Dutch costumes should only be resold on wire hangers.

“Let’s push it out of the road and into the church,” said the Michigander.  Yes! Let’s.  As a friend pointed out, I was “lucky there was one nearby.”  Friday was my Jeep’s first day with its new Michigan license plate.  I made it approximately half of a mile before it broke down in the middle of Holland.

If you’re unfamiliar, this license plate was a long time coming. Months of struggling with the California DMV ended with a blog post, contest, and subsequent connection to two fantastic California DMV employees, Jan and Kitty, that Arnold should promote if he hasn’t already.  Arnie can you hear me? I consider it a major life achievement (check!) that a DMV employee called me at home.

"Plate it your way" -State of Michigan

As winner of the contest, Micah Lande was given the opportunity to design my new Michigan plate.

A friendly neighborhood Republican helped push my car out of the street and half-into a parking lot that is shared between a church and the Holland Tulip Time Festival Store.  A patch of ice and tolling church bell prevented us from making it all the way.

Have you seen those mini shorts with writing on the butt that many teenagers think they can pull off but can’t?  My car was essentially wearing butt shorts as it stuck out of the church parking lot.

Don't dare bring one that's not laundered.

Before I even finished dialing AAA I was pre-annoyed with the tow truck company.  What do you do if you work in a job where you are set up for failure?  It is impossible to be excited when calling for a tow, but what a design challenge! Can the experience of a tow ever exceed expectations?

When you are stranded, even in your own town, you see things you would have otherwise missed.  It’s neat to be forced to look at what’s around.  The feeling is similar to doing user studies in design.  How else would you know that the Dutch Costume Resale next week is the 59th straight resale?

It's official.

Remember the days before mobile, internet-ready phones when we read Sweet n’ Low packets as we waited for coffee, and shampoo bottle ingredients as we sat in the toilet at a friend’s house?  Your mind seeks something, anything, to take in to pass the time.

When the truck finally came my Jeep was hoisted up and its butt shorts were rolled through town.  The process was fast – too fast. Shouldn’t there be more pomp and circumstance?  I waited 45 minutes for a process that only takes six?  What a great word – pomp!  More things in life should involve pomp.

There’s a strange exhilaration that comes while watching your car being driven by another car.  Is everyone looking at me? Hey everyone, look at me! It’s a combination of awkward exposure plus pride.

Butt shorts.

I appreciate a confident mustache.

I sat in the faux-Italian-themed Holland, Michigan restaurant waiting for what I knew would be sub-par pizza to be carried the six feet from the kitchen to the checkout counter.  I allowed my eyes to blur in an attempt to trick myself into thinking I was at least in the Las Vegas Venetian, and a small dust ball rolled across the floor and completed my desert meditation.   Only when the small dust ball focused itself into a mouse, did I really hit Holland jackpot.

A shriek emerged from the waiter helping me. He had one of those bodies that took control of him from the knees and lurched him like a marionette.  A second man emerged from behind the open kitchen area and tried to stomp on the mouse with his boots of rebellion.  I immediately decided that I would still eat the sub-par mouse turd pizza, if only for the sake of talking about it later.

Last week I went to Grand Rapids, aka G-Rap, for the second ice hockey experience in my life.  My first game was in third grade.  I went to a Boston Bruins game with a classmate and his dad and spent the entire game milking the Fruit Roll-up that his had given us for a snack.  Illegal in my house, I wrapped that snack jackpot around my left index finger and when I finally sucked it clean an hour later my finger was pink and wrinkled for a week.

At Grand Rapids Griffins hockey games, pizza falls from the sky.  Like any good Midwestern sporting venue the Van Andel Arena (if you ain’t Dutch you ain’t much) shoots t-shirts out of air canons, hurls hot dogs with sling shots, and drops pizzas with parachutes from the stadium ceiling. My long torso did nothing to help me grab meat and cheese out of thin air, but with a seat right behind the goal net, I had something better. I had Newbury.

Who doesn’t love a good, strong mustache? I finally had something to root for – let’s go Newbury! Bring in Newbury! Newbury for Senate! I eagerly awaited the shift from second to third period so Newbury would be fully featured once again.  Skip to 1:04 for a frontal view and stroke of said Baleen.

I thought of Newbury as I sat and watched the mouse turd pizza place lose stars in real time on my Yelp review.  A third employee came out, looked at the skittering bundle as it easily outran the boots of rebellion, then shrugged with conviction as he looked at me and stated, “That’ll happen.”

He could’ve been wearing a mustache.

Come to Holland, MI where you can downhill ski in our urban city!

I was called out on my consumption orientation yesterday.  I’ve eaten and enjoyed meat my whole life, but during dinner last night I wasn’t sure and my poker face was no help.  I’m not ready to subscribe to one camp or another.  Then “it” was said: “you are a vegetarian.”  But, I’m not ready.  I want to change my affiliation for each new food encounter but society frowns on those that are indecisive or misrepresent themselves.  Why would you try to be something that you’re not?

