olympic sprit

I've avoided it for as long as possible. I've closed my eyes and my ears and refused to acknowledge what has been building up. But this past weekend, something snapped. Maybe I woke up. Maybe I looked around me. The Olympics are in London. I am not excited.

I'm not much of a spectator sports person. I would not go into a stadium to see people run laps or dash down a track a sixteenth of a mile long, and I would certainly not pay for it. The Tour de France is the only sport I've seen live in the last ten years outside events I've participated in, like football, running and cycling. Football is the only thing I watch on TV. Whether there are Olympics or not makes no difference to my life.

Except it does. London is a big city, 8 million people by the latest count, but the two weeks of sports days can be felt everywhere, and the ramifications aren't pleasant. The venues are largely concentrated in the east of town but scattered throughout. Athletes, officials and spectators will shuttle around, clogging roads and putting strain on a public transport system that already runs at capacity. I have received several flyers warning me that bus routes will be altered, tube stations exit only, and roads blocked.

On my way to work, I walk by Earl's Court. In normal times, this is a dull conference center where trade shows like the Service Desk & IT Support Show and the Great British Beer Festival are held. During the Olympics, it will be the venue of the volleyball tournament. Pedestrian flows to and from Earl's Court tube station will be tightly regulated. I hope I'll be able to walk as I always do, even though I go against the flow of the crowds both in the mornings and in the evenings.

I hope but I don't bet I will. Some roads that I have to cross on my way to work provide Olympic routes, express lanes that are off-limits to regular traffic. Crossing them will be severely restricted. I will still make it to work with only minimal aggravation, but distant tube commuters won't be so lucky. People are advised to work from home and stay away from public transport during the Games. A recording to that effect by Boris the Clown, mayor of London, is currently played in all commuter rail stations across town.

Imperial is next to Hyde Park where the triathlon and marathon swimming will be held and the marathon, race walking and road cycling finish. Some days will be completely mad. All days will be at least a bit mad because the Japanese and Swiss Olympic teams reside in Imperial student halls. Every morning, the Senior Common Room will open late to Imperial staff so that the athletes can have their breakfasts in peace. Will they be served the usual fare, full English with tepid drip coffee?

Travel and breakfast will be minor inconveniences. Security looks like a big fiasco. G4S, the company that got the quarter-billion-pound (!!) contract for providing guards and screeners failed spectacularly. Fewer than two weeks before the opening ceremony it came to light that they were 3500 staff short. Soldiers, some just returned from tours in Afghanistan, were quickly drafted to fill the gaps. Yesterday, I saw the first platoon march through St. James's Park, nothing Olympian about their camouflage uniforms and lithified faces. But they were eerily in tune with other security arrangements.

These must be the most heavily militarized games ever. Air defense missiles have been installed on top of a residential tower block near the Olympic Park and on four further sites in London. Near Greenwich the Royal Navy's largest vessel has been moored for the last month and a half – to protect the equestrian events in the park at the expense of spooking the horses.

I could go on. But there's bright side. Today it was revealed that the Olympic torch will pass just outside my living room next Thursday, on the penultimate day of the relay. I won't have to jostle for space or get wet from never-ending rain to watch it. With a pillow under my arm I will lean out of my window and soak up the excitement. Let the Games begin!