FED, BATH & BEYOND

-- You'll never know, so I'll tell you, just how hard the people in Edit work at an event such as Wimbledon. Producer Pierre Moossa, who I believe is in his early 30s and has the brightest of futures ahead of him, led a talented group of mostly 20-somethings in putting together the teases and montage segments that you saw. No one at Wimbledon puts in longer hours than these people -- I saw Matt Casey after Sunday's final when a bunch of us were back at our hotel sharing a few beers and he told me that he hadn't slept in 40 hours. 

-- Hopefully, you had a chance to see Jimmy Roberts' essay that ran during the 4th set rain delay. Jimmy wrote it and Pierre et al.  put in 24-hours' straight-through work in editing it so that we could bring it to you. And here's the funny thing: If that second rain delay never occurs, that essay likely does not run because the match plus the first rain delay exhaust all our air-time. So all of Jimmy's work and all of Pierre's editing would have been for naught. And don't think that doesn't happen. I believe Jimmy may have been doing a rain dance in Studio 4 as we were watching that 4th set.

Of all the things Jimmy said in his piece, what I most liked was what he had to say about the Williams sisters: "Maybe the question we should be asking is, What is the appropriate emotion?"  

-- On Friday night we stayed an Adam Duritz-ian "very, very, very, very late" at work. It was midnight by the time I was done. My faithful compadre, Raspberry Beret Remak, had yet to eat and there was some chow in our offices. So I waited while she ate and decided, having spent the entire day indoors, to walk around the grounds. I strode onto Centre Court--delightfully, it was wide open, no security gates, no mean guards shooing me away-- and just took a seat at midcourt for about ten minutes. Did all that I could to absorb the atmosphere in that green cathedral knowing that something special was ahead of us that weekend.

It was a little like Rocky visiting the Spectrum on the eve of his first fight with Apollo, with the obvious difference being that I'm merely a spectator.

I believe all of us involved with Wimbledon understood that, to that point, the fortnight had been somewhat underwhelming. Only Andy Murray's victory versus Richard Gasquet and, perhaps, the remarkable run of China's Zheng Jie were going to last in our memories for more than a month or so. But we also all knew that we had two wonderful finals lined up, and the latter certainly delivered.

-- What's John McEnroe really like?, I've been asked. Well, this is the first time I've worked in a studio with him, but around us he was professional, courteous and very, very cool. Actually, engagingly boyish, too. That's what really stood out for me. He was tantrum-free and when we surprised him by showing footage, on the 25th anniversary, of his '83 Wimbledon win, he seemed genuinely excited, like a 5-year old who learns there's a hot fudge sundae in his immediate future.

On Friday night we taped until about 7:48 p.m. local time, and Mac had a commitment over at the BBC (just a couple doors down) at 8 p.m. Still, that gave him little time to relax and reload. On that evening we had a studio full of interns who were appearing in the never-aired Sconehenge bit. When we finished taping, someone (not me) suggested Mary Carillo and Mac pose in front of Sconehenge with the interns, and then more and more interns produced cameras, and suddenly it was 7:55, 7:56. Mac never let the moment sweat him, never seemed anxious. He was simply terrific, just as he was when he interviewed Roger Federer afterward.

-- I realize that I'm an NBC employee throwing wet kisses to other NBC employees here, but, well, it was a moment that I was proud to be part of. And contribute to. McGuinness has a lot of people in his ear, and as the match gained gravitas in the 3rd and 4th sets, I realized that he didn't need yet another. But here I was with all these interesting bits of tid to feed him. So I began emailing him during the match and during the breaks he'd read the emails, sift through what he thought was worth mentioning and what was not, and pass on the info to Ted. A lot of producers, simply because they were on tilt, might not have had the patience to do that. McGuinness did.

Quick sidebar on that, and on the wonders of technology: Loyal Johntourager E.W. sends me a text message during the 5th set mentioning that, should darkness halt the match, it would mark the second time in less than a month that NBC would cover a major championship, with its sport's greatest star (perhaps of all time), on a Monday during the day. The first, of course, was the U.S. Open. All within a span of less than a minute EW texts me, I email McGuinness and he tells Ted Robinson, who never had the opportunity to use it because darkness never halted the match. Still, pretty cool, eh?

