Following the good advice of another poster, I bought access to a VPN from the UK for only $15 a month and can cancel at the end of the month. So now BBC recognizes me / my computer as being from the UK.
Now I have access to BBC and can watch Olympics in stunning HD ... COMMERCIAL FREE!! British commentators rock, and I love Steve Cram's commentary for distance and Michael Johnson's commentary for sprints.
I'm on east coast time, so if I wait until about 6 pm or so (11 pm in the UK), I can watch the entire day's events uninterrupted. Today I got to watch the the entire women's marathon without any blips. Also got to see the heats of the men's 1500 and the entire 3,000 steeple.
Rise up, O masses, and shake off the fetters of NBC!
(FYI, I got my VPN from "HappyVPN". An absolutely easy install on the Mac. Probably not hard on a PC either.)