The Paris Olympics get started this weekend. C'est bon.

I'm JR Radcliffe and this is the Daily Briefing newsletter by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Sign up here to get it sent to your inbox each morning .

It'll be mostly sunny today after some patchy morning fog with a high near 80, and expect a gorgeous Saturday (sunny, high of 84) before a chance for some afternoon thunderstorms on Sunday, with a high near 86.

Hello, 2024 Olympics

Who's excited for the Summer Olympics?

The every-four-years spectacle gets underway (officially) tonight, with some team events already in the early stages of group play. We have plenty of Wisconsin connections in this year's draft, most prominently with Giannis Antetokounmpo and Tyrese Haliburton (from Oshkosh) competing in men's basketball and sprinter Kenny Bednarek (from Rice Lake) on the track.

Take a look back at several big Olympic moments featuring Wisconsin athletes (some great, some dubious), and check out our full roster of Wisconsin-connected Olympians , plus a schedule of when they're expected to compete. Mark Stewart recently chatted with University of Wisconsin alumnus Zach Ziemek , poised to appear in his third Olympics.

It doesn't take long for things to get going; on Saturday, Giannis and Greece will face Canada in a major pool-play clash as part of the "group of death" in the men's basketball competition. Let's do this!

Is Wisconsin about to get its first national park designation?

Wisconsin doesn't have a national park anywhere in its borders, but that could change.

U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany introduced a bill Tuesday that would designate the Apostle Islands as a national park, upgrading it from its current designation as a national lakeshore. The first hearing on the matter was held Wednesday in Washington, D.C.

Becoming a national park would attract more people to the Apostle Islands, located in the northernmost point of Wisconsin on the south shore of Lake Superior.

"I just think the Apostle Islands fit the bill of a national park. I mean, these are places that are truly special in America," Tiffany said. "It deserves a designation as a national park, because it really is one of the great places, not just in Wisconsin and the upper Midwest, but in all of the United States.

"I don't see any reason why we can't do this by unanimous consent, where everyone agrees," he said.

A number of new national parks have been added to the roster in the last several years. In 2020, the New River Gorge in West Virginia earned the designation, and in 2019 two parks were designated: White Sands in New Mexico and the Indiana Dunes, in northwest Indiana along Lake Michigan.

Don't miss these

• Employees who had been working for Kohl's remotely will now have to return to the office.
• A familiar face, the son of former Milwaukee Brewers star Prince Fielder, is now 19 and has signed a contract with the organization.
• Bradford Beach is closed because of E.coli.
• Some frolicking mink (including an albino) in Port Washington had a viral moment.
• Want to spend the night in Wisconsin in a World War II submarine?
• Last year, the summer kicked off with drought. This year ... it absolutely did not.

JR Radcliffe can be reached at (262) 361-9141 or jradcliffe@gannett.com . Follow him on Twitter at @JRRadcliffe .

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: The Paris Olympics get started this weekend. C'est bon.