-- You have to hand it to Mother Nature for getting in her last licks. On the final singles final at Wimbledon that could ever be disrupted by rain, She gave us two rain delays. That nearly allowed darkness to also play a role in the match. By the way, those shots of the London sky just before sunset were pretty radical, weren't they?

-- A final thank you and a hoisting of Pimm's to the outstanding, unbelievably cheerful and helpful staff at Wimbledon. Our press agent, the bright-eyed and charming Alec, embodied everything I loved about the place: chipper, helpful, extremely bright and ineffably charming. I totally have a man-crush on him.

Me, rushing breathlessy into Alec's office: "Alec, is it All England Lawn Tennis Club or All England Lawn & Tennis Club?"

Alec: "John, didn't you ask me that yesterday ... and the day before?"

POST-WIMBY

 So many great experiences, observations, etc., as I made a Chaucerian (and not, Mr. Roberts, if you are reading this, a Dickensian!) pilgrimage westward from London:

-- Listening to the witty, funny-without-being-vulgar deejays on Radio One. Two features from Monday a.m.'s program: one, a bit where the caller gets to select what song is played next, but you are only allowed to phone in "if you're knackered or a complete slacker." Two, a "No-Hope DVD" segment where they suggest only the worst DVDs for your viewing pleasure. One was a German zombie movie. "It says on the back of the box," said my Radio One host, "that it's a movie 'about three Germans who encounter 150 zombies'. Honestly, I don't know who I'm rooting for."

-- Getting lost on the way to Stonehenge and on the way out of Stonehenge. And reading while I was at Stonehenge that some of the stones used to build it were lugged from 240 miles away. So, if you're scoring at home, that's prehistoric Druids without the benefits of a lorry, petrol, navigable roads or the written word toting multi-ton stones 240 miles with success. And yours truly, with a rental car, Atlas, fully paved roads and road signs, driving halfway back to London and then halfway to Land's End in the same day.

-- Thinking to myself, while at Stonehenge, "This would make an awesome miniature golf course." The Brits call it "Crazy Golf", by the way, which I love.

--Spending a day in the pristinely beautiful city of Bath where, ironically, it showered. Actually seeing a sign for Solsbury Hill, the same one Peter Gabriel made famous. Walking into a square located between Bath Abbey  and the Roman Baths and listening to this talented young guitarist, about 15 or so, singing Rhianna's "Umbrella" (ella, ella) and thinking to myself, as I absorbed the guitar playing and this idyllic British location (Lord, have I gone totally Gwyneth on y'all), How cool would it be to hear an Oasis tune right now. And then this kid, this guitarist/psychic, began strumming "Don't Look Back In Anger".

Next, I headed over to the Roman baths themselves. The short story is that after the Romans veni-vidi-vici'd Britain (apparently, it was not yet Great), they happened upon these natural hot springs in this lovely little valley surrounded by seven hills (Hey! Roma has seven hills!). And by, like 200 A.D., they'd built this sublime bath house that had everything but a smoothiebar. It even had a roof on it. Funny that the Romans could put a roof on their bath house in 200 A.D. while Wimbledon still doesn't have one.

Anyway, as I stood on that terrace admiring this feat of Roman ingenuity and of nature's gifts, one thought repeated itself over and over and over again: "CANNONBALLLLLLLLL!"

When I finally made my way down to the pool itself (which is like 5 feet deep ...and why they don't add some chlorine and charge people 20 pounds to participate in a never-ending game of pool volleyball is beyond me), I tried to dip a foot in the waters. Earlier, I'd seen an elderly Indian woman with hairy legs doing so for five minutes and the security left her unbothered. When I--not elderly, not female, not Indian, but with hairy legs-- attempted to follow her path, a security guard rushed me as if she were Clint Eastwood in In The Line of Fire.  "You can't take a bath at the baths in Bath?" I asked. "No," she replied.

-- Finally, and here is my last image of England to share with you (and I dearly wished I had stopped and snapped a photo), while driving through the village of Studley I happened upon the following billboard. I am not making this up. It read, just like this:

BRIAN'S WELL-HUNG

GARAGE DOORS 

In Studley. Brian, you are a cheeky one.