It is going to be hard to spit from the mitt the next couple of days because I am headed southward in search of sunshine and a remedy for an almost headcold that the few and the unlucky seem to be getting.
Someone once said, The best way to change your luck is to change your oil and then hit the road. I'll let you know how it goes.
A weekend clumped together and blurred by activity. Nothing makes a writer and volunteer crankier than democracy: the tiring tedious fairness, the silly notion that there are no stupid questions. The damp day and godawful early damper morning that challenges even the best shampoo and conditioner combo. What does the weather matter when you've got the people of southeastern Michigan as both your umbrella and your rain cloud?
In day three of concentrated ground reporting I uncovered, no, spotted and drove through a road schmeared deer carcass stretching over three tenths of a mile of highway asphalt on eastbound I-96. The buck or doe had been splattered in three or more parts casting a tinkerbell pink tone over the normally gray road. Yet another example of the changing fall colors.
In the mitten the climate involves things on the ground as much as the stuff in the air. I mentioned acorns the other day but neglected crabapples and cornstalks. I forgot about the three teens lying in the library lawn splitting a two-liter of Mountain Dew and the lipstick stained pen tube on the ground in the public bathroom. The grass needs to be cut, soon enough it will want to be raked and later, shoveled. With the things on the ground needing so much attention it is very easy to run into somebody or to accidentally walk into a tree. Please be careful out there.
We are not under siege. You know what that sound is? It's the great fall shakedown. That is an acorn on your head, chunking up your lawn, stuck in your grill. Wait for the signal.
You can't discount an entire day because it is gray. You can make it feel bad because it was so much less than the day before it. You do this by closing your eyes and threatening a sleep strike until the sun comes back out. Works 40% of the time.
Before anything really gets to changing around here there has to be a lot of rain and a lot of bright pink sunsets and a lot of daytime moon sightings. Then, we will bring you yellow and orange and red leaved trees.
A beautiful fall day in Michigan is like the golden edges of a chocolate chip cookie. That cookie smells like cut grass with a hint of Skin-so-Soft and light tire smoke. It feels like the inside of a fur-lined jean jacket and looks like goldenrod dipped in honey. Only androids and republicans cannot appreciate a beautiful fall day in Michigan.
After the rain we had new lakes in places where there used to be dry land and bombastic greenery in places that just used to be grass.
On this, the ides of September, we recovered from the 100 year rain of the past several days.
We are going to need a bigger boat.
The Hydroplane Olympics commenced today on I-96.
and I-75
I-59
US 23
We are under water. A low fog cloud started things off this morning and left by noon to make way for dump buckets of sky sauce. Everything looks like a flooded summer museum.
Highlights of driving in Detroit: optional stoplights, WJLB's the quiet storm, and the feel good warmth of an autumn day filtered through cracks in concrete, bricks, and second-growth trees.
Baseball is supposedly a summer sport but really it is a fall pastime. You'd know the difference if you were 1) a true fan and 2) in Michigan right now.
The weather has turned my negative nelly weather description dial over to the sunny side. Where things were damp yesterday they were dancing today. Children skipping home on cracked sidewalks, the shade of maple trees, extra bright neon Bridge Card Signs, the lottery up, drinks a dollar, dogs on the porch, the ice cream man has not left just yet.
It rained for the first several hours of daylight today and it didn’t let up until all the dirt roads were moistened into brownie batter. Nobody seems to mind. Of course, most people are driving vehicles with over two feet of ground clearance, but it’s like people get used to the dampness here like people get used to sitting in dim rooms and two-week vacations. Somewhere along the line you learn to not expect much, let alone dry socks.
Today was around seventy degrees with blue skies hosting gently whipped cloud puffs and several rogue hawks circling over what appeared to be a pack of lost frogs on Sharp Road.
Did you order this weather? Six shades of Gray, Under your Cloud, Darker than Seattle, London, and an episode of Deadwood Combined. Cold Enough For Ya? Just a few of the possible names for a weather blog based out of Michigan. My birthplace and home for the next couple months (unless S’s two-year plan works out). I can’t pick just one witty weather related name. I think it’s because here the weather refuses to conform to my needs. So unless I change my needs to “needing to feel like I’m constantly sitting on the second to last step on the stairwell of an unfinished basement” I will have to go with something more general. The climate is so bossy in the north. It directs time and purpose, ruins days, cars, lives, and hairstyles. It lifts us up and pushes us off roads, car hoods, sidewalks, and each other. Affects our sight, emotions, and blood sugar level. Maybe not blood sugar but I’m pretty sure we are all suffering from vitamin D deficiency. Anyway, it’s time to boss back with the only thing mightier than a sword, a hurricane, or a well-built Ford: the blog.
