Ron C. Judd / Times staff columnist
Hellenic high jinks have begun

PHOTOS BY DEAN RUTZ / THE SEATTLE TIMES Katie Couric, "Today Show" co-host, bottom, is thrown by U.S. judo champ Jimmy Pedro during a segment yesterday at the "Today Show" studio outside the Olympic Stadium in Athens.

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And so it begins.

The Games of the XXVIII Olympiad are close enough to smell. Then again, that may be the softening soles of our sandals, sticking like used bubble gum to the griddle-hot Athens asphalt.

We've only been here a couple days, and as we await the opening ceremony, nothing of note has really happened. But, as readers of this missive from past Games know, nothing happening is our specialty. To wit:

Greeks greet geeks

Still operating in a jetlag stupor, we stumbled onto the wrong bus at the media center Wednesday night and wound up being dispatched, rather than to our hotel, to a posh beachfront resort.

Turns out this was the traditional big pre-Games party, wherein the national hosts — in this case, Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, the Athens organizing committee head herself — spends the equivalent of the gross domestic product of Tajikistan to welcome the world's media with truckloads of party favors and Very Beautiful People.

Amazing quantities of both at this bash, which looked more like something you might expect to see in Jack Nicholson's backyard on Oscar night than an official Olympic event.

The scene: Soft, humid breeze off the Saronic Gulf. Massive, softly lit swimming pool surrounded by marshmallow-soft sofas. About a half a kilometer of high-grade gourmet foodstuffs. Numerous open bars. And, to complete the scene, a gaggle of what appeared to be some four dozen picture-perfect young, female, cocktail-dressed Greek beauties, milling about and looking nervous, like gazelles at a crocodile-infested savanna watering hole.

Loud Euro-disco pumped out of 6-foot speakers. Guys in suits and leather loafers with no socks worked the crowd.

	Gianna Angelopoulos- Daskalaki, left, president of the Athens Organizing Committee, meets and greets guests at a welcome party Wednesday night.

As is our custom, most of us journos just stood there in our khakis and melted sandals, agape, not knowing whether to take notes or flee.

A couple hours into the affair, Gianna, who, like Madonna, Pele and Lassie, has achieved official single-name status in Greece, appeared. Camera flashes lit up the night as the suave Games boss completed a cool mingle lap around the pool.

We'll say this: The woman knows how to make an entrance. If her nation does half as well at tonight's opening ceremony, the world will be smitten.

Speaking of opening

The mystery of the marching Greeks has been solved.

The dilemma: Greece, apparently owing to some dusty, 30-century-old patent rights, always marches into the stadium first for the parade of nations. But the host country always comes in last.

Which will it be tonight?

Probably both. The schedule shows the Greeks sending a flag-bearer to lead the parade, then coming in with its full delegation at the end — long after, we fear, much of the world has already been exposed to potentially lethal doses of Bob Costas.

The miracle of hydra

The crew of KING-TVers is here, shooting local angles for the Olympics. While they were at it, anchor Allen Schauffler and teammates decided this week to pursue a greater good: A documentary piece portraying all of Athens' awesome historical sites.

They asked for, and received, permission from the Greek Antiquities authorities — not always an easy task — and shot all the scenes in glorious conditions. Just as it was all wrapping up, Schauffler, standing with crew on the island of Hydra, dropped the videocassette containing all of this footage — and watched it do its own little triple jump, off some rocks and right into the Aegean Sea.

Ultimately, a gallant Greek Navy person helped fish it out of the drink, after an hour in the corrosive saltwater.

Project ruined, most likely. But enter KING audio/video guy Greg Thies, a former AV specialist at Sea World. As a desperate measure, he soaked the ruined cassette in fresh water, aired it out, and a miracle occurred — the footage was not only readable, but perfectly useable.

It airs on KING-5 tonight before the opening ceremony. If you like it, offer up a prayer of thanks to your personal favorite Greek god.

Live TV is not for the timid

You might think, from watching the "Today Show" from the middle of the Olympic Park each morning that Olympic television is all perfume and puffery.

Well, yesterday, we personally witnessed perky talkmeister Katie Couric take off her microphone, slip out of her 4-inch heels and get tossed unceremoniously over the shoulder of, and slammed flat onto a floor mat by, Jimmy Pedro, four-time U.S. judo Olympian.

The main difference between Katie and Pedro's normal, competition flip-ees:

Nobody rushes to pick them up, dust them off, and immediately repair the fault lines in their hair and makeup.

Let the gouging begin

As usual, the whining jackals known as the world's Olympic media — more than 10,000 strong, and by "strong" we are indeed referring to body odor — have already convened and began competing for bragging rights for Worst $200-A-Night Hotel Room in Athens.

We're not saying whether ours is in contention, but our personal room décor is best summed up in the words of veteran colleague and world traveler Blaine Newnham, who visited from his own hotel yesterday and observed matter-of-factly: "Your room looks like it was designed by the Soviets."

Making us all proud

A sports-page story in yesterday's Athens Metro newspaper:

"Faster, higher, stronger ... cheater? U.S. athletics has introduced a fourth wheel into the Olympic motto heading to the Athens Games."

Important time zone note

Athens is 10 hours ahead of Seattle, meaning by the time you go to bed every night, we are already taking our second shower of the day after.

It's a free country, isn't it?

U.S. newspaper photographers have been learning the hard way that Greece doesn't live by the same First Amendment standards they've always taken for granted at home. Earlier this week, the Greek government decided it had seen enough construction-workers-rushing-to-meet-deadlines photos.

Next thing you knew, photogs were being told, firmly, to stop shooting them — at the risk of having their gear and/or images confiscated.

And finally ...

Everyone's biggest fear for the opening ceremony at the last Olympics in Salt Lake: Appearance by the Osmonds.

Corresponding biggest fear for the opening ceremony here: Yanni.

That's it for now. Somebody please tape the ceremony for us. And for the love of God, keep the tape away from Schauffler.

Ron Judd: 206-464-8280 or at rjudd@seattletimes.com.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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