THE FAMILIAR A&W SIGN at the corner of M-22 and M-115 in the port city of Frankfort served as a beacon last week when it seemed to lure...

I’M VISITING STARBUCK'S FIRST CORPORATE STORE IN TRAVERSE CITY. The place just opened to great fanfare and is it ever packed. Its...

I’VE BEEN TRYING TO GET A HAIRCUT for well over two weeks. I’ve stuck my head in the barber shop several times only to discover two or...

I WAS STUNG BY A BEE LAST WEEK when I was deadheading a flowering plant in my girlfriend’s garden. I haven’t been stung in years. While...

FALL IS THE START OF SOUP SEASON and I'm suggesting three soups that remind me of this wonderful time of the year. They are: Butternut...

THE LADY BLUSTERED THAT SHE'D BEEN COMING to NW Michigan for thirty years, after I tried recommending shops for her to visit in greater...

HOW CAN IT BE MID-SEPTEMBER and I haven't even thrown a line in the water? This thought entered my mind as I read Hemingway’s story about...

WHAT I’M IMPRESSED WITH IS THE NUMBER AND DIVERSITY of golf courses that one can find up and down M-22 in NW lower Michigan. I’ve played...

I’M ON A LATE SUMMER CAMPAIGN to add some new plants to my small garden outside my hilltop loft. Frankly, I had let the garden go for a...

I RECENTLY DUSTED OFF AN OLD COOKBOOK by Christopher Kimball that somehow ended up in my loft's storage area. I discovered a written note...

DETROIT IS COMING BACK. Led this time by the arrival of the autonomous vehicle and all the intelligent technology that goes with it. No...

MY FIRST EXPOSURE TO BLENDERS came in the early 1960s when I would watch my dad and uncle make whiskey sours during our holiday family...

MY GOLF SWING IS NOT VERY CONSISTENT THESE DAYS and that truth is becoming quite an irritant to this old boy. In my younger days, I used...

MY GIRLFRIEND’S NEWER LAWN AND GARDENS have been my responsibility for a couple seasons now. After all, this fits right into my...

Frankfort, MI If you haven’t ventured out for a while it is time to grab some friends and come play one of the M22 Golf Trail picturesque...

ASPARAGUS ARE SPROUTING IN NORTHERN MICHIGAN. This annual occurrence is welcomed by me and just about everyone else I know. From mid-May,...

A NEW ADVENTURE IS IN STORE FOR ME. I’m helping market a unique lake view property that has been developed over the last two years on the...

MY ESSAYS START WITH ONE SIMPLE POINT and then I let them flow through space with little concern about an outcome. My thought this day...

I’VE HAD A THOUGHT THAT HAS BEEN SPINNING in my cerebrum for a good week. It goes something like this – Perhaps we humans, with our...

MY GIRLFRIEND HAS TWO BIG MAPLES in her backyard in Traverse City. Her son decided to make homemade maple syrup and began tapping the...