PORT CAMPBELL, Victoria -- I read an article in the in-flight magazine the other day that claimed Australians spend more time on the internet than anyone else in the world. I can tell you they're not doing it in hotels.
I pulled into the Loch Ord Motor Inn here just as the rain was starting -- it's now coming down in a downpour like I haven't seen for quite a while -- lured in part by signs about in-room wi-fi. One of these days, I need to learn to ask what the catch is. Here, it's about $8 an hour.
So, with the clock ticking, I may not put up as many photos as might otherwise be the case. But here's a catch-up on the last few days.

SATURDAY -- My good-weather luck ran out.
After three gorgeous days in Tasmania, Saturday in Burnie dawned wet and drizzly. The forecast was for sun farther to the south, so I headed toward Cradle Mountain -- the other side, as it were, of the national park I'd visited the day before at Lake St. Clair -- hoping to get in another short hike or two, and perhaps to see the platypuses (platypi?) that eluded me the day before at Platypus Bay at Lake St. Clair.
Well, the closer I got to Cradle Mountain, the worse the weather became. By the time I reached the park itself, it was pouring rain, probably not much above freezing, and the only people who were out were the kind of hikers who had insulated rainsuits.
Not only didn't I go for a hike, I didn't even get out of the car.
Instead, I pulled off to the side and plotted a meandering path to Launceston -- via Mole Creek, as much because you've got to visit a town called Mole Creek if you're near by as because it was a sensible route.
Well, this pretty much salvaged the day. It remained cold and gray, with some drizzle and the occasional rain, but I more or less blundered across the kind of scenery that would be famous elsewhere, but in Tasmania is almost incidental to other places.
Take, for example, the dramatic panorama of the Mersey Valley, which I can identify thanks to this helpful sign.

Because of the gray weather, the view doesn't look quite as good in photos as it did in person. Trust me, it was pretty spectacular.

Oh, and I mentioned Mole Creek. Here it is, in all its splendor.

But I'm glad I went that way, because I saw a sign for a state park featuring the Alum Cliffs Gorge (also known, apparently, as Tulmapanga) and went a couple of kilometers off the main road for a look. It proved to be a 30-minute round-trip hike, and well worth it.

Even with the detours, I still made it to Launceston by early afternoon, and rather than get a room, right away, I looked at the map and decided to continue on toward the coast, along the Tamar Valley. By now, the weather was better, and this proved to be another good decision, for a couple of reasons. First, it meant I found Brady's Lookout, a great scenic location.

Also, it took me to Beauty Point, which was fortunate so much because of the beauty, but because of a fascinating little tourist attraction, the Platypus House. (It's adjacent to another well-regarded spot, Seahorse World, but I was more interested in the Platypuses.)
Platypus House is a small operation, but it's not some cheesy tourist trap. It's actually trying to find a cure for a disease threatening Tasmania's platypus population, so it not at all exploitative of the animals (it only had five, but that was enough to be able to see them in action) and quite informative. The platypi were almost impossible to photograph, at least with my little point-and-click camera; the results aren't really worth posting here.
But as a bonus, Platypus House also has three echidnas, and they're a little easier to shoot. They're very fun to watch wandering around in their little room, and the tour guide fed them for me, so I got to watch their long tongues come out and clean up this ant-paste mixture.

Oh, and they're quite curious. They all came up and sniffed my shoes during the course of my visit. Of course, that was made easy by the fact that I was the only person taking the 2:30 p.m. tour. There really is nothing more off than the off-season in Tasmania.
If you're ever in the neighborhood -- OK, if you ever decide to come halfway around the world to Tasmania -- I recommend Platypus World.
But then, I recommend just about everything about Tasmania.

SUNDAY -- I woke up earlier than I needed to in Launceston, laid in bed for a while, finally got up, turned on the TV -- and was mad I hadn't given in and turned the TV on earlier. Live on Fox Sports 2 was the Fox Saturday afternoon game of the week (which, of course, occurs on Sunday morning here) -- the Phillies and Cubs, in the ninth inning at Wrigley Field. Who knew? I watched the Cubs finish off a 5-2 loss, and then went about my day.
Which was pretty full.
I flew to Melbourne, picked up my checked bag and rental car (a Toyota Corolla hatchback they don't sell in the U.S., which I like except for the fact the storage space behind the back seat barely contains my big duffel bag, and doesn't leave enough room for everything else. This means I'll be leaving some valuables visible when I'm taking hikes along the Ocean Road (weather permitting).
Fortunately, getting my bag and car took very little time, because I had a definite goal in mind: I was, as they say here, going to see the footy.
Sunday was the last day of the Australian Rules Football regular season, and as it happened, my arrival in Melbourne was just in time to let me get to the last game of the last day: Essendon Bombers vs. St. Kilda Saints at Telstra Dome, which was scheduled for 4 p.m.
I arrived at the dome at 3:15 p.m., parked ($23 in a garage under the stadium, from which it was surprisingly difficult to get into the stadium unless you already had a ticket), found my way to the ticket window and was told there were no seats available. Standing room, though was $19. I bought a ticket and went in.

Inside Telstra Dome.

Somewhat to my surprise -- and, given how I was dressed, dismay -- I found Telstra Dome may be covered, but it's not enclosed. Or, as near as I can tell, heated. There's just chain-link fencing at the gate, so the wind blows right in. Since there was quite a cold wind blowing the standees eventually clustered six or seven rows deep in the sections protected from the wind, while there was just one row of standees in areas exposed to the wind.
I have to admit I didn't enjoy this nearly as much as, say, the Serie A game I saw in Rome. I think the standing had something to do with it. I opted for the no-wind area, so I was packed in place pretty tightly. So did the fact I'm not all that well versed in Australian Rules. Mostly, though, I think it was that I couldn't really figure out a rooting interest.
In Rome, it was easy to figure out that I should root for Roma, partly because I love the city, and partly because I wanted to get out alive. But this game, while officially an Essendon home game, matched two Melbourne teams that both call Telstra Dome home.
So I watched rather dispassionately, which really is no way to go to a game as a spectator.

A St. Kilda player lines up a kick as an Essendon player watches.

One other thing didn't help in terms of enjoyment: It was, frankly, a terrible game, with St. Kilda routing the Bombers. There was one tiny bit of drama at the end. St. Kilda needed to win by an unlikely 100 points to climb into fourth place in the final standings, which provides a hugely advantageous position for the playoffs (or as they call them here, finals).
Well, in the closing minutes, the Saints picked up the goals they needed and won 21-21--147 to 5-9--39, a record margin of victory and just enough to carry them to fourth. By then, I have to admit, I was already in my car (knowing it would have taken forever to get out of that stadium parking garage if I'd waited until the end) and on my way to Geelong, my destination for the night.
I actually ended up in the Geelong suburb (or perhaps district is the more appropriate term) of Belmont, and it looked like I was going to have to settle for McDonald's or Hungry Jack's (the Australian name for Burger King). Instead, I found a place that claimed to be a "California Style" Mexican take-away restaurant -- and did, in fact, have a burrito that would not have been out of place at Sharky's or Baja Fresh. Of course, it was $11.50, but by local standards, that's probably equal to those places pricewise, as well.
Capping the night, about the time I really settled into my room for the night, I started channel-surfing and found a soccer game featuring a team in red shirts and white shorts. Could it be? Yes, it was: An English Premier League game from earlier in the day between Arensal, the official Premiership side of George Contreras, and Newcastle United from the Emirates Stadium . Funny to have to go all the way to Australia for my first look at the Premier League season but then the season began while I was in China. And while I'm sure George is already aware of this, I can report the Gunners dispatched Newcastle 3-0.
That was followed by a live broadcast of Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur, but I didn't make it all the way through that one.

BURNIE, Tasmania -- OK, I'm just about completely out of steam at this point. I left Hobart a little after 9 this morning and got into my room in Burnie about 6:30 p.m. In between was all driving, with breaks for about an hour and a half of hiking at Lake St. Clair and a few other short walks along the way.
I'll get into more details the next time I'm on line. In the meantime, here are a few photos from today.

An echidna near Lake St. Clair. I saw a wombat, too, but didn't get a photo.

Lake St. Clair.

On the suspension bridge on the hiking trail to Frenchman's Cap.

Nelson Falls.

All for now. Back when I get a chance. G'Day.

BURNIE, Tasmania -- Continuing the effort to get you up to date ...

Thursday I made the two-hour drive from Coles Bay to Hobart, Tasmania's largest city, and that turned out to a day of taking care of things, more than sightseeing.

First, I had to deal with my computer issues. While downloading my Coles Bay photos into the laptop -- which wasn't recharging, you'll recall, although it showed it had several hours of battery life left -- the battery indicator suddenly went to zero, discontinuing the download and sending the computer into sleep mode. (I couldn't even wake it up to turn it off.) Before leaving Coles Bay, I pulled the names of three Apple dealers or service locations from the Hobart phone book (there was one in a telephone booth there), and went to the first one I could find. First, they removed the battery to turn the computer off (why didn't I think of that?) Then, we determined it was, in fact, the charger for the computer that had gone kaput. (Thank goodness it made it through the Olympics.) I now have a new charger (for A$107), and a functioning laptop.
After that, it was laundry time. As expected, they have real washers and dryers here. Of course, you pay for the privilege; it cost me $15 to wash and dry two large loads. (Of course, I may not have been at the most economical location, a combination Laundromat and café in Hobart's trendy Salamanaca Place, but it was a much nicer place to hang out for a while.)
Salamanica Place is a collection of old buildings near the waterfront, continuing a variety of shops and restaurants. It's a pretty cool place.

In general, Australia is expensive as hell. I filled up the rental car in Hobart for the first time, and it cost A$ 69.50 for 43.74 liters. (That's 11.55 gallons, making it A$ 6.02 a gallon; an Australian dollar is, at this moment, worth about 86 U.S. cents, so we're talking roughly $5.12 a gallon.) A $30 meal is pretty standard; heck, tonight in Burnie, I spent $11.95 for a foot-long Subway sandwich, drink and cookies. (It was all that was nearby, and I was tired.)
Anyway, it wasn't the most exciting day, but the computer works and my clothes are clean, and sometimes, that's enough.

BURNIE, Tasmania -- OK, I've finally staying at a motel that has wi-fi that doesn't cost an arm and a leg (the place I was at last night charged 50 cents a minute, with a maximum of $27.50), so I'm going to backtrack and at least start catching you up on the trip to date (I'm kind of tired, so I may not get fully caught up), beginning with the stay at the Edge of the Bay Resort in Coles Bay.
This is my cabin:

This is the view from my bedroom window, at sunset the first night:

And this is the visitor I had the first night. Actually, considering the joey, I guess that's visitors.

Not content with that look, she/he (?) hopped up on the porch for a closer look. A much closer look.

The next day, after sleeping for a total of about 15 hours (a three-hour nap when I first arrived, and about 12 hours that night), I went into Freycinet National Park for a few short hikes. First I tackled the most famous walk in the park, the hour round-trip to the overlook of Wineglass Bay, which has been called the most beautiful beach in Tasmania, if not all of Australia.

I also took a walk on a boardwalk encircling a lighthouse at Cape Tourville.

And I took the short hike to Sleepy Bay.

That pretty much did me in, so I went back to the cabin, where I was taking care of a few things when I looked up and discovered my wallabie was back, and rather curious what I was up to:

Mostly, though, the time at Edge of the Bay was about resting, which is what I needed most. And, heck, how tough was it to do nothing with that view out the window?

Greetings ... This is going to be a brief entry because I'm working at a public internet terminal (more accurately, THE public internet terminal) at a bakery in Coles Bay, Tasmania, and a) I have 14 minutes credit remaining and b.) this may be the worst keyboard I've ever worked at. Some keys have to be hammered to work at all; others cast double letters at the slightest touch. Please forgive any misspellings that result.

It's possible I may not be posting as much as I hope during the vacation part of the trip. My laptop is acting up; the battery won't recharge. It was actually getting difficult the last two days of the Olympics, but now it won't work at all. I fear there's a short in the cord of the recharger (which would be easily remedied, at a price) or in the recepticle in the computer itself (in which case it's pretty much toast for the rest of the trip). This would mean no photos for the rest of these entries, whenever they occur. I'm hoping to get the computer looked at in Hobart tomorrow; that's the largest city in Tasmania, so if I can do it before getting back to the mainland, it would be there.

Anyway, as for the trip itself, all went well from Seoul to Sydney, although the flight was packed and we had to circle because of traffic for 30 minutes before landing (not what you want at the end of a 10-hour flight, or when you're making a connection). I still made my Virgin Blue flight to Launceston with ease, though, picked up my rental car there and made the 2-hour-plus drive to Coles Bay, struggling all the way with the right-hand drive and how that affects everything you do. (I don't think I managed once to hit the turn signals without hitting the wiper control first.)

But it was all worth it. The view from my cabin where I'm staying, the Edge of the Bay Resort, is spectacular, and just as I was about to crawl into bed for the first part of what proved to be 15 hours' sleep, I looked out and saw the tail of a wallabie move past one window. She (I think) hopped right up on my patio and stopped about 10 feet from the sliding glass door. I got several pictures with a joey peeking out of the pouch, and then just sat down at the door to watch -- and she hopped right over and spent the next five minutes staring at me through the glass. Many photos followed. Hopefully I can show them to you at some point.

Today, after sleeping in, I did quite a bit of hiking in Freycinet National Park, which it's boring to discuss without photos, and now I'm heading back to sleep a bit more. There's more, of course, but time is just about out and I've had all I can stand of this keyboard.

SEOUL, South Korea, 5:35 p.m. -- I've mentioned at previous Olympics that the concept "no cheering in the press box" is distinctly American, or perhaps North American. As I was reminded repeatedly in Beijing, journalists (or perhaps that's "journalists") from other countries have no reservations about wearing the same clothing as their Olympic teams (a standard trait in Russia and other Eastern European countries in particular) or cheering openly for their teams and athletes. (During the gold-medal game in men's water polo, most of the Hungarian media stood and applauded their team's introductions, and celebrated boisterously with each of Hungary's 14 goals.)
I've often wondered what kind of reporting that produces. On my flight here from Beijing, I may have gotten an answer.
I'm flying Korean Air, and one of the short features shown on the plane's video system was a Korean news program of Olympic highlights. Thankfully, it included English captioning, so I got a sense of the standard of journalism
During the first of three reports on the Korean baseball team's gold medal, a report on the final game with Cuba, this was part of the narration: "Tensions rose in the second half of the ninth inning, the Korean catcher was ordered off the field after the umpire unfairly called four balls." Korea's 3-2 win was described as one that "will be a legend for generations."
Later, a report on the women's handball team, which won the bronze medal, it was reported that "due to unfair referee's decisions, the team had to participate in three preliminary games." Later, the same report said that "due to unfair one-sided decisions by the referees, the athletes could not maximize their performance."
Objectivity is a wonderful thing, don't you think?

Getting out of Beijing proved to be relatively uneventful. I was actually at the airport too early -- and I mean that not as an opinion, but because Korean Air wouldn't let me check in for about 90 minutes after I got there. I did get to watch the Korean Olympic team check in for an earlier flight, though, and let me tell you, those guys (and women) don't exactly travel light. I'd be surprised there was a luggage cart left anywhere else in the airport after they came in averaging, I'd guess, four checked items each, as well as cart after cart of team gear.
The Russian Olympic team was also on hand for an Aeroflot flight, the French Olympic team was starting to show up by the time I left, and the entire Marshall Islands Olympic team (not exactly huge) was on my Korean Air flight from Beijing to Seoul.
Time to catch my flight to Sydney. I'll be back when I get the chance.

