Top 10 Regrets from Summer 2006

Most everybody gets to the tail end of summer and thinks about things they should have done or wished they had done. I know I had planned on getting more projects finished around the house, but I certainly don't regret that ;). Here is a list of 10 things that I thought about when I looked back at this past summer. I know there are still a few weeks of summer left, but my wife has gone back to school teaching and we just don't have the freedom to do everything we want now. For me, the spirit of summer is pretty much over.

Here is the list of 10 Things I should have done (or done more of) this summer:

1. Ate more ice cream (remember, there is ALWAYS room for ice cream)
2. Drank more lemonade and less water
3. Watched more sunsets
4. Sat on the back deck and enjoyed the evening
5. Gone to the beach more
6. Spent an afternoon reading a book
7. Gone to a Detroit Tigers game
8. Gone camping more
9. Spent more time relaxing in the yard and less time mowing it
10. Slowed down and enjoyed those lazy summer days

Today, there will be no newspaper delivered to my door

Today I bravely stride forth into a new era. All through my formative years while living at home, even my college years, and on into my adulthood I have received a daily newspaper. Yesterday I read the last newspaper that will be delivered to my doorstep. I read a large number of online newspapers and news sites on a daily basis. By the time my afternoon paper gets here the news is already old news. Recent changes to our paper have also been blatant in their attempts to disguise the decline in the amount of news that was reported on.

Instead of mainly receiving a plethora of ads and flyers in the Sunday paper, we have begun seeing a bunch of junk ads Thursday, Friday, and Saturday as well. It was like the paper was compensating for the lack of news with advertising.

Even that staple of childhood - the funnies, comics, funny pages - have lost their humor and traded it in for politics, political correctness, and social agendas. The comics have not been the same since Bill Watterson quit drawing my favorite comic - Calvin and Hobbes.

So, I bid a fond ado to those days of holding the news in my hand. Another side benefit to no longer receiving the paper is one less thing to recycle and take up space in my garage.

Quotations About Freedom

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves. ~ Abraham Lincoln In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt

We cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home. ~ Edward R. Murrow

I prefer liberty with danger to peace with slavery. ~Author Unknown

Courtesy of www.quotegarden.com

They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security ~ Benjamin Franklin

Courtesy of www.wisdomquotes.com

Touching Story of an Upper Peninsula Hermit

Susan Ager is still traveling across Michigan visiting places that folks tell her to go. Her most recent request came from Hank DeSautel who lives in Adrian. He had not seen his brother in 25 years and at age 88 can not make the trip up to Grand Marais himself. He told Susan -

"Please go to Grand Marais," the old man told me, his voice crackly on the phone, "and see if you can find my brother. He's a hermit, and he lives in the woods 9 miles outside town, in an aluminum trailer, with no electricity and no water.

Hank told her that in order to find his brother all she needed to do was "go into any tavern, and ask for Dapper Dan." Which is exactly what Susan did. She arrived at the Lake Superior Brewing Co. around midnight and asked for Dapper Dan. She doesn't receive directions to his place, just his life story as told from the good folks that reside in Grand Marais.

I will not relay the whole account here. Just go to this page of the Detroit Free Press and read about Susan's adventure. It is simply a really touching story of a guy (Dapper Dan) who retired at the age of 42 and moved to the only place he knew he could afford to retire to at such a young age - Grand Marais. Dapper Dan chose to live the simple life.

Do yourself a favor and check it out. Check Susan's blog over the weekend as she is supposed to have her account of spending a weekend at a lighthouse on the Great Lakes.

Happy Summer!

Today, June 21, marks the first day of summer (officially). This is the longest day of the year (as far as daylight hours go) so you better get out there and enjoy it :). Looking for something to do? Head on over to the Travel Michigan website for lists upon lists of things to do and see. Look under the Events tab and search by month to see what might be going on in your area today and this weekend.

Scrapbooking + Blogging = Scrapblog

Now, this is not a Michigan-based company, but the premise is too intriguing not to share. Scrapblog combines elements of scrapbooking (including themes, stickers, and other graphics) with blogging. You get to create as many scrapblogs as you want for the low, low price of . . . free! People in my family love to scrapbook and from what I have seen with the tour that Scrapbook provides you can do a lot of the same work as you would with a physical scrapbook. Interested? Head on over to Scrapblog today and get started.

Thanks to Mike Wendeland's blog for the heads up on Scrapblog.