The Olympics are here! The Olympics are here!

Wait. Why am I so excited?

Half a world away — as a kid, I was told I could actually dig myself there — the 2008 Summer Olympic Games are set to begin Friday.

NBC will plaster so much of the Games on the airwaves and the Internet that even Hannah Montana, er, Miley Cyrus will be jealous.

But the days of getting jazzed for the Olympics have long since passed for me.

Sure, there are a few compelling story lines. Well, at least I think there are a few compelling story lines.

Other than the U.S. men's basketball team trying to avoid another embarrassing showing and Michael Phelps striving to come home with more gold than the Mayan civilization, these Games are devoid of excitement.

So far, the biggest stories have been the smog, Chinese officials trying to rig the weather and the U.S. cycling team showing up at the Beijing airport prepared for a nuclear winter.

Really riveting stuff.

Like everything else in sports coverage these days, the news isn't about what is going on athletically, but about what is going on off the field.

The Olympics are not immune.

In the coming days, I'm sure we'll hear about someone doping, about someone protesting, about someone sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber to avoid the smog in Beijing.

Here are some stories that would make for some interesting Olympic Games and certainly would grab my attention:

• Phelps, going the way of Jason Giambi by growing one mean 'stache, finishes .001 of a second away from winning his eighth gold medal.

The 'stache slowed him down. Thanks, Giambi!

• Someone actually watches the men's badminton competition at 5 a.m. on the USA Network.

• The U.S. men's basketball team, attempting no-look passes and high-flying dunks while completely ignoring fundamentals and forgetting this is not the NBA, loses to Angola.

• Giant insects and other-worldly creatures come out of the smog, er, the mist, and trap the U.S. trampoline team in a grocery store.

• Not to be outdone by U.S. swimmer Amanda Beard, Mandiba, the horse from Valencia, poses nude to protest the unethical treatment of people.

• Norway handball star Ragnhild Aamodt decides to sit out the first game of the Olympics with a sore knee. Norway officials claim there is no problem — it's just Ragnhild being Ragnhild.

• A kid at Fun Fore All inCranberry petitions the IOC to make Dance Dance Revolution an Olympic sport.

• I win my fantasy Olympics league. Go Katie Hoff!