So that's it, a wrap from the Beijing Olympics.
Tomorrow morning is going to be a scramble to get packed and to the airport. I might post something if time permits from Seoul on how the mass exodus works out, but that would be the last true Olympic item, unless, after a little rest and reflection, I decide to come back for one more grand summing up.
But I plan to keep posting as opportunities permit during my Australian vacation -- mainly for the benefit of family and friends, but certainly for anyone else who wants to keep following along. It certainly won't be multiple posts every day, but it is, after all, a vacation.
Strictly by coincidence, my itinerary on my full 40-day journey is almost entirely Summer Olympic cities, at least in terms of flight destinations: Los Angeles, Seoul, Beijing, Sydney and Melbourne. (The one exception is Launceston, Tasmania, which is not likely to land the Games any time soon.)
And it wasn't the reason I planned the Australian vacation -- mainly it was an opportunity to get back to a place I really liked at a relatively low cost -- but I eventually realized that it took me full circle. My first Olympics was the Sydney Games in 2000; given the rapidly changing state of the newspaper industry, many of us here fear the Beijing Games will be our last.
I certainly hope that's not the case, but if does close the circle -- the five rings, as it were, with the Sydney, Salt Lake, Athens, Turin and Beijing Games -- well, it's been an amazing journey.
Hope you enjoyed this part of it.

Now that all the events are done, Ventura Country would have finished with five medals: a gold for Phil Dalhausser and Todd Rogers in beach volleyball; silvers for Jessica Mendoza and the women's softball team, and for the men's water polo team, and bronzes for Brandon Knight and the baseball team, and the Bryan brothers in tennis doubles.
The way we count medals in the U.S., that would tie the county with Slovenia, Bulgaria, Indonesia, Sweden, Croatia and Lithuania for 38th. (Use the rest of the world's accounting method, ranking by golds, and the county would slide quite a bit.)
Any way you measure it, a pretty good haul.

At the end, the dynasty beat the upstart.
Before a crowd that may have included every Hungarian in Asia, cheering wildly -- even in the press tribune -- Hungary scored five straight goals in the second half and beat the U.S. men's water polo team 14-10 in Sunday's gold-medal game.
The U.S. was tied at 9 early in the second half, but didn't score again until 1:28 remained, and by then Hungary was up 14-9.
"We didn't play the game we wanted," said Tony Azevedo, who scored four goals. "They took some great shots and were great on offense, but we came out a little flat at the beginning of the game."
It was the most goals given up by the U.S. in the tournament.
"You are never going to win when you give up that many goals," said Azevedo.
The U.S. men won their first water polo medal since a silver in 1988, but that wa not an immediate consolation.
"Nobody wants to be second place," said Peter Varellas. "Nobody likes losing their last game. We had a great run in this tournament, but we didn't finish the deal>

Two Fuwa at baseball's bronze-medal game.

High among the best things about the end of the Olympics is this: I won't have to look at the Fuwa any more.
The Fuwa, as you are unavoidably aware if you've been in Beijing for the last three weeks, are the Olympic mascots. There are five of them: Beibei the fish (which looks nothing like a fish), Jingjing the Panda, Huanhuan the Olympic flame (which has flame-like hair), Yingying the Tibetan Antelope (which looks nothing like an antelope) and Nini the Swallow (which looks like a kid wearing a bird's head hat).
Eliminate the redundancy in their names, and -- as we have been told over and over (and over and over) -- you get Bei Jing Huan Ying Ni, which means "Beijing Welcomes You."
The consensus among the media is that they're the worst mascots ever, which is saying quite a bit because in Turin, the mascots were a snowball and an ice cube. But these get the nod for two reasons: sheer volume and particularly dopey walking versions.
It hasn't been all that long ago that the Olympics had a single cartoonish mascot -- Sam the Eagle from the L.A. Games comes to mind -- but somewhere along the line, someone decided that if toys of one mascot sell, multiple mascots would sell even more.
And so we had three in Sydney, three in Salt Lake City, two in Athens, two in Turin -- and now five here.
And so, at the venues, you're liable to run into five people walking around in giant inflatable mascot costumes about eight feet tall and four feet wide. A couple of us were talking about the mascots as they blundered through the backstage area at track one night, and agreed there's something about them that just begs you to punch them. It's like they're walking punching-bag toys.
But to the best of my knowledge, no one ever yielded to that temptation.
Probably because there can't possibly be a dumber reason to risk a stint in a Chinese prison than taking a poke at a giant inflatable antelope.

Fuwa decorations at the Temple of Heaven. Does this look like a fish to you?

It's Sunday, Aug. 24 -- Day 17 of 17 for the 2008 Olympics, Day 21 of 22 for Scripps in China. And as you can see, we have blue skies for the finale.
A little late posting today because I got tied up with other things -- wrapup stuff like a column I'm working on, and packing.
My last event of the Beijing Games will be the men's water polo gold-medal match between the U.S. and Hungary at 3:40 p.m. (12:40 a.m. at home). I'll try to post a score as soon as possible in case anyone's staying up for it.
Other than that, I plan to have a couple of other post here as I tie up a few loose ends. Right now, I've got to get back up to the room for a couple of things, then I'm off to water polo.

And for my last hurrah as a tourist in Beijing, the Temple of Heaven.
I'd seen it (actually, just one building of a fairly sprawling complex, as it turns out) on posters in every media workroom at the Olympics, and thought it looked pretty cool. And I really like the name.
So I took the No. 5 subway farther south than before, almost to the end of the line to the Tiantandongmen station (I am not going to miss spelling out these names) and made the short walk into a lush park -- the largest open green space (2.73 square kilometers, according to Wikipedia) I've encountered in my limited wanderings in the city -- dotted with ancient ceremonial buildings.
And filled with people. As I walked from the East gate -- there appeared to be a ticket window, but I was waved in with my Olympic credential -- I came to a long covered corridor (known, according to maps, as the Long Corridor -- go figure) lined with people -- sitting, talking, playing cards or participating in a group sing.

You know it's a good time when an accordion is involved.

Clearly, this is a hot spot as a gathering place for the people of the city.
Much as I would have liked to look around and see what else was going on -- what was that hacky-sack like activity involving a small disk with feathers sticking out of one side? -- I feared I might be fighting the clock in terms of seeing the sights, so I moved on.
In the distance, I could see the circular building I had thought was the Temple of Heaven, but is actually known as (and I love this) the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. It's behind a wall, and there's definitely a 20-yuan admission fee to get inside, but yes, the Olympic credential again worked as a free pass. So in I went.

Well, this might be the single most photogenic building I've seen in all of China -- and given my feelings about a lot of the new architecture I've seen here. I don't think photos can really transmit the brilliant colors or design details -- apparently as brilliant as they are thanks to a $6 million restoration project to get ready for the Olympics -- but here are the best attempts I can offer.

Some of the amazingly intricate roof details.

Looking up the Danbi Stairway.

I was probably fortunate to get in at all. A sign indicated the Hall of Prayer of Good Harvests normally closes at 5 p.m., and it was about 5:15 when I got there. Luckily, they seemed to have extended the hours, so I had a little bit of time to wander around and shoot roughly 100 photos (don't worry, you're not going to see all of them) including the now obligatory I'll-take-your-picture-if-you'll-take-mine exchange with other tourists.

All too soon, though, it was clear people were being herded out of the gates, so I reluctantly left, taking another photo or two outside.

There's a whole lot more to the Temple of Heaven complex -- the map lists such enticing names as the Imperial Vault of Heaven and the Wall of Echoes -- but the light was fading, and so was I. The Hall of Prayer of Good Harvests was going to have to suffice.
Which it certainly did, and does.
When it comes to tourist sights, I really think that I might have saved the best for last.

No. 5 trains meet at the Lishuiquio South station, just outside the media village.

Subways are a great thing when you're traveling.
Not only can you get where you're going with a far higher degree of certainty than with a bus -- railroad tracks are fixed; bus routes can change -- but they provide a great window into the everyday slice of life, whether in New York or Milan or Athens or Sydney.
I'm not sure that ever felt more true than it did this afternoon and evening, during my final chance to get out and about in Beijing.
Today's destination was the fabulously photogenic Temple of Heaven (a post on that shortly), but when it comes to getting genuine impressions of the city, the subway rides, both today and earlier in the week, may have been the most fruitful part of the entire trip.
I picked up a number of cultural tips from a book before coming to China, and two have really been proven true on the subway: The Chinese have a different concept of personal space than we do (which is to say none at all, really, probably because in a city of 17 million, crowding is a given) and staring is not considered impolite.
Boy, have I been stared at on the subway. Sometimes they're staring at my ever-present OIAC (the credential hanging from my neck), trying to figure out if I might be somebody important. Sometimes they're just staring at me, because as I've mentioned before, there aren't that many Caucasians on Beijing subways, even during the Olympics. (It's kind of an interesting experience to be the tallest guy around for long periods of time; I don't think I've been on a subway yet, no matter how crowded, where I couldn't see over everyone else in the car).
Beyond that, I've seen all these sights that remind me how much people are people the world over. There was a boy and his dad playing an animated game of rock-paper-scissors on the car next to me. There was a woman trying to get her baby girl to talk ("Sub-a-way," she kept saying, in that exaggerated way all parents use when trying to teach words. "Schhwa," the girl would answer.) There were the cluelessly self-centered. (I remember reading an article a few years ago about how one of the unintended side effects of China's one-child policy was a generation of pampered only-child males. The textbook case was this slightly chubby 30-ish man who was playing a Gameboy as he walked onto the train stopped just inside the door, intent on his game, and made it extremely difficult for anyone else to get in and out.
Most fascinating of all, there was a beggar. Any hint of a flaw in the social order has been carefully papered over while we're here -- heck, they even broke an entire nation of the habit of spitting -- but there he was, on the train tonight: A kid of about 14, I'd guess, moving in a slightly odd, jerky fashion, in a ripped shirt and pair of shorts, constantly chattering -- whether at himself or to anyone who would listen. He stood by me for a long time, chattering away, and I noticed that everyone on the car averting their gaze or suddenly finding the subway map really interesting or needing to clean their fingernails. For a minute, it felt just like the No. 9 in Manhattan.
There's a Chinese proverb I've kept in mind the entire time I've been here -- and you'll probably see me quote it again in the next day or two. It goes "We can always fool a foreigner."
I don't begin to think I'm an exception. But I do think riding on the subway has been a good way to be a little less fooled.

Sorry for the long delay in posting ... deadlines and a horrifically long bus ride intervened.
The baseball team won the bronze medal by beating Japan 8-4 on the strength of a four-run fifth inning featuring a two-run double by Taylor Teagarden and a two-run homer by Jason Donald.
The U.S. finishes 6-3. Japan -- which essentially assembled an all-star team from the Japanese major leagues -- finished 4-5, which is apparently not going to sit well at home. The team's manager and a player both felt compelled to apologize to the nation in their post-game press conference.
There will be a full story in (most editions of) Saturday's Star.

It's Saturday, Aug. 23, Day 16 of 17 in the Beijing Olympics and Day 20 of 22 for Team Scripps in China.
Today's good-morning photo -- showing lovely blue sky with tan accents -- is from Wukesong Baseball Field, where the U.S. is about to play Japan in the baseball bronze-medal game. That square brown building directly beyond the hitting backdrop is the Olympic basketball arena, which I would have to say is the only one of the Olympic venues I would consider a complete architectural misfire. Its irregular walls make it look like a giant handicraft project made with toothpicks, then painted mud brown. Don't know how it is on the inside, but from outse, it is not an attractive building.
Anyway, the U.S.-Japan game is the only coverage I have on tap for today, which means there will be some exploring this afternoon and evening. I'll be writing on deadline for the Star, so I'll be back with a brief game report once that story is filed.

A bit more from tonight's water polo win ...
Merrill Moses' stellar play was the headline performance tonight. With his help, a 7-5 lead entering the final quarter proved to be more than sufficient.
"Starting the fourth quarter," said Tony Azevedo, "never in any of our minds did we think it was going to end like it did. We came out as hard as we could, our defense was great, but our goalkeeper was amazing."
Said Moses, "I wasn't going to let them score. I think they were very frustrated."
Jeff Powers said Moses was "phenomenal," adding, "He was probably the X factor right there tonight, shutting down everything. It was awesome to watch."
Said coach Terry Schroeder: "It seemed like with every block he got more confident, and for him to shut those guys down the way he did in that fourth quarter was just awesome to witness."
Serbia, which had not lost to the U.S. in at least six years, did not take well to the end of that streak. Center forward Dusko Pijetlovic called it "the worst game we have ever played. .... This is horrible, this is a horrible day."
Full details in the Saturday paper.

That's all for today from Beijing. I have an outside chance to get something close to eight hours' sleep before doing baseball's bronze medal game tomorrow.

Merrill Moses was spectacular, and the rest of the U.S. men's water polo team followed his lead.
With Moses making 16 saves, and Tony Azevedo leading the offense with three goals, the U.S. beat Serbia 10-5 on Friday night, assuring itself of the first U.S. medal in the sport since the team captained by Terry Schroeder won silver in 1988.
The U.S. will play Hungary, winner of the last two gold medals in the sport, for the gold medal at 3:40 p.m. Sunday (12:40 a.m. Pacific time).
More to come.

BEIJING -- By my figuring, I'm now 10 bus rides from the end of the Olympics -- 11 if you count the one to the airport.
You have no idea how happy this makes me.
The buses have been very reliable. If they're supposed to leave at 1:30 p.m. from space No. 2 in line 3 of the bus lot, you had better be there no later than 1:29 p.m.
Beyond that, well, it's harder to find reasons to be too charitable.
For one thing, these are city buses, which means they're built for durability, not comfort. More than that, they're Chinese city buses, which seems to mean that most of the seats have leg room designed with people 5-foot-4 or smaller in mind. About two-thirds of the seats on these buses are physically impossible for me to sit in if there's someone in the seat next to me (the exceptions being aisle seats -- allowing me to turn sideways so there's room for my knees to stick out, where they can be hit by some photographer's gear -- and the two or four single seats at the front of the bus, depending on the model).
Also, as I've mentioned before, these buses are s-l-o-w. We haven't yet been passed by a bicyclist when we're on the road, but it sometimes takes some time to overtake a particularly determined cyclist. The shuttle between the Media Village and MPC never exceeds 40 kilometers per hour (about 25 miles per hour), even during the short stretch on the No. 5 Ring Road expressway. Many cars honk at us as they pass us in the adjacent lanes or shoulder.
And finally, there is no such thing as a direct route for a media bus. Because of various security fencing and traffic-flow decisions, the one from the village to the MPC finishes its journey by making a left turn off the street leading from the ring road, makes a right at the next intersection, followed by another right, followed by a left -- to get back on the same street we were on to begin with. The route to the Yingdong Natatorium, where I'm writing this, is at least as indirect. I'd estimate we're probably not much more than two miles from the MPC, but it's usually at least a 15 minute trip -- and today, with Friday traffic, it took closer to a half hour.
Oh, and there's another thing about these Games: Most of us journalists are victims of blatant bus discrimination.
Mostly, the athletes get really nice buses -- you know, the reclining-and-padded seat kind you'd charter at home. I don't have a problem with that; they're the reason the Olympics exist.

The MB02 media shuttle, a classic example of a Beijing city bus, arrives at the Yingdong Natatorium ...

... and is passed by the kind of bus (in this case an athletes transport) that media members never see from the inside.

But everyone else gets those buses too -- sponsor groups, the "Olympic Family" (which is to say the IOC members and their family, friends and freeloaders), and even the broadcasters. I could see this coming on the very first day of competition, when I covered road cycling up at the Great Wall. At the end of the night, volunteers directed us to our buses
"MPC, these buses," they said, pointing to the city buses waiting to force us into various physical contortions for the hour ride back.
"IBC (International Broadcast Center), these buses," they said, pointing to the long-distance, reclining-seat coaches.
It should be noted the MPC and IBC are across the street from each other.
(I subsequently learned there's an entire separate bus system for the denizens of BOB, the Beijing Olympic Broadcaster. The BOB buses, for example, ran directly from the tennis venue to the Media Village, allowing riders to skip 20 minutes of riding time and one change of buses. I snuck onto the BOB bus one night and had a brief taste of how the other half lives, but was turned away on a subsequent effort.)
So we creep along on our city buses (which, in fairness, are spotlessly clean). They serve their purpose: We get where we're supposed to. There have been no horror stories like those in Turin, where buses occasionally just didn't show up and the drivers once staged a brief wildcat strike.
But I'm not going to be sorry to ride my last Beijing bus.

