Good morning to my Maine friends. It's a smoggy one here in Beijing. I wonder how many blue-sky days they actually have a year here.

I feel like I am caught in a time warp these days. For some reason, my body has yet to adjust to the time change, being 12 hours ahead of the East Coast. I find myself awake at all hours of the early morning. It'd be nice to have a real sleep.

Then again . . . imagine this: you're in a sleeping bag, on your living room floor. That's how soft my mattress is.

Anyway, the biggest difference is that I keep getting days confused.

For instance, when I wake up in the morning, I turn on my computer to check the major league baseball scores from the previous day, looking in especially on the Red Sox -- and some of the games haven't even started yet! Most are just beginning or in the middle innings.

It's crazy I tell you. I'm having no luck keeping up with my fantasy baseball team. Thank goodness I left my son Alex in charge of it.

And when I go to bed, most of my colleagues are just starting to work. I could conceivably cover an event, go to bed, then wake up and write the story and I still wouldn't miss deadline! (Ah, if only that were true all the time.)

Thursday/Friday is going to be interesting. Thursday night (my time)/Thursday morning (Portland time) Ian Crocker makes his Olympic debut in the 100 butterfly prelims. I will cover that, go home and sleep and then come back Friday morning (my time)/Thursday night (your time) and cover the semifinals -- this being on deadline.

Well, in a few minutes, Michael Phelps will dive into the pool. Later, I hope to take in Team USA's first baseball game.

Enjoy the day, er, night, er, whatever.

E-mail this entry to a friend