Clear and chilly this early Wednesday here on California’s north coast, the work-week moving right along, though, not fast enough.

News sprouting out this morning is fairly bland, or continuous-ugly in nature (i.e., the US farm bill bullshit) as the eyeballs of the world begin to sharply-focus on the upcoming winter games, starting this Friday in Sochi, Russia.
Most Americans look for the worse (via CNN): Of those surveyed for the CNN/ORC poll, 57 percent said a terrorist attack on the Sochi Games was likely. That compares with the 51 percent who believed before the 1996 Summer Games started in Atlanta that a terrorist act would occur. Sadly, the latter prediction proved true.
And most of us don’t like Vladimir Putin, either, with 54 percent carrying an “unfavorable view” of him.

(Illustration found here). olympic

The words, ‘unfavorable view,” are easier on the ears than ‘asshole,’ or ‘gay-bashing-gay-like asshole,’ or ‘douchebag,’ just plain, ‘dangerous nut.’ The Sochi games, no matter what happens on the field, will most likely be interesting — but hope not in a violent way.
Of course, in great-Russian language, Putin’s boys have placed a so-called “ring of steel” around Sochi, protecting, preventing, posturing.
Time will tell.
So far the big stink, is the big stink and other weird shit from those writers/reporters covering the games — yesterday from the Washington Post:

Amid continued debate over whether or not Sochi is prepared to host the 2014 Olympics, which begins Thursday, reporters from around the world are starting to check into local hotels — to their apparent grief.
Some journalists arriving in Sochi are describing appalling conditions in the housing there, where only six of nine media hotels are ready for guests.
Hotels are still under construction.
Water, if it’s running, isn’t drinkable.
One German photographer told the AP over the weekend that his hotel still had stray dogs and construction workers wandering in and out of rooms.

And the story contained some cute/terrible Twitter shout-outs, like this: My hotel has no water. If restored, the front desk says, “do not use on your face because it contains something very dangerous.”

There’s a lot of shit nowadays ‘very dangerous,’ but if the water can’t be touched, WTF?
The threat, however, is credible:

“This is the only Games in history where there’s been an announced credible threat well before the Games,” said Bill Rathburn, the director of security for the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta, who has worked on security issues for cities, foreign governments, organizing committees and sponsors at six Olympics.
“Since that threat was made last July, there’s been at least three terrorist incidents that have demonstrated their capability of carrying out that threat. So I think it’s very, very real.”
According to Brian Michael Jenkins, the senior adviser to the president of the RAND Corporation and a longtime expert on the topic, the intensity of the threat is unprecedented because of the volatility of the region.
“It’s being held in an arena of two wars with active continuing terrorist campaigns,” Jenkins said.
Several experts said they believed the so-called ring of steel around these Games should keep the Olympics safe, but other areas in the country, perhaps transportation hubs, could be vulnerable.

So, there it is — the ring of steel.