Ventura County now has a complete set of medals from the Beijing Games.
Phil Dalhausser of Ventura and partner Todd Rogers won the gold medal in men's beach volleyball today, beating Brazil's Marcio Araujo and Fabio Luiz Magalhaes 23-21, 17-21, 15-4. Dalhausser was the difference in the match, awesome at the net in the deciding set.
So Ventura County athletes now have a gold, a silver (Jessica Mendoza in softball) and a bronze (the Bryans in tennis). If it were its own country, three medals would equal the number earned by Argentina, Ethiopia, Greece and Finland, among others, and ahead of such countries as Mexico and Serbia.
Back later with water polo.

It's Friday, Aug. 22 -- Day 15 of 17 at the Games, Day 19 of 22 on the ground in Beijing. The end is in sight.
First, though, my last prolonged day of the Games. Up this morning at 11 a.m. is the men's beach volleyball gold-medal match between Todd Rogers and Ventura's Phil Dalhausser and the Brazilian team of Marcio Araujo and Fabio Magalhaes. Writing this one on deadline, since it starts at 8 p.m. at home, which is going to be tough because of the lengthy post-match procedures on medal day.
Then tonight at 7:40 p.m., it's the men's water polo semifinal between the U.S. and Serbia, determining whether the U.S. team plays for the gold or bronze on Sunday.
Weather for this final day -- sunny with some haze, as you can see in the photo above, although the haze has partially burned off since that shot was taken.
Really on fumes, so the entries may be at a minimum today. I'll post on the volleyball after I've written for deadline, and on the water polo as soon as it's done.

The U.S. failed to capitalize on two bases-loaded, one-out situations and Japan cashed in its chances, beating the U.S. 3-1 on Thursday night for the gold medal.
Yukiko Ueno, who pitched 28 innings in the final two days of the tournament, allowed only a Crystl Bustos homer to give Japan its first softball gold and end the 22-game Olympic win streak for the U.S.

For you early risers or late-nighters, the softball gold medal game is in a rain delay in the top of the fourth inning, with Japan leading 2-0. The U.S. failed to score after having two on with no out, and the bases loaded with one out, in the first inning. Japan took a 1-0 lead in the third when Masumi Mishina -- hitless in 13 at-bats in these Olympics -- led off with a double and scored on a two-out infield single by Ayumi Karino, and added to that lead in the fourth when Eri Yamada led off with a home run off U.S. starter Cat Osterman. Osterman retired the next two batters, and then the rains came.

We're 45 minutes from first pitch, and the weather -- although still cloudy -- appears to be holding. Because of the logistics of this venue, where the media workroom is in a separate building, I'm going to sign off now and put the computer away, since we're outdoors and rain (should it come) is not particularly compatible with a laptop.

Back as soon as possible after the game with a brief update. With interviews and the medal ceremony, that probably won't be too terribly soon after the game is over, though.

As of now (2:20 p.m. local time), the rain has stopped, although it's still overcast and threatening, but the U.S. Olympic Committee has just sent out an advisory that the game is still on for the scheduled 6:30 p.m.
I had hoped to post some live updates for the insomniacs and early risers in the crowd, but if it's going to be wet or threatening, I'll have to leave the computer in the media workroom. If you're up, or when you get up, check back for an update closer to game time.

There's a building -- a series of five buildings, really, though only the first one is really worth discussing -- that I've been seeing every day since I've been here but know almost nothing about.
Near the Water Cube and Bird's Nest, It's called the Pangu Plaza, and it's been described as looking like a dragon, although it's really a rather uninteresting series of boxes except for the first and tallest building in the series, which looks something like a flaming torch. Here's the complex at night, behind the Water Cube, as seen from the Bird's Nest. Note the video screens, which are built into each building and have been showing Chinese Olympic highlights throughout the games. (Wild guess here: They'll eventually show advertising.)

Early in my stay, I was told this was because BOCOG -- the Beijing Organizing Committe of the Olympic Games - was housed there, but apparently that's not the case. The Pangu Plaza's English-language website doesn't seem to be working (at least when I click on the various page headings, nothing happens), but a New York Times article reports it's an office/condo/hotel complex -- largely still unfinished -- and is the subject of a number of rumors about people who have supposed bought condos there (which is, of course, an old attention-getting technique in real estate, to plant rumors about supposed famous tenants). Eventually, it will have a so-called "seven-star hotel" and high-end shopping.
Anyway, I think it's kind of a cool structure, though the entire complex is not in the same class as some of the other major projects in the city, so here are a couple of other pictures, of the building by day ...

... and by night.

I've made several references to how worn down I am as the Olympics roll along, and you should realize it's not just me. Fatigue is a hard thing to illustrate, but the opportunity presented itself yesterday. These two photos were taken on the 1:30 p.m. bus from softball at Fengtai back to the Main Press Center, about 25 minutes into a 40-minute ride.

Proof, among other things, that no one looks good when asleep sitting up.
There were about 15 of us on this bus. Another guy and myself were sitting at the front, writing; two friends were talking; a photographer was editing shots and his laptop, and everyone else was asleep or close to it.

Or Not-So-Good Morning, as it were.
It's raining here, steadily, which is already messing up the Olympic schedule. Today's BMX event has been postponed a day, most of the field events at the Bird's Nest are being delayed (although they are currently throwing javelins), and tonight's softball is most definitely threatened. The current low-detail forecast on the Olympic info system -- which offers forecasts for three-hour periods -- shows rain continuing through the 9 p.m. forecast, the last one for today. A more detailed forecast on weather.com has the chance of rain above 50 percent through 6 p.m. (the softball game is supposed to start at 6:30) and at 40 percent thereafter through tomorrow morning.
On the bright side, if things are postponed, tomorrow's forecast is for sun and 85 degrees. On the other hand, I'm already scheduled to do men's water polo and perhaps beach volleyball, and a softball rainout could pose some definite scheduling problems.
So this is going to be a day of watching the skies and the forecast. I'd planned to head out to Fengtai for the game pretty early, because of the expected media crowd, but I don't really want to make an 80-minute round trip by bus for nothing. In the meantime, I'm going to post a couple of things here and perhaps go back upstairs for a short nap.

One more time, perhaps for the last time, the United States will face Japan in Olympic softball.
Japan earned a rematch with the U.S. on Wednesday evening, defeating Australia 4-3 in 12 innings. The teams were to meet again Thursday at 6:30 p.m., 3:30 a.m. Pacific time, in the final gold medal game before softball is dropped, along with baseball, from the Olympic program.
It will be the third Japan-U.S. game in this tournament and the seventh in Olympic history; the U.S. has won all six prior meetings, although it has needed extra innings to do it four times, including Wednesday's 4-1, nine-inning victory.
Japan and Australia were tied 2-2 at the end of regulation. Each team scored once in the 11th, but Japan scored the winning run with one out in the bottom of the 12th as Rei Nishiyama singled home Masumi Mishina.
Yukiko Ueno (4-1) went the distance for Japan, striking out seven, walking two and allowing seven hits. Tanya Harding (2-2) pitched the final 6 1/3 innings and took the loss for Australia, which finishes with the bronze medal.
"It was a really tough and intense game," said Japan's third baseman, Megu Hirose. "We have definitely gained a lot of precious experience from this game, which can be helpful for tomorrow's game."
Earlier, Australia beat Canada 5-3 in the day's second semifinal, scoring two runs in the top of the sixth to break a 3-3 tie.

And with that update, it's Good Night from Beijing.

BEIJING -- Sometimes, you just need a hamburger.
That's how this all started.
For the first time since the Olympics began, I had a truly prolonged period of free time -- the rest of the day after 2:30 p.m., when I wrapped up my softball coverage.
And so I figured it was about time to try a little solo adventuring. After all, our Olympic credential gives us unlimited use of rapid transit, Beijing has a comprehensive subway system, and I've seen very little of it other than out the windows of Olympic media buses. Never mind that I can't read the language and my spoken Chinese begins and ends with ni hao and xie xie; I'm in China, and who knows when that will happen again?
So I figured I'd try something relatively simple and go out for a hamburger.
"Relatively" is the key word there. I'm several thousand miles from the nearest In-N-Out, and McDonald's wasn't what I had in mind.
Having once satisfied a similar craving at the Hard Rock Café in Rome, I decided to visit the Hard Rock here. First hurdle: I had no idea where it was.
An internet search determined it was in a hotel, the Landmark, to the southeast of the Media Village. A quick check of a map showed there was a subway stop somewhere near the Landmark. I figured that was all the information I needed.
So I boarded the No. 5 subway line that stops right by the village at Lishuqiao South. Four stops later, I switched to the No. 10 line at Huxininxijie Nankou and took the southbound line toward Jinsong, getting off after another four stops at Liangmaqiao. (About this time, I'm starting to long for a stop called Oak Street.)
So far so good, but I didn't really know exactly where the hotel was from the subway stop, and like all subway stops, there was more than one way out of the station. At random, I took the one that put me out at the southeast corner of the Liangmaqiao and the No. 3 Ring Road. When I came up the stairs, my vision was filled by -- the Landmark Hotel. I had to walk no more than a half-block to get there, fending off two different offers from guys offering to sell me "rare Chinese art and antiques." (With or without an Olympic credential -- and I was wearing it for free-subway-access purposes -- a 6-foot-2 Caucasian doesn't exactly blend in on the streets of Beijing.)

After that, it was easy. I went in, asked for a non-smoking seat, was promptly seated in the smoking section (something apparently got lost in lack of translation) and noticed about two-thirds of the people in the room were wearing Olympic credentials or Olympic-team clothing, and not just from the U.S. either. Apparently, jonesing for a burger is an international problem.
While I waited for the burger, I looked around at the décor. Sorry, but there's just something weird about seeing Nirvana memorabilia in China. But the stained glass windows were cool.

Eventually, my order -- the "Legendary 10-ounce burger" with bacon, tomato, pickles (quickly removed) and lettuce -- arrived. I was a happy man.
Unfortunately, it wasn't quite as good as the one I remembered from Rome. But it wasn't bad, and for the first time in almost three weeks, I was able to drink real brewed ice tea from a real glass with real ice.
Sometimes, the small pleasures really are the best ones.

This all went so smoothly, and took so little time, that I decided to expand my trip. A little farther down the No. 10 subway line was a stop that looked like it would put me near The Big Pants, the still-under-construction China Central Television skyscraper I'd photographed from a taxi window on our trip to the Forbidden City. I decided I needed a closer look.
Initially, the look was, in fact, too close. My stop, Jintaixizhao -- pay attention, there's going to be a spelling test later on all these names -- put me right under the 59-story building (at least, that's how many stories I think it has; a web site for the firm involved in the engineering describes it as "a nine-story podium joining two 50-story towers linked by a 13-story cantilevered overhang linking the buildings 36 stories above the ground.") That was a little too close for a good shot, but here are two from right at the base of the building.

From this angle, the CCTV building looks a bit odd ...

... from this one, you get an idea how unique it really is.

I quickly discovered that, with Beijing's cluttered skyline, there was no way to get a really good shot of the building from ground level. There are a few skyscrapers on the other side of the No. 3 Ring Road that would provide a great view if they have observation decks, but not knowing that, I just did the best I could with what I could find walking south.

Eventually, I ended up back at the subway -- the intersection of the No. 10 and No. 1 lines at Guomao station, which was perfect, because I'd decided to make another little architectural side trip and get a better look at the Egg, the National Center for the Performing Arts we'd raced past on our frustrating first visit to Tiananmen Square.
And so I took the No. 1 to Tiananmen West, popped up the stairs, made a 90-degree turn, and there it was: the Egg.

(Sorry I can't get the whole thing in one picture, but the Chinese are doing all this great architecture on a scale that almost defeats photography, at least with my little point-and-click. For this, I need to use a wide-angle lens, or perhaps even engage in a bit of Jason Johnson fish-eye overkill. [Sorry, I know 99.99 percent of you won't get that reference, but there's one person laughing very hard right now.])

My attempt at the stark Architecture Digest shot.

This building has received some architectural criticism -- because it's completely surrounded by a pool, and entry can only be made by going downstairs, through a passage under that pool, and back up into the building, some have found it a bit cold and isolated. Me, I just like the sort of audacity of a modern structure adjacent to the historic buildings of the Forbidden City, and the sort of Heavy-Handed Communist style of the buildings surrounding Tiananmen Square (as visible in the background here).

Funny thing: While I was on this little trip, I was stopped by a camera crew from a French news service -- one that apparently does material in both French and English -- looking for someone to interview about the new architecture in Beijing. I was happy to oblige; at some point, you'll apparently be able to see the results online at france24.com.
After it was done, I asked one of the members of the crew if he'd take a picture of me with the Egg. "You're the best interview we've got so far," he said. "I certainly owe you that."

That was the end of the photo part of the expedition, but I had one more stop to make. My map showed a mall relatively nearby, and I'm still trying to find a Chinese League soccer jersey, so I jumped back on the No. 1 for a couple of stops to Wangfujing (remember, there's a test coming) and went to The Malls at Oriental Plaza.
Right idea, wrong location. This turned out to be an enormous, high-end mall (just about everyone who's got a shop on Rodeo Drive is also in this place, as well as many, many others), and there was nothing as plebian as a sporting-goods store. (There was an adidas store that had some Olympic merchandise, but that's not quite the same thing.) I did pick up a couple of shirts -- the adidas sizes still ran small, but not as bad as the stuff I'd tried on at the Olympic SuperStore -- and decided to call it a night. It was a short walk back to the Dongdan station on the No. 5 subway line, and 25 minutes later I was back in the village -- after about five hours, five rides on three subway lines, the most money I've spent in a while (there are a couple of Hard Rock T-shirts in my bag, too), one hamburger and uncounted ni haos and xie xies.

Crystal Bustos ripped a 3-run homer and Monica Abbott threw eight shutout innings as the U.S. advanced to the gold medal game in softball with a 4-1 semifinal win over Japan.
Press conferences are beginning; back later with more.

Crystal Bustos ripped a 3-run homer and Monica Abbott threw eight shutout innings as the U.S. advanced to the gold medal game in softball with a 4-1 semifinal win over Japan.
Press conferences are beginning; back later with more.

A brief greeting -- no weather photo, sorry -- from the softball venue at Fengtai, where the U.S.-Japan game is coming up in 50 minutes and I need to get out and stake out a seat because of a large Japanese media contingent. This may or may not be my only event of the day, depending on the outcome of this game. (If the U.S. loses, it would play again at 5 p.m.)
Today's weather, still sunny, but increasing haze and humidity.
Back later.

In a familiar result, Troy Dumais was sixth in the 3-meter men's springboard competition Tuesday night. That's also where he finished in Sydney and Athens, leading a reporter (not this one) to suggest he might be tired of that finish.
"Tired of sixth? That's not the quote," he said. "The quote should be more like I went after everything and I didn't hold anything back, and the placement doesn't matter as long as you have fun.
"It wasn't the result I wanted, but I wasn't going to hold anything back. I wasn't tentative, and again, my fifth round -- that's the only thing that bothers me in terms of my performance at all."
The fifth round is when he scored 57.75 points on his reverse 3 1/2 somersault -- the second-lowest score of the night for any diver -- and slipped to eighth. He had been as high as third.
Dumais said the reverse 3 1-2 was a dive he'd been hitting consistently in practice.
"What's so funny is the only ones I missed were in the meet, and they were all over. And I didn't make the correction for that. ...
"I was so trying to make a correction just on that part, that I was looking for it, looking for it, looking for it. Which is not a problem, but sometimes corrections and ideas and thoughts overwhelm the processes of movements. I know I can hit that dive."
He Chong of China won the competition with 572.90 points, 36.25 ahead of Alexandre Despatie of Canada. Qin Kai of China was third with 530.10 points.
Dumais finished with 472.50 points. The other U.S. finalist, Chris Colwill, finished 12th with 425.90 points.

