Is one little medal too much to ask?

By TONY WALL

"Have we won a medal yet?" I ask forlornly, a tinge of hope just audible in my voice.

"No," my colleague replies for the 10th time this day, irritation at my incessant questioning beginning to turn to anger.

"You'll have a pretty sad two weeks if you keep asking that question," he spits.

God, this cannot be happening. You probably won't believe this, but before I started watching the Olympics, I had long, flowing hair.

But the stress - or should I say psychological torture - of being a New Zealand sports fan(atic) during the world's premier sporting event has left me with a mop of Homer Simpson-like proportions.

Not only that, I've bitten my nails to the quick and developed an expensive habit of throwing fragile items at my television set.

All I want is a medal. I don't care what colour. Is that too much to ask?

Personal bests and top 16 finishes are all very well, but hardly enough to get the blood boiling.

The longer the drought, the more neurotic I feel. Maybe it's my fault, I start thinking. Maybe I'm jinxing the Kiwis.

This seems to be borne out by the fact that whenever I'm tuned out, our results aren't too bad. We actually complete events, or don't lose by more than 10 points or laps or whatever.

But the second I switch on my TV, settle into my couch and get ready to savour some Kiwi success, it all turns to custard.

Take the triathlon, for example. I missed the swim leg, and Hamish Carter exits the water just a few metres behind the leader. He's hot to trot, set to fulfil the pre-Games predictions of a gold or silver. Bollocks.

No one counted on the Wallo jinx.

An hour after I turn on my television, Carter is so far out of the action the commentators appear to have forgotten he's even in the race.

"

@%$

%***," I mutter as Carter crosses the line in 26th place. The remote bounces off the telly.

Of course, I'm an eternal optimist. No matter how bad things get, there's always the next event.

So I turn my attention to the horses. We can't lose here, I thought. It's a sure thing.

Yeah, right. All the horses fall down lame, the Wallo jinx strikes again, and the cupboard is still bare.

Righto, what about Sarah Ulmer in the cycling. She's really good. She should get a bronze, and that'll do.

I scream, I plead, I beg, I run around the living room, I get ready to leap into the air - and bang, the jinx strikes again. She leads the whole way, then loses by 0.08 of a second.

Okay, what about this hockey. It seems like a good bet. The Dutch may be No 2 in the world, but our girls have the look of winners.

This time, in an attempt to beat the cursed jinx, I switch between the game and a bad American sitcom. The theory is, when I'm not watching, we won't let in any goals.

What happens? I switch back to the hockey with a minute left, the score is 3-3 and before I can switch away to the bad comedy, someone with a name like van den Buggerit shoots home the winner.

A last-minute loss, and John Eales was nowhere to be seen.

This time I can't handle it, and I attack the team personally when I get to work the next day.

"I'd like to see you do better," a colleague says. Oh no, not this dreaded argument.

"I'm not a bloody hockey player," I say. "That's the whole point. If it was the Couch Potato Games, I would do better."

As I write this, some sailors and rowers are in with a chance of medal success. You can rest assured that I won't be watching them race. I'm not gonna jinx them.