WIMBLEDON DAY 1: HE'S FEDERER, HE'S BETTERER

Becks! ("I quaffed at least four of you last night!"). A three-time winner here and still the youngest singles champion in Wimbledon history (17 years, 7 months at the time) and from what I've read, a singles champion in other ways as well.

That's yet another perk of spending a fortnight here (besides the obvious perk of being afforded the chance to "write British", using fancy as a verb and substituting fortnight for two weeks). Tennis players. Male and female, tennis pros are the most attractive athletes on the planet. You turn a corner and come across a stunner such as Elena Dementieva and suddenly the term "seeded" takes on a whole 'nother meaning.

With my trusty researcher Beret Remak, herself a former queen of the courts at Connecticut College, as my companion, I took in the first-round action inside Centre Court. As you probably know, Roger Federer defeated Dominic "check out" Hrbaty in straight sets. Entering the match the 30 year-old Slovak held the distinction of being the only player on the ATP Tour who had faced Federer more than once and had never lost to him (2-0).

Then, after only five minutes of play, Federer was up 3-0. Hrbaty had little chance of victory, though he did pull off the shot of the day yesterday later in the first set. I could attempt to describe it to you, but this video will do so better. Hrbaty's shot comes about 58 seconds into the clip.

With Federer up 6-3, 6-2, 5-2, Hrbaty made a great gesture during the changeover. A friend and occasional hitting partner of the five-time Wimbledon champion, Hrbaty approached Federer and asked if he could sit next to him. See, Hrbaty is 30 and nearing the end of his career (he'd played in 44 straight Grand Slam events prior to missing the Aussie Open due to injury earlier this year). Maybe he realized that he might have been about to play his final game ever at Wimbledon, certainly his last at Centre Court, and that he was playing against the person who will likely be remembered as the most dominant men's tennis player of all time.

So Hrbaty asked if he could sit next to the king. "I said, 'Sure, you can sit next to me'," Federer later told the press, adding with a grin, "there's an extra seat."

Richmond Hill

If this blog sounds as if I've done and gone to heaven, I think I have. Not only is Wimbledon wondrous, but through some quirk of fate they've place a few of us in a swanky section of town known as Richmond Hill. Our boutique hotel sits atop a hill overlooking the Thames, along the banks of which there are no shortage of pubs. And about 50 meters up the road from our front door is Richmond Park, which has to be seen to be believed.

On Monday morning, my first here, I stumbled out the door for a little jog, passed through a gate and suddenly found myself staring out at a scene from Mutual of Omaha's "Wild Kingdom". Richmond Park is not only a runner's and mountain biker's paradise, but it also is home to more than 600 red deer as well as a few foxes, some tarny owls and something called a "beefsteak fungus", which heretofore I had thought was a failed 1970s restaurant chain. Richmond Park is simply ginormous. How big? Central Park in Manhattan is 843 acres; Richmond Park is 2,500 acres.

On the drive in from Heathrow on Sunday night, our driver, Dominic, had warned me about running in Richmond Park. "Be careful of the deer, mate, they've got antlers," he said.

"I'll be careful," I said, "but are they going to attack me?"

"Never can tell," Dominic said. "You're not going to outrun them, though."

"Yes, but last I heard deer can't climb trees."

"These ones can."

  When I later told a friend of mine that I'd spotted "wild deer" inside a city park, she soothingly corrected me, "All deer are wild, John."

By the way, Dominic is a pip. As we were driving in from Heathrow on Sunday evening, we talked about all sorts of Londonian matters. Though he's a lifetime Londoner, Dominic confessed that he'd never once ridden in the Tube. Not once. That's hard to believe. "If I can't drive in," Dominic told me, "I don't go."

Dominic also doesn't like Indian food (I mean, really, can he really be from London?), though I do. "The thing about Indian food," I told Dominic, parroting what a friend of mine always says, "is that after I eat it I smell like it for two days. But that's better than what I normally smell like, so it's an added benefit."

Dominic chuckled. "I can see we're gonna 'av a laugh while you're here," he said. We're 'avin' a laugh! Are we 'avin' a laugh?

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Beret: "Just speaking in a British accent makes you sound so much smarter."

Me: "Yes, and their felicity of language is better. You sound so much smarter calling someone a 'scoundrel' than you do an a-hole."

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George Carlin died on Sunday evening and you know that, but I think ol' George had a kinship, whether he knew it or not, with the Brits. Both love language more than most. Carlin was more of a philosopher than he was a comedian, and he also enjoyed musing over the variegated purposes and meanings that so many words in the English language have.

In an obituary written by Andy McSmith in The Independent this morning, the author recalls that Carlin once said, "It's okay to say Roberto Clemente has two balls on him, but you can't say 'I think he hurt his balls on that play.'"

That same obit, by the way, had the courage/effrontery to print all of Carlin's infamous "Seven Words You Cannot Say on TV". Ironically, I think that two of those words can now be said on TV quite often (one a synonym of urine, another a euphemism for breasts). One word not on Carlin's list is one you definitely cannot say on TV or almost anywhere, and I'll let you guess what that is. But the hint is that Carlin's contemporary, Richard Pryor, once named an album of his using that word preceded by the word Bicentennial.

As much notoriety as "Seven Words..." received ( I remember my older brother Porge playing the bit for me in the bedroom we shared as kids on Volt Place in Middletown, N.J., and being quite sure that I'd be going to hell for listening to it...I'm pretty sure I'm still going to hell, but not for that), I've always thought that Carlin's "Football Versus Baseball" riff displayed more genius. Not only was it a column that every sportswriter wishes he/she had first thought up, but it once again illustrates Carlin's fascination with and love for language. Listen to or read it some time when you get the chance.

So long to George Carlin, a man who was booted out of the same high school that Regis Philbin attended. He's out there somewhere and most likely he now knows the answer as to when will Jesus bring the pork chops.