That's all for tonight. Back tomorrow with early softball (9:30 a.m. here, 6:30 p.m. there).

In today's adventure, I went to the post office. This was not originally on the agenda.
With the games winding down, it was time to take the backpack we received from the Beijing Organizers, fill it up with selected freebies and most of the few souvenirs I've purchased (the Chinese Army hat didn't fit) and figure out how to get it home instead of lugging it to Australia.
Having completed the packing process, I went downstairs to the UPS office in the Media Village -- and was quoted a price of 2,500 yuan ($364.41 -- more than it cost four of us for the trip to the Great Wall). For one backpack and some mostly lightweight items? I said no thanks and went a few yards away to the Media Village's branch of the China Post.
This was not quite like sending a package from Oxnard to Rancho Cucamonga. As soon as I explained what I wanted, the very polite and friendly postal employees proceeded -- in a very polite and friendly manner to be sure -- to pull open the carefully packed bag and poke, prod or otherwise inspect every single item in it, opening boxes, checking compartments in the bag and the like.
I stifled the impulse to say I wanted to mail it, not get it cleared to sit in first class on the next flight home. Note to future China visitors: Privacy is not part of your mailing experience.
Anyway, after all that, they went in back and came out with a box which looked sturdy enough to withstand a direct hit from a rocket-propelled grenade -- not often in my experience do you get a mailing box with visible wood grain -- dropped the backpack in and sealed it up in a manner which looks impenetrable, but I suspect won't thwart postal inspectors here or in the U.S. After filling out a rather detailed shipping form, sent it off air mail, my lowest-priced option.
Total cost: 749.30 yuan, or about $109.22 -- still more than I'd hoped, but way better than UPS. And it beats having an additional piece of luggage or risking overweight charges. Plus I'll get a box that will probably last until the end of time.
Estimated time of arrival: Two weeks.
I don't know what kind of aircraft takes two weeks to go from China to the U.S., but I don't really want to find out.
And watch the blog in mid-September, when I get back from Australia, and I'll let you know when/if it arrives, and what kind of shape it's in.

Starting better but finishing on a bit of a down note, Troy Dumais advanced to tonight's finals in the 3-meter springboard competition, placing 10th in this morning's semifinals to earn one of 12 places in the final.
Dumais was as high as third place after three dives, in fifth after four, but finished with his two lowest-scoring dives, including a final dive that had the second-lowest score of the sixth round.
"My last two dives are two of my best dives," he said, "and for some reason, I'm just a little off on them. So before the final, we're going to work on them a little bit."
Dumais' 10th-place showing followed a 12th in Monday's preliminary round, leaving him wondering why exactly he's been a bit off after he'd performed well in the Olympic trials and in practice leading up to the Games.
"I can't really put my finger on it," he said, "other than the fact this isn't home. It's tough, honestly, for me, being here for three weeks and being by bus, not getting a chance for me to get out and be by myself.
"That's my freedom and my way to get out and clear my mind and build up for the next day, and sometimes I don't get that. But I've got to create it, and I've got to get past that, and just go from there."

Greetings, or as I like to say to those of you on the other side of the International Date Line, hello from tomorrow. It's Tuesday, Aug. 18, Day 12 of 17 of the 2008 Olympics, Day 16 of 22 of our time in Beijing.
OK, this is a little weird. Here's the good-morning shot looking west from my bedroom window. You can see there's blue sky (contrary to today's forecast for clouds), but the mountains have disappeared into the haze.

However, this is the view from the living room window, which is maybe 20 feet away but faces north instead of west.

In this direction, it looks far more like a full-fledged return of the Beijing Blahs. The truth, as of now, is probably closer to the view from the bedroom window, but the visibility is clearly declining.
Anyway, I'm writing this from the Water Cube, where Troy Dumais will be in the semifinals of the 3-meter springboard competition starting in a little more than a half-hour. The semifinals cut the field from 18 to 12; if he advances, he (and I) will be back here for the finals starting at 8:30 p.m.
I'm writing on deadline from the semis, so I'll be back with an online update once the story for the paper is filed.

Ventura's Troy Dumais is through the preliminary round in the men's 3-meter springboard diving competition at the Water Cube, but it was a fairly bumpy night for the three-time Olympian.
Twenty-ninth and last after his first dive, he eventually climbed as high as sixth but ended in 12th place -- more than enough to get one of the 18 spots in Tuesday's semifinals, but far from enough to satisfy him.
"I didn't do a thing I wanted to do," he said, "other than I set all my dives up to hit them, and unfortunately I didn't perform them the way I have been leading up to this for six, seven weeks.
"It's frustrating, but I'm in there and I get another chance tomorrow."
Dumais did have two fairly solid dives -- his second (a forward 3 1/2 that scored 83.70 points, second best of the round) and third (a forward 2 1/2 with two twices that scored 83.30, again the second-best mark) -- but found little consolation in that.
"I knew my dives, and was just missing things here," he said. "... I miss my entry, that's a point and a half to two points per judge, and basically on all my dives. Add those points up, it becomes a big change.
"I'm going to go home reevaluate stuff and get prepared for tomorrow."
It was his first dive, a back 2 1/2 that scored just 63 points, that got the evening off to a rough start.
"For some reason, I lost my balance and my foot moved up on the board. When loading the board, for some reason, my toe curled under, and I couldn't jump off of it, so I had to push away ... That shouldn't happen at my level of diving."
Predictably, China's two divers -- He Chong and Qin Kai -- were one-two in the preliminaries; the gap between first and third, 34.85 points, was bigger than the one between third and 12th.
The best news for everyone but He and Qin is that -- in a change from the format at the 2004 Olympics -- none of the preliminary scores carry over. The eighteen divers start from zero in the morning.

The end of the U.S. medal drought in men's water polo is in reach.
An 8-7 win over Germany this afternoon, coupled with Serbia's upset 13-12 loss to Italy, vaulted the U.S. to the top of the Group B standings and assured the American men will play for a medal in the Beijing Games.
By winning the group, the U.S. earned a bye into the Friday's semifinals. A win there will give them a place in Sunday's gold-medal game; a loss and they'll play for the bronze on Sunday.
Back later with more.

Yes, it's another sunny day in the big city: Day 11 of 17 for the Olympics, Day 15 of 22 for us in Beijing. The mountains are still visible from the room, although getting a bit fainter in the haze. Tomorrow's supposed to get warmer and cloudier, so I think we may be headed for another bout with the big-time humidity.
I got a little extra sleep this morning -- although still not enough -- so I'm at least a bit refreshed as I head into two events today: The U.S.-Germany men's water polo game at 2:20 p.m. (11:20 p.m. Sunday at home) to determine whether the U.S. gets to the medal round, and the first round of Troy Dumais' diving competition starting at 7 p.m.
As always, updates and other thoughts on line throughout the day.

The Boulder runner I was covering, Jorge Torres, finished 25th in the men's 10,000, so it wasn't exactly a fun day of coverage at the Bird's Nest. Now it's time to run for a bus. Back tomorrow.

Before I go out to cover the men's 10,000 for the Boulder Daily Camera, I did want to pass along one other photo from my walk around the Bird's Nest this evening -- one iconic structure as seen from another.

it's blurry, obviously, but I still kind of like this photo because of the story that goes with it.
I was walking around the Bird's Nest, taking photos -- I'm going to wait until I have a chance to take a few more before I post any of them -- when this young Chinese lady stopped me and asked me to take a photo of her with some of the Olympic volunteers. Because (as those with good memories may recall from a Postcard from Turin) I have found this is one of the great ways to make people smile and perhaps to a small thing for the reputation of Americans (and I have once again while in Bejing been offering to take pictures of couples or groups together when I see one person having to miss out by holding the camera), I was happy to comply.
Then then she asked the volunteers to take a picture of her with me. And after that, we had one of the volunteers take one with my camera, which he unfortunately botched.
"I am Jen Ti," she said (that's a phonetic approximation, and I hope that spelling doesn't have some unintendedly horrible meaning). "Welcome to China."
We shook hands, did a little bow, and both went our separate ways. Smiling.

I have evened the score with the evil laundromat of the Media Village.
I reluctantly returned to the basement today. Having learned that I was far from alone in being defeated by the combination washer-dryer-frustration generator -- but also having discovered that the send-out laundry service is the one truly overpriced venture in the media village -- I knew I needed to do just a little bit of clothing to get myself safely to Australia, where instructions will be in English and the washers and dryers are, shall we say, a bit more robust (at least, that's my recollection from 2000).
But, believing any opponent can be defeated with the proper preparation, I mapped out a plan and stuck to it.
First, I washed only the heavier of my clothing, so I wouldn't have to worry about the dryer's heat damaging some of the utlra-lightweight material. Second, I did two very small loads -- socks and underwear in one, and a very modest five shirts and one pair of pants in the other.
I followed the instructions on the machine top to the letter, pressed the start button and came back an hour later to check on things. One machine was in the dry cycle, with 27 minutes left. On the other, I had apparently not pressed the dryer button with sufficient force or purity of spirit, so it had not started drying. But I actually successfully started the dryer cycle and left.
I came back a half-hour later to find, in the one machine -- yes! -- clean, DRY clothes. The other, because of the missed time, was not quite dry, and I had to leave and hang the shirts and pants in my room. But they were close, and I have no doubt that, if I'd had another 20 minutes to wait, that one would have turned out fine, too. Small loads, apparently, are the key.
So I'm going to count this as a win.
But I'm also not going to press my luck. I now have clean clothes to spare for the final week of the Games. I'm not going anywhere near another laundromat until I'm on vacation.

So here's a nice little story from the Media Village.
One of the last things I threw in my back before I left, just to be on the safe side, was a bar of soap. Usually, that's been supplied at the Olympics, but I figured it wouldn't hurt.
Well, it turned out that here, they just gave us body wash from one of the Olympic sponsors. I'm not wild about that, so out came the soap.
It's gone now, and my roommate Nick, not realizing it was soap I'd brought, went down to the front desk in our building yesterday to ask for more. He was told it was not something they stocked for us, so he went out to buy some.
But when we came home last night, on the table in our living room were two bars of soap and this note:
"Respected Mr. Lassen:
"We were informed that you need soap this morning, but it is not included in the reserved articles that Beijing 2008 Olympic Media Accomodation Service Group had prepared for you. Despite of this, our staff went to buy two soaps for you specially this morning.
"Sincerely hope you enjoy your stay in D3!
"Reception."
There are some things the Chinese have done well at these games, and some they haven't done so well.
But it can never be said they haven't tried to be friendly and helpful.
Oh, and I'd like to be addressed as "Respected Mr. Lassen" from now on.

The soap and the note.

No out-the-window shot this morning, since it was still semi-dark when I got up in order to get to the marathon.
Instead, for the weather-report photo, we have this, courtesy of a Chinese couple who reciprocated after I took a photo of them together in front of the National Stadium:

Yes, we're back to a gray day -- it's even been spitting rain a bit during the marathon -- although visibility is still far better than it had been before last week's big rain.
As for today, I am (obviously) covering the women's marathon. After that, I have to cover a track race at 10:30 tonight for one of the other Scripps papers. In between, the agenda calls for sleep and another bout with the Village laundromat. Wish me luck.

Via the Olympic News Service, which provides quotes for the media, we now have this comment from Deena Kastor:
"My foot has been sore for the past week. I thought it was just tendons; they get hyper-sensitive leading up to a marathon. I was icing it this week. It didn't affect how I was training. it was a bit sore when I woke up, but had no affect on my running. It was tight most of the way. I felt a pop in my foot. I couldn't stand on it.
"I didn't expect to be finishing the marathon in a bus."

At this point, we do not know if Deena will otherwise be available for comment.

Before I could even file the usual "Good Morning from Beijing," we have major news -- and highly unfortunate news for fans of Agoura Hills runner Deena Kastor. Just five kilometers into the women's marathon, Kastor is out of the race. TV coverage here showed her suddenly stopping, going to a knee and grabbing her right foot. No additional details at this point, but I'm near the USA Track and Field Media Relations person, Jill Geer, so as soon as we know something, I'll pass it along.

Update: A BBC blog is quoting Kastor as saying she heard something pop in her food. First word is that procedure is to bring her here to the finish for treatment, etc.; I'll report any additional news as I get it.

Bouncing back from a slow start, Mike and Bob Bryan clamed the bronze medal in doubles at the Olympic tennis tournament tonight, beating Arnaud Clement and Michael Llodra of France 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 in a one-hour, 52-minute match.
The final point came in odd fashion -- the Bryans successfully challenged a Llodra return that was called in, but proved to be out -- which was somewhat symbolic of the way the Bryans' luck and performance both improved as the match progressed.
"We weren't having a lot of luck with the let cords or the challenges," said Mike Bryan. "I think the stars were aligned against us at the beginning. We got a few let cords, and basically, we just picked up our play right from the second set on.
"Basically, we said we're going to fight our butts off, because this is a huge moment for us."
Full coverage in Sunday's Star.

The men's water polo team has put itself in excellent position to reach the medal round after a 7-5 win over Croatia -- the defending world champion and, before today, the last of the 12 teams in the men's tournament with a perfect record.
Tony Azevedo had three goals and Merrill Moses had 11 saves as the U.S. men continued the standout defensive play they showed in their 4-2 loss to Serbia on Tuesday.
The U.S. and Croatia are both 3-1; Serbia should be, too, after it plays China later, and Germany is 2-2. So at this moment, the U.S. could finish anywhere from first to fourth in the pool -- first would get it a bye into the semifinals in medal play; fourth and it's out of medal contention. It will all be sorted out Monday, when the U.S. plays Germany at 2:20 p.m. local time.

It's Saturday in Beijing -- Day 9 of 17 for the Olympics, Day 13 of our 22 in the city. Not that I'm starting to count down or anything.
We're still enjoying the aftereffects of Thursday's big rain. Although I can see a bit more haze than yesterday -- the one truly glorious day since we've been here -- it's still clear enough that you can actually see mountains from my bedroom window. Before yesterday, I didn't even know we had mountains.
They're kind of tough to see in the shot above, so here's a closer look with the zoom:

On my schedule today: First, Men's water polo against Croatia, beginning at 12:10 p.m. local time (9:10 p.m. Friday in Southern California). I'm writing that one for Saturday's paper, so I'll be back here with a quick update once I've written the on-deadline story.
After that comes the Bryan brothers' silver medal match in doubles tennis at -- well, I've given up trying to guess when any tennis match is going to start after last night's ridiculous development, when the match preceding the Bryans went 19-17 in the third set and took four hours, 45 minutes. All I can say is they're the second match on Court 1 in a session that begins at 4 p.m. local time, following the women's single semifinal between Vera Zvonareva and Elena Dementieva, both of Russia.

Literally and figuratively, the clock struck midnight for Mike and Bob Bryan.
In a match that ended at the stroke of 12, they were beaten 7-6 (8-6), 6-4 by Roger Federer and Stanislas Wawrinka on Friday night. As a result, they'll play Arnaud Clement and Michael Llodra of France, who lost to Simon Aspelin and Thomas Johansson of Sweden in the first semifinal -- an absurdly long (four-hour, 45-minute) affair that ended with Aspen and Johansson winning 7-6 (8-6), 4-6, 19-17, and pushed the Bryans' start time past 10:30 a.m. for the second straight night.

And with that, it's good night from Beijing.

