This is part two in a nine-part travelogue devoted to a recent two-day trip to Boyne City. I jest, it’s two parts, and you are under no obligation to read a word. Part I is HERE. — Management.
With no job, dogs, or kid to be up for, Wifey and I took our time getting out of bed the next morning. Then it was off to Lake Charlevoix Coffee for, well, coffee.
As this needless blog’s author, it is vital that I come up with new and fantastical ways to convey stories about my trivial life. This was super easy when racing bikes or at very least riding them. But these days, I am just another fat middle-class white guy on the conveyor belt of life looking for the tiniest shreds of happiness to get me through one day and on to the next. Goddamn, I love the smell of hyperbole in the morning!!
All semi-truths and joking aside, as much as I love writing this shit show, and sharing photos, some weeks I struggle to post anything at all. Some of that is laziness, some of that is time restraints, and some of that is a raging case of why can’t you just be like everyone else in the world and post your photos, kooky opinions, and unfunny sophomoric witticisms on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram?
This post comes to you with all the enthusiasm of a blind man entering a strip club. Of course, based on some of the strip clubs I’ve unfortunately been in during the early “bachelor party days” of my life (looking at you, Hi-Way Playground in Washington County, PA, circa 1996 with your free stage-side pizza), that’s probably a good thing. I digress.
It’s been a minute or two years since my last Macro Monday post, and I’m not going to start today. Mostly because it’s Wednesday, not Monday, and I took the photos on Sunday, which means Monday has fuck all to do with anything.
For the first time in my life, I found myself in Manistee, Michigan, for a reason other than riding my bike, even though the Lumberjack 100 was coincidentally going on just up the road at Big M at the same time. With that in my head, I struggled to hold back my desire to regale Wifey with tales of my ONE Lumberjack 100 finish in 2009 (and multiple DNFs in later years) but instead focused on our little pre-planned-spur-of-the-moment day-trip to the beach.
Like Al Camus (not that one, the Al Camus that works at Marty’s Bar washing dishes) once said, “sometimes you have to look over your shoulder before you can fail.” And that, my friends, is why I am here today.
You may or may not remember the issues with my vision that sent me to my eye doctor a few weeks ago, where I was diagnosed with cataracts and sent to see an eye surgeon to get shit rolling for surgery this summer. Well, the appointment with the surgeon was this morning, and after a bunch of tests, it turns out I do NOT have cataracts but was suffering from a dry eye episode that was causing the blurred vision and light sensitivity.
Just a quick post to prove that I’m still alive. I know the value of that is questioned by many, including myself, but I’m still here, just like that faded mustard stain on your favorite Superchunk t-shirt1. It’s just that life has been busy with many un-blog-worthy things.
On Friday, I found myself oddly void of the desire to visit the Caligula-like setting of the gym and all of its sweat, testosterone, and cluster bomb pheromone attacks camouflaged in Gymshark tights. Instead, I opted to get some shit done and then do a short photo walk at Meridian Park. This obviously did nothing for my rotund shape but did get me out of the house, and somedays, that’s all that matters.
It’s Friday morning, and I’m writing this to kill some time before going to the gym to lift heavy things for no reason. I am also writing in an attempt to cajole the last shreds of motivation in my mind into doing such an absurd thing. I feel like a sassy $5 hooker talking up my game to any pedestrian walking down my side of the street. And as you might imagine, motivational talk from someone who is blindly confidant yet so clearly undervalues their talents is not great. Of course, I’m also trying to quash the mental snapshot of myself wearing a crop top, booty shorts, pink wig, fishnets, and combat boots as I hustle my side of the cul de sac. “$5, and I’ll show you the time of your life. Where else are you gonna get chlamydia this good? ‘Cmon, baby.” Or something like that.