*"Can you imagine," he yelled into the phone, "those bastards ruined the whole buzz for them. It was all supposed to be huge! They rented the most expensive building in Vancouver for the 'Russian House,' brought in insane amounts of booze, caviar, and girls. A whole plane full of assorted hangers-on, people like Bilan, and no fewer than three Cossack folk ensembles. The party, sure, wasn't exactly better than Courchevel, but the main idea was that in the evenings they were supposed to wash down the medals won during the day and go wild with a patriotic flourish. But those bastards aren't bringing in any medals. Because they're not winning. The locals can't figure out what's missing. After all, the promises were bigger than ever: $100,000 for any medal, and for two 'red ones' (i.e., gold medals) they were even promising a cool million. Well, fine. You can drink without that. But for some of the guys in charge, it's no longer a laughing matter. Tyagachyov has been sober for almost two days now, mean as hell, picking fights with everyone, nearly came to blows with Mutko. Actually, both of them are staring down the barrel of resignation, but Mutko's position is stronger, and he's got a much smoother tongue than dumb Tyagachyov. And on top of that, apparently the Big Man himself is coming on the 25th. The younger of the two dwarfs. They're already cramming people together in the hotels to free up space for security. If they haven't scraped together 5 or 6 gold medals by the time he arrives, heads will roll in the heat of the moment. So the pressure on the athletes is nonstop, everyone's under barracks-style discipline, and they're shaking down the doctors and pharmacists to come up with something special — in short, it's like Stalingrad. And Order No. 227: 'Not one step back.' The Sochi 2014 delegation arrived on three planes and is preparing a grand spectacle for the closing ceremony of the Games. Well, there we'll have no equal. And we'll make up the medal count at home in four years. Like in Moscow once upon a time. *//////// via m_yu_sokolov