Yep, you read that right - a fibre-enthusiast's version of the Olympic games, known as the 2012 Ravellenic Games :D
If you are wondering what on earth I'm on about, well, it's basically a bunch of keen knitters/crocheters/spinners/fibre-dyers getting together to form teams on
Ravelry and competing in different imaginatively & humorously-titled yarny events such as the Frogging Trampoline, the Hand-dye High Dive, the Felted Freestyle, WIP Wrestling (*love* this!) and the Lace Longjump. There's even an event for participating machine knitters, entitled Rhythmic Machinastics! So as you can see, they all relate to the names of real events...
In the Frogging Trampoline event, competitors are encouraged to "frog" (a knitting term for recycling, essentially!) a project which has been languishing in their stash for too long - meaning completely unravelling the knitting and rewinding the yarn back into balls to knit anew for a future, more promising project.
Obviously the "Ravthletes" don't receive a fabulous gold, silver or bronze medal with Nike, goddess of victory on it like the athletes at London 2012 do, but there is definitely a sense of achievement that goes with successful completion of a project when competing in one of the events nonetheless. You also get a virtual medal so you can celebrate in cyberspace!
Needless to say, I decided to get involved as it seems like the perfect accompaniment to watching the events unfold on the TV. If you're a ravelry member, just check out the
Ravellenic Games group to see what all the fuss is about :)
