Back in December, as I was in the throes of my comp, then-sports editor John Trainer called me with what I thought was the impossible assignment.

"There's a big swimming meet this weekend. The Harvard Invitational. I need someone to cover it."

I didn't know the first thing about swimming. All I remembered about my personal swimming experiences was jumping up and down on one leg to get the water out of my ears after I was done.

"I need a color story for Saturday's page, and a color story and game story for Monday."

I'm thinking, do you want fries with that?

I had no idea how I was going to write a story about swimming. Maybe there's another story John wants me to do...

"This'll finish your comp," he said.

Perhaps he could hear me thinking, because he sure pushed the right button. I agreed to do the story on the spot.

I headed down to Blodgett Pool that weekend, still worried about this assignment. What was I going to write?

"So-and-so was swimming great on Friday, lost his stroke on Saturday, but found it again in time to win his event."

Like I said, I had no clue what to say.

I set myself up in the bleachers of Blodgett. Sure enough, it wasn't long before I found myself thoroughly confused.

It took me at least three heats to realize there were touchpads in the water that were registering the lap times.

I actually had to ask a fan seated behind me to explain what an individual medley race was.

Heck, I had a hard time distinguishing between Harvard and visiting swimmers.