine they'll really take Phelps's medals away, but this is a good reminder of what's really at the heart of the Olympic movement: sponsorship money.

Finally, and speaking of sponsorship money, tomorrow is an important anniversary in the world of romance, true love and reality TV. You don't remember? August 20 was the day Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries said "I do" in their over-the-top made-for-TV wedding-of-the-year extravaganza. At the time I gave the marriage two years, which turned out to be just a wee bit optimistic. Kim filed for divorce 72 days later and now the divorce proceedings have been going on longer than the actual marriage and there's no end in sight. Apparently the jilted groom is holding out for an annulment, based on his belief that it wasn't a real marriage, but rather a publicity stunt cooked up to goose ratings for that Masterpiece Theater imitation known as Keeping Up With The Kardashians. My favorite comment came from an observer on the Today show this morning, who said it's actually a third party who's whispering in Kris's ear that he should string things along as long as possible. Who could possibly have a vested interest in Kim staying married to Kris? Kanye West. Love it.