It all started with the condoms.

I mean, once I get an idea, I just can’t let go, and the idea of sex at the Olympics started when I found out that the Olympics have an official condom. It’s not exactly something that they advertise in the US, like: “Durex, the official condoms of the Olympics.”

Nevertheless, there IS an official condom, it IS Durex, and there was a flap because an Australian Olympian saw a bucket of “rogue” condoms with a kangaroo on it, thought it was funny, and tweeted a photo.

The bucket had a computer-generated sign that read: "Kangaroo condoms, For the gland downunder."

It was cute, but the Olympic organization didn't find it amusing, and in an attempt to protect their brand and sponsors, tracked down the offending latex and dispensed with it.

But the ensuing publicity (most people never knew there was an official condom) started folks thinking about what really does go on in the Olympic village. ESPN got a few athletes to talk on the record, and it turns out to be fairly bacchanal.

According to medal winner Ryan Lochte, 70% to 75% of athletes are having sex in the Olympic Village. The explanation is that fit, young athletes who have been concentrating on nothing but getting to the games finally are in a position to meet attractive people with the same interests and level of fitness. And the result is international diplomacy of a very personal kind.

The close quarters and skimpy uniforms also add to the heightened sexual atmosphere. Breaux Greer, an American javelin thrower said,  "You see what everybody is working with from the jump."

Unfortunately, he also made the cavalier remark that "even if their face is a 7, their body is a 20."

Way to keep it classy, Breaux.

Of course, being a mature woman, my musing about this wasn't imagining beautiful bodies having orgies in hot tubs (honestly...), as they are reported to have done, but rather about the kids at the Olympics. I tried to find out how minors were dealt with. Do they have chaperones? The age of consent in the United Kingdom is 16, so legally they could do what they wanted.

The athletes lived in double-occupancy rooms in the Olympic Village, so did a parent room with these kids? I can remember being 16, and the idea that my parents would have to room with me would have been horrifying. You want so much to be an adult and do what the big kids do.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, 47.4% of high school students have had sex, so many of those 16-year-olds might not be virgins anyway.  But the idea that 70 to 75% of the athletes are whoring around like its spring break makes the parent in me want to keep younger participants far, far away.

Once there, athletes can't assume that they will ever get to the Olympics again, so I can imagine that they would want the complete experience: living in the village, meeting peers from around the globe, trading training tips, or whatever sports people talk about. (Clearly, I wouldn't know; have you seen me?)

Having to have a chaperone would really put a damper on things, I imagine, and all because the older competitors can't keep it in their pants. That's sad.

An amusing  Durex Olympic billboard.

It's rather amusing that previous to the electronic age, Olympic athletes had pretty squeaky clean images. They were the people on Wheaties boxes, being giving ticker-tape parades and keys to cities. Palmdale's own silver medalist, Lashina Demus, was feted at Poncitlan Square's 50-year city anniversary this week. She was there with her adorable twin sons, so it's unlikely she was involved in all this debauchery.

Considering the 24-hour news cycle and the fact that anyone with a smart phone can share photos, videos and text from inside the Olympic Village, it's difficult to keep a lid on things. (Ask Prince Harry.)

Maybe if this technology had been available when Bruce Jenner was on the Wheaties box, we would have realized much sooner what a douchebag he was, dumping his wife who supported him through all his training right after he became successful.

Previous medal winner for soccer, Julie Foudy, recalled looking at all the "eye candy" at her Olympics and wondering why she got married, and gold medalist Ryan Lochte said he felt he missed out last year because he had a girlfriend, so he made sure he was single this time around.

Hope Solo, the US women's soccer goalkeeper, said that athletes really are different from the rest of us: "When they're training, it's laser focus. When they go out for a drink, it's 20 drinks. With a once-in-a-lifetime experience, you want to build memories, whether it's sexual, partying or on the field. I've seen people having sex right out in the open. On the grass, between buildings, people are getting down and dirty."

When all is said and done, I'm glad that our Olympians are having safe sex, at least. The ESPN story reported that in 2000 in Sydney, 70,000 condoms weren't enough, and they ordered 20,000 more. Today the standing order is 100,000 official condoms. At those numbers, no wonder Durex wants to keep other companies out of the village.

And at roughly 10,000 athletes, that's 10 condoms per. That's a lotta action.

