This is getting to be a serial adventure with this guy, like Harry Potter -- but way heavier at the nightmare end of things.

So far, Paul Ryan's running his campaign as Veep wannabe about like he does a marathon:  running his own course, running his mouth, and running out his clock on his own sense of time and timing.  For someone who considers himself so fleet of foot, he's certainly being footloose with the truth, getting so often tripped up by it and tangled all around in it.

Lyin' Ryan, in his latest poleaxing of the truth,  shaved more than an hour off his marathon time.  Despite impressions he's let stand to the contrary, he's run only one marathon, and clocked more than 4 hours finishing, versus that "2 hour and 50-something" he's stated.

We've had to low-crawl on our stomachs and chests all week, under razor wire and raking machine gun fire, but we've finally made it, safe:  The Weekend.

Relax, enjoy your coffee, no rush.  There'll be little mention of politics here today, save for a quick thanks to the cosmos for the Tampa-tantrum finally ending.  (Yes, now that you ask, I will have a little something in my coffee, after all.  Whooo-ah.)

OK, one more nudge at the Republican fright-fest just ended:  It is testament to the power of lies and foolish nonsense that the Mississippi River river ran backwards for 24 hours -- even though Tampa was relatively far away!

Of course, to play fair, that gathering was backward before it was begun.  (And, yes, of course, purists, Hurricane Isaac had something to do with that, too.)

Catching up with the rest of the week:

The older the echo, the louder the cry.

And then, there were the waves and waves of echoing cries crashing out in torrents from the tightly-choreographed GOP amateur hour and presidential auditions in Tampa, where everyone's dance steps are painstakingly mapped out in lockstep, on the planks of that sprawling, unbrawling floor.

It is an unusual Tampa-tantrum, this gathering, but one bearing many old echoes.

Peculiar, it was, not having George W. Bush, the previous Republican occupier of the White House, slide on by to cut some conversational brush with us, and remind us how fine those eight years were.  But, the taint of epic disaster lingers among those echoes, so -- please:  No reason to drop by.

Based on news reports we're all seeing, hearing, and reading, there is an epic amount of hand-wringing going on in every media office, cubicle, and cubbyhole.

It's especially impressive that so many intricate, flailing hand motions can be maintained, all while your feet and legs are dancing as fast as they possible can, all around not saying what you mean.

You see, Paul Ryan has been using the English language again.  As usual, he is not interested in using that language to shed any light on plans and facts, but on maiming and hiding them as best he can.

Meanwhile, news anchors, writers, and editors -- and everyone else who finds him- or herself in the clutches of mainstream media employment -- is scanning and thumbing through every possible Thesaurus that can be unearthed and brought to bear on a wholly vexing question:

What else can we call someone for stretching things, without using that awful "L" word?

You may be noticing some of these pieces feel as if you've read them before.  In a manner of speaking, you have.  It's on the order of one-size-fits-all, since any lie fits almost any Republican, and vice-versa.

Today's example:  The Romney campaign is running an ad about welfare that uses absolutely no facts -- just lies. Nothing but lies.  The campaign says it's their most effective ad yet, and no, they're not at all concerned the ad has no basis whatever in fact.

A Romney pollster was quoted as saying,  "We're not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers."  That level of outlandish, outrageous behavior is simply stunning -- lying, then bragging about it, and then being proud of it, too.

Tropical Storm Isaac's moist, warm winds increased speed to 70 miles per hour late today, just 4 mph short of a hurricane -- which is anywhere from 293 to 449 mph short of the hot-air wind-speed records that blowhards will achieve at this year's Republican parr-tee in Tampa.

In all, 2,286 delegates and 2,125 alternate delegates have gathered in one spot -- since quarantined by the Combined National Emergency Weather and Mental Health Centers, and dubbed a dangerous depression -- one not curable by anti-psychotic medications.

Chief meteorologist Wendy Enhowlen says, "It might be tropical right here, but this great depression is more topical,  especially with the economic stresses most regular people face today."

She added, "Global climate change provokes more problems than just multiplying the numbers of hurricanes.  For one thing, the palmetto bugs here are the size of reindeer."