Leelanau Whippersnapper

Now there’s a sappy title.  What can I say.  Angie and her partner Cam came up to visit this past weekend and it is true that aquantences come and go but friends span a lifetime.  I had not seen or spoken to Angie for nearly 10 years but we were able to pick up pretty much right were we left off.  All the reasons we were good friends back in the day are all the reasons we can continue to get along fine now as adults.  We did the whole nine yards up here in Leelanau.  The beaches, the Sand Dunes, Peterson Park, Glen Arbor, the Light House, Suttons Bay…it was fun to show them around and imerse them in my world for a few days.  They are on a whilwind tour around Lake Michigan, likely relaxing somewhere in the UP by now.  Tomorrow I’ll be posting a new gallery to my Facebook album and I’ll be uploading to my photography web site with new photos of their visit.  Check them out.  The computer is uploading photos now so I need to close this down for the night.  I’ll write another entry tomorrow.

The following has been stolen from Wally’s Joke Mail and reposted here without permission.  I did not write these but I’m not sure Wally did either since I’ve seen these same things posted elsewhere.  Pay attention to the highlighted ones.  These are statements I find particularly disturbing and true in my neck of the woods.  Traverse City is not by definition a conservative area in the same way that Grand Rapids is but some of the back woods boys up here would sure like you to believe it’s all about American Flags and guns!

1. You have to be against abortion, but support capital punishment on demand.
2. You have to believe that governments create oppression and businesses create prosperity.
3. You have to believe that the man wearing a turban in the airport is more of a terrorist than the white man carrying a concealed gun.
4. You have to believe that federal funding is a handout and that disadvantaged people should be able to “pull themselves up by their bootstraps,” just like you and your daddy and his daddy before him.
5. You have to believe that someone made up global warming to scare you into not driving that gas-guzzling SUV.
6. You have to believe that being sexually confused is an abomination that God hates.
7. You have to believe that the people advocating those afflicted with AIDS should “stop whining.”
8. You have to believe that if schools don’t provide sex education and/or condoms, then kids just won’t think about sex and it will all just go away.
9. You have to believe that animal rights activists aren’t doing “what God intended,” but hunters are.
10. You have to believe that if someone has fallen on hard times it is their own fault and they should be given no help.
11. You have to believe that God lives in your own little box and that He hates all the same things and people you do.
12. You have to believe that the ACLU is bad because it supports certain parts of the Constitution, while the NRA is good because it supports certain parts of the Constitution.
13. You have to believe that the tax on your yacht is too high and that the homeless man isn’t being taxed enough.
14. You have to believe that the contributions to American history made by Caucasian men are more important than those made by women and African-Americans.
15. You have to believe that Black History Month is reverse racism, but the Confederate flag is just a historical symbol.
16. You have to believe that any war we fight is for a good reason, because the president said so.
17. You have to believe that God loves everyone, except for gay people.
18. You have to believe that this message is part of a crazy, left-wing revolution.

Some people are just irritating.  Others are just plain stupid.

The population is beginning to change now up here for the summer.  Today I pulled into The Coffee Bean to grab a cup of coffee on my way home from work and I had to park next to what I think was the BIGGEST SUV I’ve ever seen in my life.  It was the size of a small school bus, it was BRIGHT white (I hate white cars) and it was clearly driven by someone who cares nothing about how that vehicle makes them look when gas is now at $4.00 a gallon up here.  I would venture to say that the owner of that car has been made rich by the stupidity of others and is now showing off his ego. The only thing missing from this truck was a set of bulls balls for the hitch. (I don’t know who the woman is below, this is just to show you what bulls balls are).

Summer time up here brings with it some pretty crazy people.  Some even more so than the back woods meth-heads that populate the area in the winter.  These people have money, love to show it off, and care about nobody but themselves.  To the locals these people who come up here only on the weekends and then somehow think they live here are known as Fudgies…a horrendously bad nickname in the first place.  These are the folks who whistle at me at work in order to try and get my attention to help them.  Guess what folks, I don’t stop for people who whistle at me.  I’ll loose a sale before I am treated like that.  I’m not a dog, I don’t have a tail.  If you want to treat me like you would a dog than you had better have a treat for me in that fucking bag of yours or I’m going to jump on you, bite you and give you rabies you stupid fucks.  Pardon me, will you help me?.. works much better.