• Up early; Checked out.
  • Drove to downtown Ann Arbor to park and walk around before lunch. Got accosted by a local cop for making a left turn in front of her. In reality, we made the turn well before she got to the intersection but had to stop for a pesky pedestrian (which she probably couldn’t see) which kept us in the intersection long enough for her to catch up and get testy. She may or may not have ticketed the people behind us who made the same left turn.
  • Walked a few blocks in the oppressive heat and humidity before turning back and checking the car for tickets. Finding none, we went into the Arbor Brewing Company for lunch. I had an “Olde Number 22 German Alt” and the cask ale with my burger. The German Alt was pretty smooth but still a bit heavy for such a hot day. The cask ale really hit the spot though.
  • On the drive up to Emily’s family’s cottage we hit a few little rain storms. As the first one began, Emily flipped on the windshield wipers and the passenger side blade promptly flew off into the distance. She assured me that she was not the one who installed it. Thankfully I did not need to see the road so we pressed on.
  • We arrived at Houghton Lake shortly before dinner. We sat on the porch overlooking the lake and got caught up with Emily’s folks and her sister and brother-in-law then some family friends joined us for some delicious pulled pork sandwiches and a belated birthday cake for Amy.
  • A few of us piled into Emily’s parents’ boat and headed out on the lake for an amateur fireworks show. The fireworks were really impressive, especially since they were going off on all sides of us. These folks really spared no expense and actually seemed to know what they were doing.

  • Up early; continued my new tradition of walking to Dunkin’ Donuts for a bagel on Friday. I hope the walking offsets the bagel like I think it does.
  • After work Emily and I hopped in the car and headed off to Michigan. Our destination is Houghton Lake but that’s an eight-hour drive which is not how we roll after work. We stopped in Ann Arbor for the night, to make the last three hours of the journey tomorrow (after visiting Arbor Brewing, of course).