Did you miss me?

So, I’m sitting here with approximately 100 surgical steel stitches in a line from above my navel well down into what Victorian pornography euphemistically calls the “Mound of Venus.”

I can’t have sex, drive my sports car (or any car for that matter), swim, or luxuriate in a hot bath, all things that I consider essential to life. No matter how long I stand in the shower, I can’t approximate the feeling of well being that I get while submerged in water.

There are other things I can’t do which I don’t miss. Grocery shopping at the “you-bag it” store and lifting heavy sacks, for instance. And as a water aerobics classmate cheerfully crowed, “You won’t be able to vacuum for months.”

I had a “complete hysterectomy.” Did you know that there is a difference between a “total” and a “complete.”? Yeah, me neither, but just like booking a “direct flight,” when you really mean “non-stop,” there is a difference. If you’ve ever sat in an airport for four hours waiting for your “direct “ flight to resume, you’ll know what I mean.

You might be sitting there wondering why the hell I haven’t written for months. I don’t really have any good excuse other than I didn’t feel like it. I always said that I never wrote for free — there was always money or a grade attached. Until one day there wasn’t.

When I parted company with the local newspaper, I had been writing my column for almost ten years. People liked it, and my editors continued to pay me for writing it. The pittance they paid was just enough to complicate collecting unemployment and my tax filing, but it was something.

I got lots of positive feedback from people in the community. But in August of 2010, caught in the bind that all newspapers find themselves in, they decided my $200 a month could be better spent elsewhere, and discontinued my column.

I felt a certain obligation to my readers, and quickly took the column online. I tried to make it appear the same time that the column ran —Sunday morning— but I didn’t always make it. Often, I spent all morning Sunday writing about what my husband and I did on Saturday night.

It was terrific not having to answer to anyone — at the end, my editors were wanting to know in advance what I was writing about, to avoid trouble with management. About the time they told me I was writing about my granddaughter Charlotte too often, I was more than ready to cut the cord.

I could include photos, link to Wikipedia entries for those who didn't get some of my obscure references (I once had to defend using the expression “being between Syclla and Charybdis” at the paper because “people won’t understand it”), and embed videos. It was fun.

Until one day, it wasn’t fun any more. It felt like work. Unpaid work. My husband, who writes for the sheer love of it, doesn’t really understand. He asked for whom I wrote, expecting to hear me say, “me,” but that wasn’t my answer. Like the class clown, if I'm not getting money, I need affirmation, an audience, and I wasn’t getting it.

And then I realized I could quit. One Sunday, I just didn’t write. No explanations, I just didn’t. And if it takes 21 days to form a habit, I can tell you it takes fewer days to quit a habit you’re weary of.

Some people make a living out of their websites, some make enough to cover their expenses, but trying to make the site pay looked like another job to me, and I already had a very taxing one: teaching composition to college freshman. Which was another reason I had trouble writing: when push came to shove, my papers needed to be graded before I could write about our latest Los Angeles adventure.

But now I feel like writing again, perhaps because I realize that I want to write — even if it is just for me. After spending the last month waiting for this surgery to determine whether the softball-size mass on my left ovary was cancer or a fibroid tumor, I have had plenty of time for reflection. Thankfully, it was the latter, which really gives me no excuse for not fulfilling my potential.

If you are a writer, you write. It’s really simple. And I am a writer, have been since roughly fourth grade. My forced reflection period has convinced me that I need to get some of the book plans I have out of my head and onto paper, but for now, just writing this blog is a baby step.

So I’ll make a deal with you, what’s left of my readership. I’ll continue to write, and I’ll strive for posting weekly. But if I can’t, don’t be surprised. It probably means I’m torturing freshman somewhere by trying to coax a decent thesis statement out of them.

For your part, throw me a bone in the form of a comment or an email once in a while, just to let me know you’re still out there. At the right of the page is a “Subscribe by email” link. Just put your email address in there, and when I post, it will come to your mailbox . Or you can follow me with a Google or Yahoo reader by clicking the “subscribe” button.

Give the class clown some love.

Ps. While I've been on hiatus (no, that's not where the Kennedys go in the summer, as Neil Young once asked an interviewer) Charlotte has gained a little brother, Desmond. Tune in next week for the adventures of Super Chub!