The finish line is almost here. Americans have weighed a plethora of questions in choosing their presidential candidate.
But amid the quadrennial explosion of political ads, bumper stickers and debates, some questions still baffle: Why is the Republican mascot an elephant? Why are Democrats linked to the color blue? And what happens if the candidates tie?
Below, a voter's guide to such perpetually confounding riddles:
Q. Why are presidential elections always in November, and always on Tuesdays?
It all comes down to weather, harvests and worship.
Back when voters traveled to the polls by horse, Tuesday was an ideal day because it allows people to worship on Sunday, ride to their county seat on Monday and vote on Tuesday - all before market day, Wednesday.
And the month of November fit nicely between harvest time and brutal winter weather -- which can be especially bad when you're trudging along by horse and buggy.
But since many voters now travel by horsepower instead of live horses, some people -- like the group Why Tuesday? -- are pushing to move election day to a weekend day to increase the country's historically dismal voter turnout. According to the group, 15 states do not allow early voting, and 27 percent of non-voters said the main reason why they didn't vote was because they were too busy or couldn't get time off to vote.
Q. Why do Republicans have an elephant and Democrats have a donkey?
Back in 1874, cartoonist Thomas Nast used an elephant to depict the Republican vote in his drawing "The Third-Term Panic." The cartoon was published in Harper's Weekly after the owner of the New York Herald reportedly criticized the notion of Republican President Ulysses S. Grant running for a third term. (Grant didn't end up running in the next election).