Five early impressions after awakening in Beijing this week for the Olympic Games

1. This is a country we don’t want to invade. Of the 1.3 billion people, 700 million seem to be dressed as police officers and security personnel while standing at attention. They’re guarding everything from cell phone towers in barren fields to firetrucks outside media village apartments. One policeman just stares at a barb-wired fence all day, a tad more busy than a parking attendant at UNLV football games.

2. There are signs in bathroom stalls at the Main Press Center requesting you discard used toilet paper into a supplied trash can instead of the toilet, which means you can officially label China as the world’s leading nation for taking the whole recycling idea too far.

3. Beijing is Summerlin with humidity. Everything looks like it was built yesterday. Still, something tells me that to make room for such stunning features, the Chinese government skipped that part about eminent domain and compensating those displaced.

4. They have sure taken to the whole capitalism (gouging) theme here. Wireless access for any journalist needing the Internet (translation: each and every one of the nearly 6,000) during the Games is $516, which works out to 3,500 yuan, which also can get you 256 skewers of lamb and shrimp at the food court.

5. I might want to live here. I asked 10 Chinese citizens Thursday who Brett Favre is, and none had a clue. One guy pointed at the Bank of China, and another thought I wanted breakfast. No one has ever heard of Favre and life continues. Amazing.