Wednesday

Just a few lines this morning to keep the information pipeline flowing.  Its another great looking day here in the QCA.

The Vuelta a Espana is underway.  It is the year's third major, three-week stage race in Europe.  As you can see from the map, the route is hardly a "tour" of Spain.  Maybe of Northern Spain.  They did have a stage earlier this week in the Basque country where 4 and I visited last year, but now in the same towns where we stayed.

The Vuelta suffers from a little of "cycling fatigue" in the sense that the Italian and French Tours have sucked a lot of energy out of the viewing public, not to mention that we had the Olympics this year.  While the Spanish stars always show up at the starting line, many of the other big names have already begun to shut down for the year.

(For the Americans in the professional peloton, there is a fairly big stage race going on this week in Colorado.  At least these guys don't call it a Tour of Colorado.  Obviously, the map shows that the race visits only popular destinations in the central part of the state.  Still, I'm sure that Colorado sees this as a major economic event for the state.  Kind of like a Presidential primary.)

This Republican Senate candidate from Missouri is an example of why politicians rank lower than used-car-salesmen in admiration polls.  Adding to the mess is the media's obsession with every related (or not) detail to the story.  Who said what.  When.  And how can those statements be interpreted.  Actually, the media hacks may rank lower than the politicians.  But its a tight race to the bottom.

I'm giving 1.01 the nod as Granddaughter of the Day for this pic from last night's din-din.  In days of old, @srh4 and I would just take a mess like this outside and break out the garden hose!

All for now.  Lots of stuff going on today.  I doubt if I make it back here before tomorrow. 

BCOT