The Columns

Well, it's that time of year again.  The ice dam in the driveway has been replaced by a glob of nearly composted leaves from last Autumn, I've extracted the last of the season's Slush Nuggets from the bushes, and the First Robin of Spring has been transformed into a dreamy smile of well-fed satisfaction on the face of the neighbor's cat.

It's time to put The Dock back out in the lake!

I've written about The Dock before. To review, it's basically a collection of mismatched metal poles and wooden sections that we have cobbled together over the course of the past fifteen years. Just picture a majestic but run-down old barn, with all the wood a deeply weathered gray, bent and warped under the weight of untold seasons of hardship and honest toil. Only it's a dock.

OK, something has been bothering me. Exactly how would a handful of pirates in a small boat be able to take over a 17,000 ton cargo ship?

I just read about the daring rescue of Captain Richard Phillips, the incredibly heroic freighter captain who gave himself up as a hostage to Somali pirates to keep them from harming his crew. He spent five days in a lifeboat with his captors, until some snipers on an American warship gave a pretty convincing demonstration of the basic drawbacks you might face if you happen to take up a career in pirating.

But what I don't understand is how the pirates keep getting on board in the first place. Have you ever been near one of those ships? They're huge! It's not like you can just pull up alongside, knock on the door, and say, "Good afternoon, sir. Somali pirates here, and we've come around to take you hostage. Mind if we come in?"

Today my wife and I observed one of our family's most hallowed traditions.  It's a custom that has transcended generations, unfailingly signaling the end of the long, cold winter and the approach of at least a few days and nights guaranteed to be completely free from wool socks and ChapStick. I'm talking about the First Hamburger of Spring.

Actually, when I sat down to write this column I was planning to discuss President Obama's trip to Europe and the G-20 Conference in London - but then I fired up my barbecue grill, the Enterprise, and I got distracted.

Not too long ago I asked my readers to write and tell me about the crappy things they have done over the years to make money. The idea here was that I would get you to do my own crappy job, and write this column for me. I got a fairly good cross-section of all the predictable replies to that request - you know, everyday occupations like executioner, road kill scooper, medical experiment subject, or telemarketer.

Several people wrote to tell me that the most unpleasant job they’d ever had was shucking corn in the hot sun. I’m sure all the corn-shuckers suffered greatly, but I’d just like to tell these pansies about a friend of mine who, as a teenager in England, was periodically lowered into the sewer in a harness with a high-pressure water hose to “tidy up the pipes.”

Forty years later, all of us are still a bit hesitant about shaking hands with him.

Each Spring, as Old Man Winter starts thinking about getting his frosty white butt out of town for Spring Break, we Michigaroonies begin to experience a phenomenon that's unique to states where we spend four months out of every year walking around in stupid-looking little wool hats and wearing our socks to bed.

I'm talking about Slush Nuggets.

In case you've never heard of them, "Slush Nuggets" are those great little treasures that show up in your yard as the snow melts. I live on a busy street, where the snowplows push their grimy little glaciers up into my yard all winter long. By the time March rolls around I've accumulated a pretty substantial heap of road slop, and a particularly rich haul of Slush Nuggets.