The Rules of Rural Michigan are as Follows: Listen up City Slickers !

1. Pull your droopy pants up. You look like an idiot.

2. Turn your cap right, your head isn’t crooked.

3. Let’s get this straight; it’s called a ‘dirt road.’ I drive a pickup truck because I want to. No matter how slow you drive,you’re going to get dust on your Lexus. Drive it or get out of the way.

4. They are cattle. They’re live steaks. That’s why they smell funny to you. But they smell like money to us. Get over it. Don’t like it?
I94 goes east and west, US23 goes north and south. Pick one.

5. So you have a $60,000 car. We’re impressed. We have $150,000 corn pickers and hay balers that are driven only 3 weeks a year. And occasionally to school…

6. So every person in rural Michigan waves. We think of it as being friendly. Try to understand the concept.

7. If that cell phone rings while an 8-point buck and 3 does are coming in, we WILL shoot it out of your hand. You better hope you don’t have it up to your ear at the time.

8. Yeah, we eat taters & gravy, beans & cornbread. We fry our fish after catchin’ ‘em. You really want sushi & caviar? It’s available at the corner bait shop.

9. The ‘Opener’ refers to the first day of deer season. It’s a religious holiday held the closest Saturday to the first of November.

10. We open doors for women. That is applied to all women, regardless of age.

11. No, there’s no ‘vegetarian special’ on the menu. Order steak. Or you can order the Chef’s Salad and pick off the 2 pounds of ham & turkey.

12. When we fill out a table, there are three main dishes: meats (includes fish), vegetables, and breads. We use four spices: salt, pepper, hot sauce and ketchup. Oh, yeah…. We don’t care what you folks in Cincinnati call that stuff you eat… IT AIN’T REAL CHILI!!

13. You bring ‘coke’ into my house, it better be brown, wet and served over ice.

14. You bring ‘Mary Jane’ into my house, she better be cute, know how to shoot, drive a truck, and have long hair.

15. College and High School Football is as important here as the Lakers and the Knicks, and a dang site more fun to watch.

16. Yeah, we have golf courses. But don’t hit the water hazards — it spooks the fish.

17. Colleges? We have them all over. We have State Universities, Community Colleges, and Vo-techs. They come outta there with an education plus a love for God and country, and they still wave at everybody when they come for the holidays.

18. We have a whole ton of folks in the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines. So don’t mess with us. If you do, you will get whipped by the best.

19. Turn down that blasted car stereo! That thumpity-thump crap ain’t music, anyway. We don’t want to hear it anymore than we want to see your boxers. Refer back to #1.

20. 4 inches isn’t a blizzard – it’s a flurry. Drive like you got some sense in it, and DON’T take all our bread, milk, and toilet paper from the grocery stores. This ain’t Alaska, worst case you may have to live a whole day without croissants. The pickups with snow blades will have you out the next day.

That is where I am from.

namaste.

I wanted to be Neil Young.

But I was just this fat kid from Keeler, Michigan so I did the next best thing. I learned every freaking Neil Yound song that I could and played the hell out of that $25 guitar that I got for christmas.

And tried to impress the girls. It didn’t happen the way that I thought it would. Though I did impress myself.

Don’t know which one was more important. Cortez the Killer is the song that got me kicked off of college radio. I looped it for a couple of hours while I got high in the control room. It was late at night and I didn’t think that anyone would care.

Surprise.

I am trying to embed it here so that it can be shared with my hundreds of readers. You deserve that much from me.

namaste.

Fat Tuesday is the day when all of the fat and Butter had to be used up and gotten out of the house prior to Lent.  Weird science, I know, but hey.  What are you gonna do?

Anyway Fasnachts are basically donuts that are powdered with sugar, or plain.  And they are a pretty boring big deal here in Pennsylvania.

When I lived in Michigan in the Detroit area the poison of choice there was Paczki.  Pronounced poonch-key.  This is a Polish version of Fasnacht.  The main difference with Paczki is that they are filled.  Thereby making them superior to Fasnacht.

I love Paczki.  Especially when they are freshly made.  Warm, and soft, filled with bavarian creme.  MMMMM….

I am now hungry.  And I can’t have any because they will make me fat.

Now I am sad.

Namaste.

Now, let us be clear here.  We all have voices that talk to us in our heads.  Our conscience, our thoughts, our guilt.  We all hear things going on in our heads.  Me, I just have a few more than most.   So I am not that crazy.  Though I am a little left of center.  I will admit to that.

Anyway.  I was thinking of my Father coming home tonight.   My Dad passed in 1996.  November to be exact.  He had been sick since November of 1995, and had lingered until November of ’96.  I got the phone call telling me to come home, that he was not going to last.  I was living in Columbus, Ohio at the time.  Mom and Dad were living in Dowagiac, Michigan.

Unfortunately, Dad passed before I got home.  I got a phone call while on the highway to slow down, that he had already passed.  I can’t describe what went through my head at that moment.  This man that I had wanted to make proud one time, had gone and I would never have the opportunity ever again.  This man, who I ran away from all of my life because I never felt that I measured up to his standards, was gone and I would never have the chance again to make him think that I was worthwhile.

I was thinking about that tonight driving home.  My kids are strewn about the country.  Two out in Arizona, and one in the Detroit area.  I wonder if they ever questions whether I am proud of them, or if they even care.  I try to tell them, when we talk, how much I love them.  I didn’t get that from my Parents as much as I would have wanted.   Maybe I tell my kids too much now.  Maybe it doesn’t mean anything to them.
But I wonder.   Do they think of their Father as someone they can come to?  For anything?  What do they think of me?  I just don’t know.

The Knob Creek is kicking in.  Work tomorrow.  Gotta scoot.

Namaste.

Margquette Michigan already has a brewery.    The Marquette Harbor Brewery, to be exact.

And from what I see of their offerings, I am going to have my hands full taking them on.  But I think that I am up to the task.

At least as long as I am sitting here dreaming of opening a brewery in Marquette, Michigan, competing with Marquette Harbor Brewery.  And not really doing it.

At least for now.

Namaste.