Opening ceremonies, why do they insist on doing this to us?

[Ron Obvious]

1. Brilliant!

After reading this, the phrase 'floating weirdos' bubbled up from the depths of my calcified brains to remind me of this description of the opening ceremonies for Euro 2000:

The sculpted dirigibles that paraded around the King Baudouin Stadium on Saturday night were thankfully less obscure than the cast of floating weirdos that preceded France 98, but even so Lynam found the plot hard to fathom. The basic premise seemed to concern a young local boy dreaming about football, and one can only conclude that the lad must have consumed a large platter of powerful Belgian cheese before retiring for the night.

"There are the two teams, um, in blue," Lynam said, as a score of oddly cowled figures processed on to the pitch at the start of the ceremony. "They won't actually be playing football, of course." That was down to the heavily made-up androgynous figure in pyjamas kicking a huge scarlet sphere in the centre circle. "He's still dreaming, of course," Lynam noted, before reading the performer's thoughts: "Two years in acting school, and I get this."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/4747850/Sport-on-TV-Dreamy-Des-wards-off-Belgian-nightmare.html