For the benefit of any insomniacs out there, since it's now 2:53 at home, the U.S. did end up beating Canada 8-1. Since then, it's pretty much been perpetual motion: the interviews finished at 3:58 p.m., I caught the 4 p.m. bus (and wrote my story on the way back to the MPC), grabbed a bite to eat and then caught a bus to the Olympic Green Tennis Center, where I'm awaiting the Bryans' doubles semifinal with Roger Federer and Stanislaus Wawrinka.
Federer and Wawrinka earned their spot in the semis earlier this afternoon, beating Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes of Indiana 6-2, 6-4 in the conclusion of a match suspended last night with Federer-Wawrinka leading 4-1 in the first set.
The other doubles semifinal, between Simon Aspelin-Thomas Johansson of Sweden and Arnaud Clement-Michael Llodra of France, is early in the first set at this writing. I'm hoping the Bryans might be playing by 7:30 or so, which would be their earliest start in three days, by more than two hours.

Going to the bottom of the seventh, the U.S. leads Canada 6-1, having added four runs in the seventh on an RBI single by Caitlin Lowe, a run-scoring double by Jessica Mendoza and a two-run single by Andrea Duran. More later -- though how much later will depend on whether I'm able to wrap things up in time to catch 4 p.m. bus back to the MPC or have to wait for the one at 4:30.

The U.S. has gone up 4-1 in the top of the sixth, with the tying run scoring as Kelly Kretschman was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded, and the go-ahead run coming as Jessica Mendoza scored from third on a wild pitch. Two more runs came in on a throwing error by shortstop Jennifer Sailing, Canada's third error of the inning. The U.S. scored its four runs without a hit.

A quick update from softball: With Jessica Mendoza hitting a pair of two-run homers, the U.S. beat Japan 7-0 today in its scheduled softball game. Natasha Watley and Crystl Bustos also homered as the U.S. set an Olympic single-game record for home runs.
The U.S. scored four in the first, then picked up three more in the fourth, giving it enough for a five-inning mercy-rule win.
The team's suspended game with Canada has resumed and is now through five innings, with Canada still leading 1-0 on the unearned run it scored yesterday in the first inning.
The Japan game started late, so there won't be a story in Friday's paper. Instead, I'll have a story on both games for Saturday.
Back later to wrap up the suspended game. It may be a while, depending on when this game ends, because I've got to catch a bus back to tennis as soon as possible.

Having arrived at the Fengtai Softball Field a bit early, I went outside the Olympic security area for a quick walk around the perimeter of the Fengtai Sports Complex, just to see what might be in the neighborhood. This is the street running behind the softball stadium.

The block includes a 7-11 type store, two barbers (two doors apart) and this walk-up butcher shop.

Reflecting either the Olympic softball, the Sports Complex's softball and baseball academy, or both, planters in the neighborhood are painted to look like softballs or baseballs.

These boxes along the street are portable toilets -- each with an air conditioner! -- that are all over the streets around the Olympic venues.

I went for my walk in hopes for two specific reasons. There's a huge soccer stadium that's part of the sports complex, and I was hoping to find a store that might sell merchandise for whatever team plays there; a Chinese soccer jersey would be a very cool addition to my collection. I was also looking to see if one of the many Beijing Starbucks might be in the area, because my brother collects Starbucks mugs and you don't see a Beijing one every day.
I went 0 for 2 -- but I did find the Confucious Restaurant (was the noted philosopher also a gourmet?), which shares its building with a Honda dealership (note the sign at the right).

All in all, a quick but interesting little excursion.

Sorry, no picture as of yet, but it's probably the nicest day so far ... mostly blue skies with a few clouds, and after yesterday's rain, the best visibility yet. I discovered on the bus ride this morning to the softball venue that there's a fairly substantial ridge of hills to the east of the No. 4 Ring Road, not unlike looking at the San Gabriels from the San Fernando Valley on a clear day. (The tradeoff, of course, is that probably means it's going to get very hot as the day goes on.)

Today's schedule: U.S. softball vs. Japan at noon (9 p.m. Thursday at home), followed by the completion of yesterday's rain-suspended game, which Canada leads 1-0 in the fourth inning. I'll be aiming to get the Japan game into the Friday paper, assuming it doesn't run too long, but the suspended game won't be done in time, so check for it here, as well as in the Saturday paper.

Later tonight, I'll be covering the Bryans' tennis semifinal against an opponent to be determined. The match to determine the other semifinalist, between Roger Federer-Stanislas Wawrinka and Mahesh Bhupathi-Leander Paes, was suspended with Federer-Wawrinka leading 4-1 in the first set when play was called off for the night at 1:35 a.m. One other match was also incomplete.

The Bryans play the third match in a session beginning at 4 p.m. local time, so it's going to be another late night.

That's all for now. Back later with softball.

In a match featuring some very entertaining tennis, Bob and Mike Bryan advanced to the semifinals of the Olympic doubles tournament by beating Chris Guccione and Lleyton Hewitt of Australia 6-4, 6-3, needing just 52 minutes for the job. Which was a good thing, since they didn't hit the court until 10:38 p.m. because of a rainstorm which delayed the start of the day's play by more than four and a half hours.
The Bryans trailed 4-1 in the first set and ran off the last five games, with service breaks of both Guccione and Hewitt. The second set stayed on serve until the seventh game, when the Bryans broke Hewitt; Mike Bryan then held serve before the twins broke Hewitt's serve to wrap up the match.
They'll play the winner of a late match -- and since it's almost midnight here and hasn't started, I do mean late -- between Roger Federer-Stanislas Wawrinka of Switzerland and Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes of India.

So, thanks to my last couple of nights at the Olympic Green Tennis Center, I'm starting to get to know the bugs of Beijing.
The press room has a bit of a problem with mosquitoes. I mentioned this to Tim Curry, the tennis media representative for the U.S. Olympic Committee, and he said, "Yes, and if you look at them, they look different than our mosquitoes." I'm not sure about that, but I do think they're smarter. I had one land on my computer -- in the exact dead center of the screen, where I could not risk fulfilling my impulse to swat it into the mosquito hereafter.
And outside on the courts -- well, bright lights attract bugs like rock guitarists attract groupies. I've seen insects of every shape, size, color and dining preference -- as a couple of welts on my neck and arm would indicate. Not that I'm the only one getting to know the area insects. Last night, there was a woman who shrieked rather energetically when something large and multi-legged -- I think it was a grasshopper, but I didn't get a great look -- decided to extend a personal greeting on behalf of the Chinese animal kingdom. This wouldn't have been quite so much of a problem if the Bryans hadn't been in the midst of a point at the time.
It could be worse, though. For one thing, I haven't seen anything else like the insect pictured here -- I'm told it's a cicada -- we encountered at the Great Wall. (Just for the record, that's a big bug, not a small brick.) It was so large that it should be required file a flight plan when it gets airborne.
Plus there's this: In July, the New York Times ran a story about Chinese efforts to battle a plague of locusts that was moving toward Beijing. (Interestingly, my attempts to access that story on line here as I wrote this note were blocked. A MSNBC story was available, though.) Some 33,000 exterminators were brought in to stop the invasion.
Apparently, they succeeded, because I haven't seen any locusts.
Of course, we still have 10 days of Olympics to go.

We're getting a little rain here.
This is like saying Bill Gates has a couple of bucks.
Having a big break between this morning's water polo and this evening's tennis, I came back to the Media Village to get a nap. While I was on the bus back, the skies opened up. It's been a while since I'd seen rain like this, and of course, I had nothing in the way of umbrella or raincoat, so once I got back to the Village, I got absolutely soaked in the probably 300 yards from bus to front door of my building.

The rain has disrupted a bunch of events. Among those of local interest, the U.S. softball game against Canada was called in the fourth inning with Canada leading 1-0. That game will be resumed Friday, after the U.S. plays its regular-scheduled game with Japan at noon (9 p.m. Thursday in Southern California).
Also, tonight's tennis has not started. Optimistically, the official communique is that it has been delayed "at least an hour," not starting earlier than 5 p.m. Since it's 4:40 here at the Village, which is only about 2 1/2 miles from the tennis venue, and it's still raining heavily, I can't see them starting any time soon, if at all. (I just checked the weather on the Olympic Info computer system, and as of 4:28 p.m. local time, there was a weather warning: "In the next two hours, a thunder-lightning process may occur.")
So, for the meantime, I'm sitting tight in the Village.

While I think about it, a couple of updates on things:
-- Remember the tank which appeared in front of the Main Press Center a couple of days ago? By late that afternoon, it had been roped off to keep people from climbing on it. The next day it was gone, and it has not as yet returned.
-- Since I wrote about the laundromat, I've learned that the laundry service is the one really expensive thing going here at the Media Village. One of the other Scripps guys sent out a week and a half's worth of clothes and it cost about $90. This means I may have to try a return engagement with that combination washer-dryer downstairs. In fact, if tennis gets rained out, I may try it tonight.

Despite a strong defensive effort, the U.S. men's water polo team suffered its first loss of the Olympic tournament this morning, losing 4-2 to Serbia, ranked with Croatia as the strongest entrants in Pool B.
Coach Terry Schroeder and his players were satisfied with their defensive effort -- "We talk about holding teams to six or seven goals," said Peter Varellas, who had both U.S. goals -- but the team was done in by missed offensive opportunities and Serbia's edge in extra-man situations.
The U.S., now 2-1, plays Croatia (3-0) on Saturday at noon (or 9 p.m. Friday Pacific time).

On the Lassen Scale of Murk Measurement, this is above average -- about a 7 on a scale of 10 for visibility. Yesterday, you could barely see the electrical tower to the right of the building in the middle of the picture.

On tap for today: men's water polo vs. Serbia, starting in about 10 minutes, and more Bryan brothers tennis late tonight.

Bob and Mike Bryan are through to the quarterfinals of the men's doubles tournament after a tough 7-6 (7-2), 6-4 win over Julian Knowle and Jurgen Melzer of Austria on Wednesday night.
"I thought it was high-quality tennis the whole way through," said Bob after the victory in 1 hour, 26 minutes. "Melzer's seeing the ball like a beach ball. I hit some 140s (mph) at him, and he just clocked it up the line. I thought we had to do our best stuff."
The Bryans will face Lleyton Hewitt and Chris Guccione of Australia in the quartefinals. Like Wednesday's match, that will be the fourth match on its court in a session beginning at 4 p.m. local time (1 a.m. in California), so they'll face a long wait to get to play.

That's it for tonight from Beijing. I'll be back at it in the morning with U.S.-Serbia water polo beginning at 10:50 a.m. Thursday local time, 7:50 p.m. Wednesday at home.

This is a bit out of sequence -- and I've already lost one attempt to post this, so we'll see what happens this time -- but since I had front-row seats on my bus trips this morning, I thought I'd give you an idea how our morning commute looks.
Leaving the Olympic Village, we use the Olympic Lane to avoid traffic on Anli Road.

After a few minutes, we reach the No. 5 Ring Road, named because it's the fifth beltway out from the city center, not because of the five Olympic Rings. It's visible on the bridge ahead. We turn onto the paralleling frontage road.

Eventually, we get onto the Ring Road. Note the merging form of the white car, which has just discovered it can't get past a security checkpoint.

We get back off the expressway almost immediately, at the next exit. Notice the board with all the colored squares at the right of the checkpoint. This shows all the various vehicle passes which allow Olympic access. Imagine trying to keep all those straight.

Entering the main Olympic complex, we pass the Olympic Green Tennis Center (which I hope to show you in more detail in a future entry) ...

... pass one corner of the athletes' Olympic Village (note the Italian flag on display; sorry about the reflections in the bus window) ...

... and eventually, we can see the Main Press Center through the morning haze.

The last turn into the MPC is often an adventure, since right-of-way seems to be determined mostly by assertiveness. This morning, it was pretty mild. We only cut off the one bus you can just see entering at the right of the frame.

Normally, I'd go into the MPC to check with my Scripps colleagues or pick up information at the USOC office, but today, I went right across the street and into this parking lot, which serves as the bus depot for the media transport system.

Today, I need the MB08 bus to the Fengtai Sports Complex Softball Field, which is in row No. 2 (of eight). Row 2 is not hard to find.

Three spots up the row, I find the MB08. Note that the sign, like all Olympic signage, is in three languages: the host nation's, English and French.

I once again snare a front-row seat. The vast majority of the media buses leave on the hour and half-hour, so when we leave at 10 a.m., there is a massive traffic jam leaving the lot. For the first five minutes, this is how things look.

Eventually, we get out of the lot, navigate the streets of the main Olympic complex and end up on the No. 4 Ring Road.

After about 30 minutes, we reach the Fengtai exit. Note the white car in front of us, which has just passed us on the shoulder and is now in the early stages of crossing four lanes of traffic. This is pretty standard driving procedure in Beijing.

A few moments later, we're on Fengti South Road, arriving at the softball stadium, which I've shown you earlier.

Total elapsed time for this trip was about an hour and 20 minutes.
I've subsequently made the trip back from Fengtai, stopped off in the MPC and taken another bus to the tennis center, where I'm waiting for the Bryans to play their second-round match. They're the fourth match of the night on Court 3. Currently the second match is 5-5 in the second set, so I have some waiting to do. (I am, of course, rooting for the guy who won the first set, to get that match over as quickly as possible.)
I'll have an update on the Bryans when they wrap up. If I had to guess, that won't be any earlier than about 7 a.m. PDT.

Here's the story for Wednesday editions of The Star, plus a couple of photos by yours truly (photographers and writers sit together here, so there's no issue about using the camera):

Teammates greet Crystl Bustos, center, at home plate after her sixth-inning homer.

By David Lassen
dlassen@VenturaCountyStar.com
BEIJING -- Members of the U.S. women's softball team sincerely believe the competition is improving in the Olympic tournament.
So far, it's hard to tell from the results.
With Cat Osterman throwing a no-hitter and Crystl Bustos blasting a two-run homer, the U.S. won its 16th consecutive Olympic softball game, beating Australia 3-0 today at the Fengtai Softball Field.
The U.S. team, which is 2-0 and has yet to give up a hit, continues pool play on Thursday, facing Canada at noon in Beijing (9 p.m. today PDT).
Osterman picked up the third win of her Olympic career, striking out 13 and walking three in topping the one-hitter she threw in an eight-inning win over Japan at Athens. That follows a combined no-hitter by Jennie Finch and Monica Abbott in the opening 11-0 win over Venezuela.
"I really wasn't thinking about (the no-hitter) too much until the end," said Osterman, the former University of Texas standout. "Obviously, the seventh inning, you kind of get a feel of what's going on, and I saw the scoreboard.
"It's nice. It is, but we have a lot more games to play and obviously, the gold medal is the ultimate thing. So in the end, if I would have to trade this in, I would trade it for a gold medal. That's the only thing we're working on."
The U.S. took the lead in the bottom of the fifth, when Lovieanne Jung walked with one out, stole second with two outs and scored on a single to left -- just over the glove of shortstop Natalie Ward -- by Natasha Watley. Then came Bustos' homer in the sixth, after Camarillo's Jessica Mendoza drew a walk from Australia pitcher Tanya Harding to lead off the inning.
"She's gotten in shape," Mendoza said of Harding, the veteran pitcher who led UCLA to a 1995 NCAA title that was later vacated because of NCAA violations. "She was about 30 pounds heavier the last time we saw her. ... She looks good, she's worked, she's obviously come out on a mission. The Olympic Games versus any other tournament, it's amazing what happens. And Tanya Harding is a perfect example."
Bustos had walked and flied out in two earlier at bats, but with Mendoza on first in the sixth, Harding was not able to pitch around her.
"That's my job," Mendoza said. "I don't know how anyone can throw to her, because she can hit any pitch out, she can hit any pitch anywhere. But the thing is, we have a lot of hitters around her, as well. So she doesn't have to worry that she's under pressure all the time."
Australia was the last team to beat the U.S. in Olympic competition, by a 2-1 score in 13 innings in pool play at the 2000 Games. Since then, the U.S. has won 16 games, 14 by shutout, outscoring opponents 79-2. But a game that was scoreless into the fifth was more along the lines of U.S. expectations for this tournament.
"We didn't expect to come in and kill everybody," Mendoza said. "Yesterday was really nice, but we knew Australia was going to battle us. We know Canada's going to come after us, and Japan, and there's a lot of teams that are going to be like this. And we've got to be ready."
Coach Mike Candrea agreed.
"I think it's a very competitive field, and like I told our kids, you can't ever get comfortable," he said. "I don't care what the score is, you can't get comfortable because I think the pitchers are better and the hitters are better."
That being the case, Candrea thought the way the U.S. scored its first run -- with the help of one of its four stolen bases -- was significant.
"The big thing right now is you saw today how we put ourselves in position to score a run, and that's overall speed. I think that's one thing about this team we tried to develop ... understanding that we're going to be in close games, and baserunning really makes a difference in those close games. Because all you're looking for is getting yourself in position to score as often as possible, and getting the key hit."