Why? Because it’s much more interesting for the rest of us. Conflict! Intrigue! Gossip fodder! Go ahead and surpass awkward and head straight to bold.  If Holland put out a magazine that featured a group of seniors sitting smiling on a sidewalk on its cover, it might be authentic, but I probably wouldn’t read it unless the pages accidentally opened because some sort of coffee spill made it cling to the napkin I was using to wipe up the mess.  The saturated area would swell and give the paper that damp bubble that pills like a sweater when wet but feels extra crunchy when dry.

If something contradicts itself an even number of times, is it true?

Holland took the opposite route. It put out a magazine cover that screams of an urban identity and downhill skiing.  Wow! Now this was a magazine I couldn’t pass up.  I even picked it up with bare hands from the free stack near the coffee shop bathroom and paged through, vigorously looking for the place where the secret urban mountain is located.

Would the urban mountain have good hot chocolate? Tattooed people? Democrats?  Would it be a haven for the apres-ski set? Are there other half-French words I could learn there? Are there sandwiches named after movie stars?

I’ll skip ahead.  We all know that Holland didn’t deliver on the urban mountain, but kudos for the generative cover. In this era of diminishing print media ID magazine has shut down but Holland magazine was packed with enough intrigue to get me to page through.

I wonder if the urban mountain has any vegetarians?

Maybe next year Apolo Ohno will shave his soul patch.

I hurled my body down an icy chute yesterday in a day of luging that just might have made the entire state of Michigan worth it.   In order to luge, you lay down on two big blades and the flimsy hammock that connects them and flex your entire body.  To turn, you look the direction you want to go and use your calf to lean your outer blade into the curve.  In order to stop, you sit up and pick up the front of the blades, or, in my case you allow yourself to continue to hurl until you smash into a giant foam cube.

I wish foam cubes had a greater presence in life.  Awkward conversation with someone you wish you were friends with? Lean over into the giant foam cube.  In the middle of saying one of those sentences that you can’t figure out how to end so you keep adding more and more words hoping that some kind of closing magically comes out of your mouth?  Fall face first into the giant foam cube.  Giving a presentation and a booger accidentally floats out of your nose? There should be a giant foam cube for that too.

It’s a subtle sport, the luge, and Michigan should be proud to be home of only one of three such tracks in the country.  I’d like to take part in more sports that can only be done here, but I’m not sure what they are – any ideas?  What would a Michigan triathlon look like? Deer hunt, snowmobile, luge?  Each state should design its own sport.

My whole body hurts today.  I wonder if the Olympians hurt this much after their races? Speaking of hurting and Olympics, it’s that time of year again – time for me to get teary while watching the Olympic torch relay on TV.  Each runner with an emotional story – it’s like watching a hyper-condensed version of Extreme Makeover Home Edition – waterfalls.

The Olympics are in Canada and the US government has its commercials on TV in case Americans get any crazy crazy ideas about not coming back, or don’t realize that Canada is a different country.  The spots are reminders to bring a passport if you go see the games, and the website they’ve created for it is www.getyouhome.gov.  The embedded subtlety, that getting home is more important that going out and seeing the world, is on par with that of a luge turn.

Our country and Apolo’s facial hair may always stay the same, but if you’re looking for something new, let Michigan deliver you down a hill on a luge.  We have foam here.

Hello again, chin fuzz.

I’ve taken to straddling our space heater.

I’ve lived in Michigan long enough that I have routines now.  In the dark dark Michigan morning:  I wake up. I lay in bed looking up.  I stand up.  I waddle over to our space heater.  I straddle our space heater and let warm infuse me from all directions.  I venture beyond our space heater and into the day.

I wish my space heater had a saddle on top.  In fact, more things should have saddles.  I love the craftsmanship embedded in a great saddle, but I’ve never taken to the large animals that are under them.  Heaving a heavy saddle over a horse sounds great, save for the horse.  In fourth grade I went to a week of horse camp with the Girl Scouts.  I was most interested in how cool I would look in my tall, leather riding boots, walking all over town and leaning nonchalantly on walls in public places, but once at camp those boots ended up materializing as chunky rubber overshoes.  I tested into the most beginner level of horses named Heineken, and he and I walked in slow, clockwise circles for five days.

Heaters always look like heaters, except when they look like other household appliances.  Who hasn’t let his or her fingers linger a little longer over the toaster on a cold morning?  I learned a tip from some Michigander friends – after cooking something in the oven, leave it open as it cools off – free heat.  Hot showers are an obvious good idea except if you have hair that’s equivalent to a shammy when it comes to retaining water.  A head in the midst of evaporation is as uncomfortable as those pants that are just a smidge too tight.  If you stay perfectly still you can convince yourself that everything is just fine.  Move the slightest bit and sirens go off.

Twenty-two wisdom-infusing years have passed since my special time with Heineken.  I just bought a new, fantastic pair of boots