Tuesday

The Home Page pic changes again.  Those Fall colors just didn't do anything for me.  This is one of my favorites from the last few years, taken by 2 just after I reached the summit of the Galibier in September of 2009.  It might be consider as a nod to the effort just completed for that last group of extended tax returns.  I'll come up with something a little more timely in the next day or two.

The death of the Indy car racer at the Las Vegas track on Sunday is resonating through the auto racing industry.  NASCAR has taken very strong measures for driver safety, especially after Dale Earnhardt and Adam Petty's deaths several years ago.  Not only do they continue to make design advances in the cars, but they also have installed "safer" barriers at almost all of the tracks.  These "safer" barriers are walls that "give" on impact to soften the blow of a car hitting the wall.  Indy cars go so much faster, have the open-wheel design, and just can't hardly touch one another without something bad happening.

I generally don't mind the bumping that goes on in NASCAR, and at most of the tracks, trading paint is part of the race.  But when they go to Daytona and Talladega, the high-banked, super-speedways where the cars never let up off the gas, big wrecks at high speeds always occur.  (Dale Sr. was killed at Daytona.)  I'm not one of the viewers drawn to the crashes.  Kind of like I can't watch the replays of football and basketball players tearing up knees and ankles. 

The 2012 TdF route was formally announced this week.  (So the Home Page pic can be in recognition of that as well.)  It goes clock-wise next year and will make a third-week visit to the area near where 4 and I stayed in August.  Practically, the hills that have become part of the fabric of the TdF are in fairly small areas in the Alps and Pyrenees such that you can be fairly close to a particular year's route while staying in the prior year's hotels.  On the map, you can see that the Western part of France is mostly avoided in 2012.  Those areas tend to be predominantly flat, and I'm guessing that while the race is likely obligated to get there regularly, there's not the draw there like the mountains to the South and East.

A couple of names in consumer sales have recently announced some store closings:  Lowe's Home Improvements (20 stores), and Gap (almost 200 stores).  These are well-known names that are reflecting some economic realities.  Lowe's may have grown too quickly and not addressed the challenges of the real estate market collapse as well as it's main competitor, Home Depot.  Personally, I like the local Lowe's store better than Home Depot.  (And that has nothing to do with the fact that the 48 is known as the Lowe's Chevrolet!)

Then Gap is in the middle of the clothing wars with all of the other retailers.  My guess is that growth on the Web and overseas will replace any of the lost volume from the bricks and mortar locations.  I assume that they will still sell my jeans to me on-line.  I haven't been in a Gap store in years, but I've worn nothing but Gap jeans for probably 15 years.  Gap is the only store credit card I have besides Kohl's.  Hmmmm.  I wonder:  maybe the market ought to be able to short LtPC preferred providers.

Plans are to hit the road with 2 and The W later.  We normally run on Monday nights, but Biaggi's got in the way yesterday.  The number of TT training days has slipped below 20.  If you're betting today on the 60 minute target, take the Over.

More later.

BCOT