Cat Osterman prepares to deliver a pitch during her no-hitter.

Jessica Mendoza takes a swing.

Just for variety's sake, this is the view this morning from our living room, instead of the usual shot from my bedroom.

Yes, the Beijing Blahs are back, after a one-day respite.
A bit later than usual with the first post because I had a longer transit this morning, getting to Fengtai Softball Field for the noon game (9 p.m. PDT) between the U.S. and Australia. The stadium is huge. I'll try to sneak an inside shot later, but for now, here's a look at the outside of the stadium. This is the area behind home plate.

Also on my schedule today will be the Bryans' second-round doubles match, late tonight here in Beijing. It's about time to head into the softball stadium (the workroom here is in a building across the parking lot), so more later.

Mike and Bob Bryan had little trouble winning their Olympic doubles opener this morning, defeating Mark Knowles and Devin Mullings of the Bahamas, 6-2, 6-1, in a 52-minute match.
Details in Tuesday's Star. The time for the Bryans' next match won't be known until late tonight here.

Now here's something you don't get a look at every day. On our arrival at the MPC this morning -- where I was planning just a quick bus-to-bus jump to get to the tennis center for the Bryans' first-round match in doubles -- we were greeted by this new element in Olympic security. "First time I've seen a tank at a sporting event since the Super Bowl after 9/11," said one reporter.
Naturally, everyone was scrambling off the bus to take pictures (note the TV camera to the left), including a number of people who stood in front and posed for pictures. Wisely, no one tried to stage a re-enactment of the Tank Man incident.
Not sure if this was a cameo appearance, or a new regular feature.

This is the view out my window at about 8:30 this morning. If you've been paying attention to previous entries, you'll note that a.) you can see more buildings in the distance than ever before, and b.) there's a distinct bluish tint to the sky, and a brightness to the lighting that indicates the presence of, um, what's that thing called again? Oh, yeah, the sun.
Not quite a postcard day, but it does make the first time we've seen anything resembling sun and blue sky in exactly one week. Which I guess means that in Beijing, Tuesday is Sun Day.

Sam Querrey's Olympics are over.
After his earlier loss in singles, Querrey and James Blake were defeated by Igor Andreev and Nickolay Davydenko 6-3, 6-4 in a first-round doubles match late Monday night. As was the case in Querrey's singles match, the winner(s) had one service break in each set.

Ventura County's other tennis Olympians will finally begin play Tuesday morning -- Monday night in Southern California -- when Mike and Bob Bryan face Mark Knowles and Devin Mullings of the Bahamas in a match rescheduled from Sunday's rainout. That match begins at 10:30 a.m. here, 7:30 p.m. at home.

BEIJING -- In his Olympic debut, Thousand Oaks' Sam Querrey was beaten by Russia's Igor Andreev 6-4, 6-4 on Monday evening at the Olympic Green Tennis Center.
Andreev broke serve in the first game of the second set and repelled Querrey efforts to break back in both the sixth and eighth games en route to the victory in one hour, 13 minutes.
"I played all right," Querrey said. "My first serve percentage could have been a little higher, and then in the second set, some of those 30-all, 30-40 deuce points, I could have played a little tighter -- maybe made one more ball, or just kind of focused in a little harder."
Querrey is back in action later this evening, teaming with James Blake in doubles against Andreev and Nikolay Davydenko. I'll have an update here after that match and full coverage in Tuesday's Star.

My destination on this morning's shopping expedition.

BEIJING -- Now that the Games have begun, there aren't going to a lot of chances for further exploration of Beijing.
However, I was able to squeeze in a quick look at a shopping center this morning, since it's across the street from the Media Village.
This was purely in the name of research, of course. How often do you get a chance to see what a bottled Starbucks frappachino costs on the other side of the world?
So I wandered into this two-story building just outside the far end of the village, and my first impression was that this particular mall was a bit down at the heels.
I couldn't quite figure out if the first floor was a single clothing store or a bunch of smaller clothing operations, but I do know that it also included a Papa John's Pizza, a KFC (reportedly the most popular restaurant chain in China) a coffeehouse that was closed, and a bunch of empty stalls in what looked like it used to be a food court. A whole bunch of space was papered over with "closed for renovation" signs.

Exotic Chinese dining.

Upstairs was a Lotus store, which appears to be much like a Wal-Mart, right down to the same sort of signs showing the prices of items on sale. Even with everything from groceries to appliances, Familiar items were few and far between; most of them, for whatever reason, were in the sugary-junk category: Doublemint gum, Oreos, Chips Ahoy cookies, Snickers bars and the aforementioned bottled frappachino.
As has been the case for most things we've encountered here, prices were quite a bit lower than what we'd expect. A "special edition" CD/DVD of Norah Jones' Grammy-winning debut, "Come Away With Me," went for 46 yuan, about $6.70. (I was somewhat suspicious of the authenticity of this item, since the packaging appeared to have been designed and printed on someone's home computer). A Michael Jackson Greatest Hits CD was even less at 20 yuan (about 2.91).
Now, the reception I received in the store seemed to be significantly less warm than I've become used to in the Media Village. My smiles at people received very few in return, and a store employee followed me around for a short time while trying to act as if she wasn't. I do understand this; I'm guessing they don't see a lot of Caucasians with cameras walking around, even now.
So I took only a handful of photos, and I thought pulling out a notebook and writing down prices would have made me seem even more suspicious. So I can only report a handful of prices for a rather random group of articles that stuck in my head.

A rare opportunity to observe Chinese-made stuffed animals in their natural habitat.

Based on the signage, it appears there are even knockoff Wal-Mart stores in China.

A purple Spaulding Lakers basketball -- or if you prefer, a gray one with the Phoenix Suns logo -- goes for 80 yuan, or $11.65. A rather high-tech looking Yonex badminton racket (one of dozens of makes and models available -- try finding that a mainstream U.S. store) went for 189 yuan, or $27.53. That frappachino was priced at 13.90 ($2.02) a bottle. A bookshelf stereo system cost 799 yuan, or $116.37. A bicycle with a battery-powered motor went for 2,200 yuan, or $320.43. And the exact model of washer-dryer that taunted me in the Media Village was the single most expensive item I saw: 6088 yuan, or $886.71.
Somehow, I resisted the temptation to buy one and have it shipped home. I didn't buy anything, in fact.
But I still have two weeks. And those CDs are a really good deal.

BEIJING -- Just back at the MPC after an attempted evening doubleheader. In water polo, Tony Azevedo scored five goals as the U.S. beat China 8-4. In tennis, the Bryan brothers' opening match was rained out, as was most of the first day of the tournament. Just nine of 46 scheduled matches were completed today.
Since the tennis people had already been treating their schedule like a state secret -- Sunday's schedule appeared midday Saturday, and we've never had a hint of a Monday schedule -- I have no idea at this point when the Bryans might play their first match, or when Sam Querrey, scheduled to play on Monday, will make his Olympic debut. I'll post that when I know it. I don't recommend holding your breath.

The Yingdong Natatorium. You have no idea how difficult it was to take this picture.

So I'm at the water polo venue, the Yingdong Natatorium, for this afternoon's U.S.-China men's game. It's no Water Cube, but it certainly looks sufficient to the task. It's not full for the current match, Croatia and Italy,but I suspect it will fill up shortly.
You won't be seeing any pictures from the U.S.-China game, though, because, well, there are strict rules about cameras in the press box (or Press Tribune, in Olympic-speak). They aren't allowed. And if there's anything the Chinese do really well, it's strict.
I walked upstairs to take these pictures, managed one, and was immediately accosted (politely) by a volunteer saying no pictures were allowed. I explained that I just wanted a few for myself (I didn't think mentioning both my blog readers would help the issue), as if I were on vacation, and if that was the case, was there someplace I could take pictures.
The volunteer said, "Please wait here. I need to talk to my supervisor." And left.
I took another picture.
She came back.
"Your credential does not allow you to take photographs," she said. Pause.
"But if you're just taking them for yourself -- go ahead."
So I took a couple more, came down here, and through the miracle of the internet -- not to mention international cooperation -- here it is: Yingdong Natatorium.
Now, to a degree, I understand this. They want to keep the photographers in the photographers' area, and the writers in the writers' area.
But this is two venues, and two such exchanges. (It happened at the cycling on Saturday, too.) My little digital camera isn't likely to be confused with professional equipment, and at the road cycling, I was even up there when there were no riders within 30 miles. Common sense would seem to suggest there are bigger things to worry about than my little camera.
But rules are rules, so it could be a challenge to show you some of these venues -- unless I'm able to achieve the fine Chinese art of consensus, as I was here.

A fiendish chamber of horrors disguised as a mild-mannered laundromat. My nemeses are the first and third machines in the foreground.

BEIJING -- Having a bit of free time this morning, I decided to attempt one of the truly risky, unpredictable, baffling undertakings known to international travelers -- the sort of thing that makes strong men weep and leaves the toughest individuals drained, dazed and disheartened.
I went to the laundromat.
Anyone who's ever done their own clothes in Europe knows that the big, space-eating, predictably efficient washers and dryers we know and take for granted just aren't a worldwide commodity. The washers are OK, but the dryers? You can put clothes in a dryer for two hours, run them on the maximum setting, and have them come out wetter than when they went in.
And so I ventured nervously into the basement of our building, knowing that by doing a load of clothes today, it would be at least theoretically possible to get through the rest of the Olympics with clothing on hand, although I'd probably be flying to Australia wearing my last clean shirt.
Two hours later, I came out a broken, beaten man with a bag full of semi-damp clothing.
In theory, the machines here are quite clever -- a washer and dryer all in one unit. They'd be cleverer they didn't have about 17 bewildering buttons and dials, semi-incomprehensible instructions (even with a newly translated set of English instructions taped to the top), and a bad attitude.
The running time for a wash-and-dry cycle was supposed to be 90 minutes, so I started two machines (they have very small capacities), went to breakfast, and then to the workroom for my daily session of deleting e-mails from boxing promoters.
About an hour into the process, I decided to go down to see if the clothes were actually drying, and how hot the machines were. Since I have a bunch of synthetic, fast-drying clothes, I didn't really want them on the highest dryer setting. They might melt.
As I left the workroom, I asked an Australian journalist to watch my bag (my computer was locked in place) -- then asked her if she'd used the laundry yet. She said she had.
"It was," she said, then paused for several seconds, as if trying to decide just how much she should tell me/brace me for, "interesting."
Down in the basement, it was clear the clothes had finished washing, but I wanted to see how the drying was progressing. Bad move.
Once I opened the door, the machines would not restart, despite a great deal of prodding and pushing of buttons. An Italian journalist joined in trying to help, and had no more success.
So I had to enlist the help of one of the workers in the reception area. She couldn't get the machines to re-start either, and enlisted more help. Two more workers came, all of them pushing buttons and turning knobs, until they finally stopped gave up and started an animated conversation in rapid Chinese.
While they were talking, the machines restarted of their own volition. A half-hour later, I came back, and they were still running. One was almost out of time. I stopped it and took my clothes out. They were a little damp.
The other was still running, and showed the same amount of time as when I'd left. I went to pull the clothes out of it, and it wouldn't let me open the door. A Chinese worker came, shut the machine off, and tried to open the door. It still wouldn't open. He spoke no English, but managed to convey that we should just wait a moment.
We did. The door wouldn't open.
He started it up again, then stopped it. The door opened. The clothes were mostly dry. I was happy to settle for that.
So yes, the trip to the laundromat was indeed interesting.
But if I need to do any more laundry while I'm here, I'm sending it out.

ON A BUS, EN ROUTE TO BEIJING -- Day 1 of travel for these Olympics has been an interesting experience. Our driver on the way to Juyongguan didn't initially know where he was going -- he made a wild three-lane swerve to get the off-ramp for the freeway to Badaling, then stopped dead on that off-ramp to decide which direction to take. (He chose the wrong one, leading to the scene of an Olympic bus pulling off the road and asking a police officer for directions.) It was a relatively minor detour, but the kind of glitch that gives you a bit of a pause when you're en route to your first event.
On the way back, it appears a handful of spectators have managed to get onto our journalist-only bus; they have no credentials, no equipment of any kind and one of them is carrying Olympic flags. This in itself would not be that big of a deal, other than the breach of security it represents, the fact the bus is already horribly overcrowded, with people standing for a 75-minute ride -- and the fact one of these spectators appears to be the loudest man on earth. I can hear every word of his conversation, sitting a good 20 feet away on an extremely noisy bus. He's already been told twice to please speak more quietly, and it doesn't seem to be making an impression. (At least he's an Aussie, not an American.)
As for today's road cycling coverage -- I don't know if The Star will use my story or not, I was specifically at the event for Boulder Daily Camera to cover Christian Vande Velde, a former Boulder resident who finished fifth in this year's Tour de France. Vande Velde finished 17th, and the story is wholly centered on him -- exactly what Boulder would want, but not necessarily of broad interest. So if you don't see a story, that's why.
There aren't going to be a lot of these days when I'm not covering one of our local athletes, but there will be a few. Tomorrow, though I'll be back with a local story -- though I still don't know which one. The Bryan brothers have their first doubles match at the end of a session beginning at 5 p.m. local time, and the men's water polo team -- which trained in Thousand Oaks and is coached by Westlake Village resident Terry Schroeder -- plays China in its first match, also (of course) at 5 p.m.
I'll have to confer with the office about which event to cover. But since it's 4:25 a.m. at home as I write this (7:25 p.m. here), that discussion is quite a few hours in the future.

Tomorrow's NBC visuals today -- here are some shots at the end of the third of seven laps of the men's cycling road race:

I can also report the sun has officially surrendered in its effort to break through the haze.

JUYONGGUAN, China -- So here I am, back at the Great Wall.
This time, it's to cover the men's road cycling -- the Scripps paper in Boulder, Colo., has a local athlete riding. Getting here was interesting -- our bus driver got lost, adding about 15 minutes to what should be a 75-minute trip, and the city bus was packed to overflowing -- and now that we're here, there are a couple of problems.
First, this was designed as the finish to be a tremendously photogenic and telegenic site -- the riders are making seven laps around the mountain pass where we're located. On each lap -- and ultimately, at the finish -- they will come through a gate in the Great Wall about 100 yards before crossing the finish line. (In the photo below, the bus is where the riders will be. The blue circle in the foreground is where the medals will be awarded.)

One problem is, of course, the photos are once again being spoiled by the Beijing Blahs -- the unending haze blanketing the city and region. Unless the sun breaks through -- and it's making a valiant but so far unsuccessful effort --everyone's going to get photos like this (with parts of the wall barely visible beyond the conference center housing the media work room and operational offices). This is a look I'm certainly familiar with after yesterday's trip to the wall.

The other problem is our work space. Since this is a conference center, it's a rather ornate permanent space (often, at things like this, we're in tents). It might be in the loveliest media work room I've ever seen at the Games. You can't see it, but there's even a grand piano in one corner (there's a guy standing up in a red shirt, and a TV right behind him; the piano is behind the TV).

