I had a little panic attack before I went out to play tonight. I was watching Marat Safin's match in the locker room with Roger Federer and Tim Henman and the television started to play up. The lines were going up and down and then they weren't even straight. I asked Roger and Tim if it was the TV or my eyesight and they said "The TV is perfectly okay." Of course, they were just having a little fun at my expense.

A lot of fans probably don't know just how loud and funny Roger can get. He has a really, really good sense of humor. People think of him as very quiet and calm but watching the Safin match he was screaming and yelling along with the rest of the players as the big Russian let a 6-1, 4-1 lead slip away against Ruben Ramriez-Hidalgo. I hope Roger controlled himself a little better when he met the Pope earlier in the day. Roger is also a genius with languages. He used to be coached by Peter Lundgren, so I can almost speak Swedish with him.

I actually spent quite a bit of time talking to Tim today while we were waiting for our match to go on. You don't often socialize with your opponent the day of a match but Tim and I are very good friends and we've been on the tour for so many years together that it didn't feel unusual or awkward. It was tough for both of us today trying to prepare for the match. It looked like Safin was cruising to a quick win but in the end the match lasted just over three hours. Guys were saying to us 'You've been warming up for two hours - what is going on?' Actually, I'm surprised some guys noticed. There was a hot magazine kicking around in the locker room today - 'Stuff,' with lots of girls in bikinis - and that proved popular with a lot of the guys.

I had a long breakfast with Jonas this morning because we both had late matches today and I didn't get on site till about 1 pm. I warmed up with Marat and then we had a bit of a chat afterwards about the knee injuries we've had in the past. We spoke about how frustrating it is to be off the circuit for a long period of time. I had a late lunch with Simon Aspelin and later dinner with Simon, his doubles partner Todd Perry and Leander Paes.

As expected I found it very, very tough out there under lights with my vision. Judging the distance was the biggest problem. I had requested in my first tournament back to play during the day so it was disappointing to get two matches that were played under lights. Still, I don't want to blame that for the loss. I played a good first set when Tim wasn't on top of his game and had a set point. In the second set Tim played very well and overall he was the better player on the night.

I'll still be around Thursday so check back for another blog tomorrow