Unfortunately, that photo is when I arrived, an hour before the start of the race and well before the last five or six buses of media representatives. The room is now filled with at least three times its planned capacity, probably more. The media crowd is so large because the medals here will be the first awarded in these Olympics, and in part because the 283.8-kilometer ride will be the first indication of whether the smog is an issue for endurance athletes.
Since this is a conference center, volunteers and BOCOG workers keep finding and squeezing in more chairs, and they're pulling out extension cords, but the table space is all spoken for. (They're also trying to open up some additional space, but people need to be near internet access, so their options are limited.)
Luckily, I arrived early, just in case of a problem like this, so I'm comfortably situated at a table, although -- having felt bad for a guy who was working on the floor next to me -- I've given up some of my space so he could squeeze in at the end of the table.
So it's rather cozy in here. And we only have about four hours of race to go.

BEIJING -- Since the night of the Opening Ceremonies is, for those of us who aren't them, the calm before the storm -- the last night before 16 days of competition -- I thought I'd take this opportunity to give you a photo-filled look at the Media Village where those of us from the Scripps team are spending the Olympics. These photo-intensive blog entries are immensely time-consuming, because of the upload times for the pictures, so there may not be many chances to do anything like this for a while.
We're in MV-1 (there are two). According to everything we'd read, seen and received prior to the Olympics, it was supposed to be called the North Star Media Village. Upon arrival, we discovered there had been a name change:

It's a sprawling complex, with 16 primary buildings, mostly high-rises (ours has 32 stories). Eight of them encircle a central square shown in the upper part of this map; the other eight extend down the long corridor below that area.

When we arrive at the complex, we enter through this building, which has an open-air passageway and a little device that checks our credentials -- I'll try to elaborate on them at some future date. (This is the view from inside the complex, not as we see it from the buses).

On the first day, we checked in here, in the reception office:

Coming off the buses, or exiting the reception building, we walk east toward the central square; that's our building, D-3, looming in the background.

The central square has a three-building temple that's been converted into an Olympic store (feel free to make your own joke here about the altar of commerce). I'd have shown you the inside, but they closed early today because of the opening ceremonies.

There's also an area of outdoor tables so you can bring food out from the nearby restaurants if you desire. Since the humidity has usually been about 187 percent, I'm not quite sure why you'd desire, but some people do.

Entering our building, or any building, you're usually greeted by a door person wearing a "Welcome" sash who greets us in English. (When I'm alert, I respond by saying "Ni hao," which is hello in Chinese. And when they open the door, I say "Xie Xie," (sort of pronounced shay-shay), which is "Thank You." In this case, there were two greeters.

This is my room, as it looked the day I arrived, before I started accumulating all the gifts I showed earlier, the Chinese Army hat I bought at the Great Wall, and all the other stuff that now clutters the space. You can see the sparsely furnished living room in the background.

This is the view out the bedroom window today. If you think back to the day I arrived, this is actually quite a bit clearer.

And here's that central square from my room. (The window's a little dirty, which doesn't help the sharpness.)

This is the view out the living room window. By the way, that tube at the lower right is the subway line we rode on our first trip to Tiananmen Square. It runs above ground here but goes below ground as you move toward the central city.

We have a free Laundromat in the basement (I may throw a load of clothes in tonight just to see how long the cycles are). There's a small gym for us to use in an adjacent building (there's a much larger one in another building) and, on the 27th (and top) floor of that building is the only swimming pool in the complex, a rather narrow lap pool.

The complex is big enough to have its own bus service.

For the Olympics, at least, it has its own fire station.

There are two newsstands (USA Today is 20 Yuan, or about $2.91) two general stores ...

... three restaurants (this is the one where we usually have breakfast) ...

... as well as a bank, a post office, offices for a mobile phone company and UPS, and, well, all the other stuff on these signs.

All in all, it's a pretty decent place, with some nice landscaping.

While I'd probably still rank the Turin Media Village as No. 1 in my experience, simply because it's the only time I've had a private room and private bath (here it's a two-bedroom, one-bath suite), and Sydney had the best setup in terms of meals and amenities, in the overall scheme of things, this is the nicest of the four media villages where I've stayed. (In Salt Lake City, we were in a hotel.)
Hopefully, I'll still feel that way in two weeks.

MUTIANYU, China -- OK, so that was pretty great.
Making plans to visit the Great Wall, then making a new set of plans when the initial set fell through, trying to round up everyone in our group, putting a 2200 Yuan charge on my credit card to secure a van and driver, having people drop out, getting new people to go (in order to split the cost) and then having them drop out?
Worth the trouble.
They don't call it the Great Wall of China for nothing.
I can only imagine how I'd feel if I really could have seen it.
In our last sightseeing hurrah before the work begins in earnest, four of us were on the road at 7:30 this morning for about a 90-minute drive to Mutianyu, a spectacular mountainous section of the Great Wall.
This was described, both on line and from the travel agent in the Main Press Center (our source for the van and driver) as significantly less touristy than Badaling, which we'd planned to visit because it's closer and easily accessible by bus (which would have been free with our Olympic credentials). But the section at Badaling was closed today for practice for this weekend's road cycling, which goes there, so we scrambled to put together the more complicated, pricier trip to Mutianyu.
Less touristy, it should be noted, is not the same as "not touristy."
While our Olympic credentials were good for free admission, the chair lift to the top set us back 55 Yuan. This being like a ski lift, it doesn't stop, which threw one of our Scripps team members. Literally. Luckily, there were no injuries.
Eventually, the four of us were safely seated and on our way up the mountain.

At the top, we discovered a lengthy section of the wall snaking along the crest of the mountains. On a clear day, you could see for miles. Of course, this being August in Beijing, it was not a clear day.


Still, it was awesome to walk the Great Wall. It stretches more than 4,000 miles, and was built and maintained over a thousand-year period beginning in the sixth century to protect the northern border of three Chinese states. I can't imagine what it was like to build it.

It was warm, and sweat-through-your clothes humid; there were busloads of tourists (I took a picture for a couple from California; the woman turned out to be from Ventura), and of course, the magnificent vistas I'd seen on line had pretty much vanished in the haze.
Doesn't matter. It was the Great Wall, one of the so-called new Seven Wonders of the World, and like most great sights, photos don't do it justice.
Oh, and that chair lift? It was only to go up the mountain. To go down, you slide down on a toboggan. (Cost included in that 55 Yuan that covered the chair lift.)

We were sternly told "no photos on the way down" by the woman at the top of the slide, but if I'm not going to be dissuaded from sneaking a picture or two in the Sistine Chapel, I'm certainly not going to be stopped going down a Chinese mountainside at relatively high speed.

That's Nick Gholson, my Scripps colleague and roommate (well, suite-mate) at the Media Village, I'm preparing to run over.

Oh, and that "less touristy" stuff? This is the area at the bottom of the hill, lined with stalls selling souvenirs, and crowded with tourists.

Imagine what touristy Badaling must be like.
So while we wish the weather had been clearer, none of us regret the money and time we spent to see the wall. How else could I have a photo like this, with the Great Wall nearly visible in the background?

The Great Wall truly is a must-see if you visit this part of the world.
With luck, you might be able to actually see it.

BEIJING -- So we took another shot at Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City today -- this time going by cab -- and we had much better luck.
Not air-quality-wise, of course -- more and more, it looks like these will be The Gray Sky Games -- but at least we really saw what we set out to see, with a few bonuses.
For one thing, along the way, we got a decent view of the CCTV building I've mentioned previously, the unique open-in-the-middle skyscraper known to locals as "The Big Pants." It's a gray building in a gray haze, but nonetheless, here it is.

Eventually, our cab driver dropped our four-member group at Tiananmen Square, and this time, we were able to walk through it. Here are a few pictures.

The Zhengyang Gate.

The Monument to the People's Heroes, with the National Museum of China in the background.

A large version of the omnipresent Olympic logo.

We didn't linger long in the square, though, because our real objective today was to visit the Forbidden City, which you're familiar with if you've ever seen "The Last Emperor" and must visit if you're ever here.
One tip: Wear comfortable shoes. You're going to walk. And walk. And walk.
The Forbidden City was the palace of China's emperor for almost 500 years, and is the largest palace complex in the world, with almost 1,000 surviving buildings in an area of about 2.6 million square feet (or, as a CNN story I found on line put it, "more than half the size of the Mall of America." (I'm not sure what that says, that we have to reference a shopping mall to convey the size of this place, but there it is.) The "Forbidden" part of the name refers to the fact no one could enter or leave without permission of the Emperor. The "City" part -- well, once you walk through it, you'll know it's as big as a decent-sized town.
We went through the Tiananmen Gate into the Forbidden City at about 2:30 p.m., and more or less walking straight through (at the best case we could managed, since one member of our group is hobbled by a sprained ankle), we made it through to the North Gate just after the 4 p.m. closing time. It is, of course, hard to capture the size of the place in photographs, or to really do some of the detail of the palace buildings justice, but here are a few pictures.

Having made it through the buildings, we tried to catch a cab back to the Media Village, but that proved to be a truly difficult task. Apparently, there are rules about where they can and can't stop (rules we clearly don't get), and also, it was very, very rare to see an empty cab.
Just at the moment we were about to start a long walk to the subway, though, a cab finally stopped for us. While the cab from the media village used the freeway and a main road, the one back took us through some older back streets -- and with pedestrians, bicyclists and other cars darting in front of and around us, convinced me to add Beijing to the list of "Places I Will Never Drive," a distinction previously held only by Italy.
("It's like driving in a video game," somebody suggested. That's probably about right -- if the game is "Death Race 2000.")
The guys in the window seats got some good shots of the older portions of the city, but since I was stuck in the middle of our little car, the best I can offer is one view out the front window.

Tomorrow, it's off to the Great Wall, bright and early. I was stuck with the task of organizing this trip, and given how much of a pain it's been -- and that I'm currently on the hook for the $400 cost of renting a van and driver for our group -- it darned well better be Great.

One thing about covering the Olympics: you get showered with gifts.
Small, often useless gifts -- many exist only as free plugs for the Olympic sponsors -- but there are few helpful items among the junk.
Pictured above are the two sets of gifts we received upon arrival in Beijing. The green pouch on the left was in our rooms at the media village, and contained some of the items; the black backpack on the right (officially the "media kit") was handed out when we checked in at the Main Press Center.
And so we now have a chance for the first play-along-at-home game in the brief history of this blog. Here's the list of items; how many can you identify?

The media-village items included:
Storage bag
Coffee mug
Umbrella
Olympic mascot doll
Shower sandals
Toothbrush, toothpaste, comb, shampoo and baby bath
Framed original art from a local school student
Alarm clock
Olympic pin

The media kit:
Backpack
Media guide
Transport guide
Press center guide
Reporter's notebook
Postcards
Small headset radio (used to receive translations at press conferences)
USB fan
Electrical adapter plug
Bag of various toiletry items (including baby wipes, baby oil and baby shampoo)
30-yuan Chinese phone card
Mouse pad
Laptop shade
Flashlight
Binoculars
Sunglasses

I can already tell you some of this stuff -- most of it, probably -- will be left behind when I leave Beijing. I'm hoping to get the backpack home, because it's pretty nice. Beyond that, all bets are off.
I'd kind of like to get the original art home, too, but It's large and bulky and I don't want to lug it around Australia.

Ventured out on our first real sightseeing excursion this morning, to Tiananmen Square.
Our timing could have been better.
We left the Media Village about 8:30 this morning -- well, about 20 minutes after that, actually, since it took a bit of time to figure out the correct point of exit -- and jumped on the Line 5 subway at the Lishuiquao South station for a trip south to the central city.

Eleven stops later, we switched to line one for a two-stop trip to Tiananmen East Station. Or so we thought.
The subway zipped right past the two Tiananmen stations, so we had to jump off at Xidan and navigate our way back.
We asked a volunteer how long the walk should take. "13 minutes," she said.
"Fifteen minutes?"
"No, 13 minutes."
And so we started walking east, back in the direction we'd come from. We seemed to be walking against the flow of traffic, including enormous amounts of uniformed security guards and a large number of people wearing Coca Cola uniforms.
Along the way, we passed another of the new architectural showpieces of Beijing, the National Center for the Performing Arts, better known as the Egg. Since we were fighting a time deadline (two of our five Scripps people needed to be back at the Main Press Center for a 12:30 p.m. swimming press conference) I didn't really have a chance to walk around and find the best angle; here's a grab shot of the building; hopefully I'll get back later for a better look.

Shortly thereafter -- total walking time 15 minutes, as it turned out -- we reached Tiananmen Square, massive (reportedly the largest public square in the world), famous (also infamous, for the 1989 massacre you can't really research here on the internet) and completely roped off. There sure were a lot of people around, though, and a lot of security guards.

Bad as it is, here's a look at the square itself. And yes, it is another lovely day in Beijing.

And here, to the north of the square is the Tiananmen Gate to the Forbidden City, with the famous portrait of Chairman Mao.

We'd planned to try to see the Forbidden City, but the crowds were overwhelming, the humidity was horrific, and our travel time was longer than expected, so we bailed out. Not a particularly successful trip.
Of course, it would have helped if we'd known that the crowds, the security, and the closed subway stations were because we had arrived immediately after the Olympic Torch Relay passed through, with Yao Ming carrying the torch through the square.
Not the most successful excursion, but at least we now have some confidence in our ability to navigate the subway, an idea of the lay of the land -- and the knowledge that we won't have to worry about the torch relay during any future visit.

And now, a brief message to those friends and family who have usually received Olympic T-shirts as gifts after the Games in Sydney, Salt Lake, Athens and Turin:
Not this time.
Went to the Olympic SuperStore yesterday -- the traditional shrine of commerce accompanying any Olympic Games -- and discovered two things:
1. It's not a good idea to visit the store the first day, when the ratio of over-eager employees to customers is about 10 to 1.
2. Shirt-shopping is a little too high-risk this time around.
To the second point first: All the sizes here run small. Really small. Really, really small, as a matter of fact.
How small, you may be asking?
Well, at home I wear a Large. In Europe, maybe an Extra Large.
Here, I started by trying on an XXL.
It was too small.
So I bought a XXXL, the largest size available, for the one T-shirt I'm getting myself. (The polo shirt -- what I usually get myself at the Games, doesn't come in a XXXL, so my Olympic wardrobe is not growing much this time around.)
From a practical standpoint, this means the rest of you are pretty much out of luck. The XL wearers on my list? They don't make shirts big enough. The mediums? I don't if I should go XL or XXL for you. And I'm not even about to guess on the women's sizes.
So, sorry about that. No shirts this time.

The SuperStore, with little tiny shirts visible on the far wall.

In general, the shopping experience at the Super Store was, shall we say, trying. With so many workers and so few customers on Tuesday afternoon, all you had to do was look at an item and three or four employees were converging on you, telling you it came in other sizes or colors or asking you if you had any questions.
I'm thinking this must be what it's like to walk into a Hummer dealership when gas is over $4 a gallon -- you get swarmed by eager, hungry, desperate people.
There are some nice things in there -- some really nice ceramic items, in particular -- but I'm not going to try to carry coffee mugs another 18,000 miles (remember, I'm taking a little side trip to Australia after the Olympics.) So I spent an all-time low of 292 yuan -- about $43 -- at the SuperStore this time, for two hats, a shirt and a gift for a friend's daughter.

It's late, so this will be very brief, but as promised, here are a couple of photos of the Water Cube at night.

And here's one of the Bird Cage tonight, as well. Quite a few people were around because a dress rehearsal for the Opening Ceremonies was in progress ... I could hear a bit of the music.

That's all for Tuesday from Beijing. Back tomorrow with, among other things, a report on a visit to the Olympic SuperStore.

I'm big in Cuba, you know.
Well, I might be, for a moment.
As a group of us were about to head out on our little walking excursion to the Bird's Nest and Water Cube, we were stopped by a Cuban journalist who wanted to interview us about competition between the U.S. and China for the most medals at these games.
Guess who ended up answering the questions?
His English was limited and my Spanish, sadly, is just about non-existent, but he managed to get his questions across and I rattled off my answers, that I think the U.S. will likely have the most total medals, but China could well win the most gold; how China has identified the sports where it thought it could pick up medals and devoted enormous resources to them, and that women's gymnastics could provide one of the better head-to-head competitions between the U.S. and China.
At the end of our conversation, we were joined by another Cuban who spoke much better English, and so our communication improved a bit. (Asked how I thought Americans would react if China wins more medals, I said it was difficult to speak for an entire country, but I would not be surprised, and that even the U.S. Olympic Committee has said, coming into the Games, that they believed China had the strongest team.)
It was a reminder that this is truly an international media event -- and also made me the butt of jokes from my Scripps colleagues for the rest of the afternoon. They're convinced that my answers are going to be mistranslated and turned into anti-Chinese sentiments, sparking an international incident that gets me thrown out of China.
If the blog suddenly disappears, you'll know what happened.
In the meantime, I welcome any of my new Cuban friends who might stopping by the blog.

I am interviewed by a Cuban journalist. Hopefully, this doesn't violate the U.S. embargo. (Photo by David Nielsen, Scripps Howard News Service)

Got out of the Media Center today for a (reasonably) short walk to the two signature structures of these Olympics, the National Stadium (better known as the Bird's Nest) and the National Aquatics Center (far better known as the Water Cube.)
We weren't allowed inside the Bird's Nest because of rehearsals for Friday's opening ceremonies, and since it's another soupy, murky day in Beijing, the pictures of the outside aren't all that great, either, so I'm going to focus on that on another day.
We did, however, get into the Water Cube, which is very impressive. It doesn't look that great from the outside -- at least not in the daytime, on a gray day like this.

Based on the photos I've seen, it's quite spectacular at night; I hope to get some night shots later on, perhaps as soon as tonight, and will post them when I do.
Even on the inside, though, you know you're in a truly distinctive structure.
Because the exterior walls and roof are a translucent plastic, there's a very pleasant sort of diffused lighting inside during the day. And you really do get the effect the designers were going for, which is a structure "based on the natural formation of soap bubbles" according to the web site for Arub, a design and engineering firm involved in the development of the building.

For the technically minded, the walls and roof are bubbles of a material known as ETFE (ethylene tetraflourethylene, if you must know), as thin as 8/1000th of an inch. They're strong enough to withstand the weight of a car (according to Beijing This Month) but are susceptible to damage from sharp objects -- even the beak or talons of a bird -- so there's a network of thin wires to protect it from passing birds.
It is the largest ETFE building in the world (not that there are a lot of others, apparently), and because it's so light, the metal framework is much lighter than it would have been if the building had been covered with glass. The material allows in more light and heat than regular glass, decreasing energy costs by 30 percent. Each bubble has a lighting system that allows the building to change colors (which is one reason it looks so good at night); apparently, it's going to turn from its usual blue to red at the moment the Olympic torch is lit.
You're always aware you're in a unique structure, what with the giant bubbles over your head, and the wall at one end that shows off the translucent structure particularly well.
At the other end, where the diving competition will be held, there's an interior wall between the divers and the bubbles -- I'm assuming because the light might be an issue for divers -- and it's covered with the very colorful graphics of the Beijing Games.

I'm sure you'll see a lot of the Water Cube on TV. I hope it does a good job of depicting just how unique the building is.
I know this: Like the Walt Disney Concert Hall or the Sydney Opera House -- two of my favorite iconic buildings -- I had high expectations this was going to be a design I would like, and it still exceeded my expectations.

Breakfast at the North Star Media Village, my home for the next 20 days, is popular ...

... very popular. Note the high fashion of the media dress code.

So never mind the weather, the smog, the transit, or the high cost of wireless access.

Upon arriving at the media village, what we really wanted to know was this: How's breakfast?

This is not the trivial matter it may seem to be. For one thing, breakfast is included in the cost of our housing, and you'd like to think it's worthwhile. Mostly, though, with the frantic schedules that we can face when the Games begin, breakfast is the one meal we know we'll have time to eat, as long as we're willing to get up a few minutes early.

Well, this morning, we had our first Beijing Media Breakfast. And here, the Chinese truly have distinguished themselves.

They may not quite have reached the Gold Medal Standard of Media Breakfasts -- the fondly remembered, still discussed breakfasts in Sydney, which featured breakfasts for every culture -- everything from baked beans for the British to fish for the Asians -- but it's darned close. This morning's spread had scrambled eggs, fritattas, bacon (pretty good, too, which is rare outside of the US), french toast, fruit, stewed tomatoes, mushrooms, a fish stew sort of thing for the Asian media (it actually looked like it would be pretty good, but not at 6 a.m.), pastries, et cetera, et cetera.

This is a huge relief. Because at the Olympics, breakfast really is the most important meal of the day -- and occasionally, the only one.

BEIJING -- So I've heard all these stories about how Chinese society relies on consensus -- or, if you prefer, that no one wants to be the one who actually makes a decision.
I believe all of them.
Upon arrival today at the Main Press Center in Beijing, I went to the rate card desk (it's an Olympic term for where you get everything you have to buy at exorbitant rates through the organizers) to obtain the wireless access cards that are required to, well, do anything on line.
These had been paid for in advance by David Nielsen, the chef de mission (to drop another Olympic term) for Scripps Howard-- but between the time the check was drawn and the time it was received, there was a slight shift in the dollar-to-yuan exchange rate. (Downward, of course; it's the only way the dollar ever seems to move.) So there was an outstanding balance of 10.80 yuan -- or $1.58 at today's exchange rate -- before I could get the cards.
Well, you never saw so many people involved in settling a $1.58 debt.
A worker at the rate card desk gave me a printout showing the outstanding balance, and told me to go to the Bank of China (at the other end of the MPC) to pay the balance.
I went to the bank branch, displayed the printout and explained what I wanted.
And with that, the conferring began.
One woman spoke to another woman, who spoke to another woman, who went into an office and came out with a man, who huddled with the other three, who spoke to another man.
Ultimately, they decided I did not have the proper piece of paper. So they contacted someone from the rate card desk who came down to the bank branch, was told what I wanted, and came down with the proper paperwork, which he filled out and gave to me.
One problem, though: Instead of the outstanding balance of 10.80 yuan, this paperwork was for that plus the amount that had already been paid -- more than 21,000 yuan, or better than $3,000.
When I pointed this out, the rate-card-desk guy went back to his office and came back with a new document, with the correct figure. I signed it, we both went to one of the tellers, and I pulled out the yuan I had received from the same teller less than an hour earlier. ("We meet again," she said.)
Everything done?
Not quite. For some reason, there still wasn't something right with the paperwork. Another round of discussion occurred, the rate-card-desk guy went back to the rate card desk, and one of the bank employees asked me to be seated. (She offered me a bottle of water, which I gratefully accepted -- and probably had roughly the same value as the amount in question.)
Finally, the rate-card-desk guy came back with paperwork that passed muster, I paid the 10.80, received various and sundry receipts -- and five little pieces of cardboard with user names and passwords.
Elapsed time: About 45 minutes. Number of people involved: At least 10.
But, hey, they did reach a consensus.

... and here's a first look at the much discussed air. This is the view from my 12th-floor room at the North Star Media Village about noon today (Monday). It's sort of like June Gloom in Southern California, but a bit more toxic.

Still kind of scrambling to get situated, but at least I'm up and running on line. I'll try to file a bit more later this evening ... since it's currently 12:58 a.m. on the West Coast, I suspect not too many people are going to be inconvenienced by a slight delay.

SEOUL, South Korea, 5:21 a.m. local time, Aug. 4 (1:21 p.m. Aug. 3, Pacific time)

Well, the long first leg of the trip to Beijing is complete, and all things considered, it wasn't too bad.
Sure, 12 hours on a plane in coach is never fun, but Korean Air -- which I'm going to get to know rather well over the next six weeks, with six flights covering 24,000 miles, including my post-Olympic vacation in Australia -- acquitted itself quite well on my first flight with the airline.
Every seat on our 747 appeared to be full -- certainly, I didn't see any empties anywhere near me -- and yet, in general, the flight wasn't at all uncomfortable.
Even though the seats were just as tiny (17 inches wide, according to SeatGuru) and close together (a 33 inch pitch) as the other overseas flights I've taken, I was still actually able to fully stretch my legs out without banging them on the seat in front of me. Good design work, I guess. As a result, I was actually able to get, oh, four hours of sleep or so, which is a rarity for me. Not enough -- I'm going to be really dragging by the end of this day -- but that's probably a good thing in terms of trying to get onto Beijing time as quickly as possible.
Speaking of time, as anyone who's crossed the international dateline is aware, it does some confusing things when you cross the Pacific. Our flight left LAX at 12:30 a.m., which meant we were served dinner about 2 a.m. Sunday Pacific time. Eight hours later, when we were served breakfast, it was 2 a.m. Monday Seoul time.
The meals, incidentally, were pretty good. We had a choice of an American meal or a Korean meal -- and I saw no crossovers. The Caucasians on board went for the American food; the Asians for the Korean meal. I thought about being a little more adventurous, but it was a long way to the next meal if I didn't like something. And the Korean breakfast served to the guy next to me did not smell too appetizing.
Note to George Contreras: That guy happened to be wearing an AC Milan warm-up suit, which I of course mentioned. He asked if I was a fan; I told him I followed the Italian league, but considered myself more of a Roma fan -- at which point he admitted he was more of a Manchester United fan.
He seemed like a nice enough guy. On the negative side, one of the people near me set some sort of a trans-Pacific record for flatulence, and when you're on a full 12-hour flight, there's no place to hide from something like that.

We arrived in Seoul at 4:40 a.m., and not surprisingly the big Incheon airport is, at this moment, asleep. The lights are turned down, but the sky is beginning to brighten as I write, so the odds of stretching out and sleeping on one of these empty rows of seats aren't good. Beside, I have a horrible fear of sleeping right through the departure of my 9:30 a.m. flight, and if that happened, who knows when I'd get into Beijing? (There's sort of a big event coming up there, you know, so seats figure to be at a premium. All the stores are closed except one snack bar. I might wander back over there in a few minutes, since I've still got a lot of time to kill.)

I've found an open wi-fi source here, so I'm going to try to upload this now. I'm not sure how quickly I'll be able to get internet access in Beijing -- worst-case scenario, it may not be until tomorrow -- but keep watching. I'll get back to you all when I can.

A little blurry (as am I) but here's the flight from L.A. on the tarmac in Seoul:

Hard to see this, but it's a Korean baseball game on a TV in the waiting area:

Sunday's feature on Jessica Mendoza was drawn from nterviews with Mendoza in Chicago, Los Angeles and by phone (from Montana) over a three-month period, as well as sessions with her parents and husband. Transcribed, the interviews covered more than 70 pages and 30,000 words, so there were inevitably some interesting topics that didn't make the article. Here are some of them:

Danger zone: Mendoza has traveled so extensively that she's lost track of how many countries she's visited -- "I want to say it's about 30," she said, noting she'd had to have her passport expanded with more pages for visa stamps -- but one place on the list that she's unlikely to forget is Afghanistan.
She was there in January on a U.S. military visit. At the Olympic Media Summit, she said "it was very interesting for many reasons, but just to get a better understanding of the war and the separation of Iraq and Afghanistan."
It also, she said, gave a whole new meaning to the concept of "representing your country" -- something Olympians and members of the military do in very different ways.
"I was over there without my teammates," she said, "and I ended up doing a presentation when I came back. And the emotions that I felt there, just looking in the eyes of soldiers and talking with generals and understanding a little bit more of why we do some of the things we're doing -- I came back with an understanding of what USA across your chest really means."
She elaborated in a later conversation.
"They told me about kinetic versus non-kinetic confrontations -- kinetic being like going in and killing people, and non-kinetic being going in and building relationships, building schools, providing jobs.
"In Afghanistan, it is more of a non-kinetic -- not war, but whatever you want to call it. And it just made me so happy to see what they were doing there, and see all of the Afghanis with jobs. If they have jobs, they won't turn to the Taliban."
Mendoza's husband Adam Burks -- a Marine Corps veteran of Operation Desert Storm -- was understandably not enthused when the trip was proposed.
"I was genuinely concerned and didn't want her to go," he said. "But as I sat back and thought about it, being a former Marine -- well, once a Marine, always a Marine -- there's nothing more that I would appreciate [in that situation] than if someone were to take time out of their life, out of their busy schedule, and come to visit me. ...
"Those guys are in a tough situation over there. They're going through some trials and tribulations. I can only imagine what they're experiencing."
And so he gave his OK -- "All you do is give to God and say your prayers and hope everything works out for the best," he said, "and it did" -- which is in keeping with his larger view of Mendoza's peripatetic schedule.
"I never want to be in the way," he said. "I never want to hold her back. This is her gift, and this is what she wants to do, and I want her to do it."

The bat: One of the more interesting tributes to Mendoza's offensive prowess is that there's a Jessica Mendoza model Louisville Slugger aluminum bat in the marketplace and has been since 2004. She called that "a dream I'm thinking I'm going to wake up from.
"It's crazy to see your own name on a bat," she said, "because I remember when I was growing up, I had the Sheila Cornell-Douty bat" -- Cornell-Douty was a member of the 1996 and 2000 Olympic teams -- and then I had the Dot Richardson bat when I was in high school.
"And I just remember how cool it was to have someone you really looked up to, and you really thought their power, their hitting, might somehow transfer to your own hitting and the way you play. And I remember thinking how cool it was that you have this bond with the bat."
On the national-team tours, Mendoza has learned at least some of the young players swinging a Jessica Mendoza feel the same way.
"I've had a lot of girls come to our games with the bat, and they're like, 'I hit a home run last night! I've never hit a home run!' Thinking that it has to do with us working together to do it. It's really a cool feeling."
Mendoza frequently autographs the bats -- "between the handle and the barrel ... where you don't want to make contact anyway" -- and tries to do a little more than just sign her name.
"I put little messages on them," she said, "and little tips to hit that they can look at before they step in the batter's box."
The only disappointment for Mendoza is that she really doesn't get a lot of say in what the bat is like.
"I always want to pick the colors, but they kind of pick it based on surveys and what most young girls would like in a bat," she said. "... My bat right now is purple and green, which is pretty wild."

The president: Among Mendoza's many activities, she's the new president of the Women's Sports Foundation, described on its website as "the leading authority on participation of women and girls in sports -- (it) advocates for equality, educates the public, conducts research and offers grants to promote sports and physical activity for girls and women."
Mendoza was already a member of the foundation board before being selected as president earlier this year.
"There's a lot I want to do with the foundation," she said. "The foundation has accomplished so much since it was founded in the '70s, with Title IX, advocacy, just getting stuff out there and its grants."
One of the current programs, she said, is called "Go, Girl, Go," which strives to make sure young girls are active -- "hitting on the obesity rates," she said, "and getting young girls that are poorer and come from places where they don't have parents that are going to drive them to the softball field and pay for them to play. ... For free, they can go and get active and learn a little bit about life skills ... That kind of stuff, I absolutely love.
"But I also kind of feel like I don't want to be the foundation of the past."
Her hope, she said, is to make it something younger women are aware, more of a resource -- "They can call somebody and say, I want to be an athletic director, how do it I do that?" -- and, she said, a little more hip and fun: "Not that the Women's Sports Foundation is about fun, but trying to pull in the X Games audience, and basically anyone who wants to play sports to see that it's something that is fun and great and the next thing you know, they want to be a part of it.
"So that's my goal for the foundation. It's kind of a lofty one, but we'll see."