ICE FISHING CARNIVAL

By Tim Colin
Ice Fishing Carnival is an event held each year in Michigan. The event takes place out on the ice covering Lake Birdie. This event has been going on for decades and has always been exciting for participants and spectators alike. Many people participate in the sanctioned fishing and snowmobiling events. These events are very safe and great for family entertainment but, I don’t go to watch these events.

Instead, I like to watch the unsanctioned, showoff your snowmobile driving skills event. These people crank up their snow machines for exciting slides across sometimes treacherous ice. Watching people fly across the ice at 100 mph on their snowmobiles is really exciting. I especially like it when someone is going too fast and they are heading directly for someone’s cabin up on the shoreline. Watching the machines flip over and over as the drivers try to swerve out of a certainly fatal skull on cabin siding collision, can really give you a thrill. It is so much better than auto racing. Snow machine riders have almost no protection against frost bite let alone crashing into objects like cabins and ice shanties. Of course if there is an explosion, their clothing is usually highly flammable. Luckily they can roll around in the snow.

Another unsanctioned event that will give an onlooker a cheep but, no less exciting thrill, is the annual “Who is the stupidest person in Michigan?” event. In order to participate in this event you need to own a late model pickup truck with a blue book value of $50,000 or more. Each year there are at least a dozen people who participate in this event. The goal is to see how many of these trucks can park next to each other before the ice gives out underneath them and the vehicles become aquatic habitats for fish and other lake plants and creatures. Boy when that ice gives way those trucks really go down fast. You don’t dare make a trip to the port-a-potty or you might miss the whole show.

I get even greater thrills when the conservation and sheriffs officers start showing up and issuing citations to the truck owners. In addition to loosing their expensive trucks, these dim wits also get a nice hefty fine for polluting the lake. But, wait, there’s more. They also have to pay to have their sunken big trucks hauled out of the lake. For someone who likes to watch really dumb people loose lots of money doing something really stupid well, life does not get any better than a day out on the ice during Ice Carnival.

Of course you don’t have to go to a sanctioned event like on Lake Birdie to watch people do really crazy things out on the ice in Michigan. They do the same thing on every lake and river in the state as soon a there is a thin layer of ice on the water. The only thing is that during Ice Carnival you can get a hot dog and use a port-a-potty while you are waiting for someone to do something really stupid.

THE SNOWMAN TERROR

HEY SNOWMAN, LEAVE THOSE KIDS ALONE
By Tim Colin

Last night my brother’s Ted, Mike our colleague Gerrard and I spent the night in a local children’s park waiting to capture one of the strange monsters known by the general public as snowmen. However, professional investigators like us believe that some snowmen are tainted with evil and come to life after midnight every December when the moon is full. Our organization learned of these evil snow demons from Gerrard’s great grandfather.

Gerrard’s great grandfather is named Hank and he was born in Germany back in 1902. Hank lives nearby the park and will often take a leash out for a walk through it. Hank lost his pet poodle 20 years ago but imagines that the pooch is still alive. Hank feeds and waters his dog everyday and after mid-night he imagines taking his dog for a walk so the dog can do its business in the children’s park. Hank had told his great grandson Gerrard that he had seen a large snowman roaming around the park looking for people to switch with its long stick fingers.

According to Hank people in the village where he was born believed that in December when the moon was full the snowmen made by children would come to life and switch the naughty children on the backside with the stick hands that stuck out of the abdomen. Gerrard told us that this was an old Celtic legend. I pointed out that the Celts were in Ireland and Scotland not Germany. Gerrard responded “Well, my grandfather’s village was in the mountains so he must have been a highlander.”

I saw absolutely no problem with his logic. Neither of my brothers said anything because they have problems locating the United States on a map of North America. My brother Mike thinks the nations of the world are arranged on the globe in alphabetical order.

Before we started our investigation I decided to check out the story old Hank told Gerrard regarding a snowman prowling around the children’s park after mid-night. I listened to a police scanner the other night and sure enough there were several reports about an old white man wandering around aimlessly in the park when it was blowing snow and well below freezing. I was then sure that the reports must have been about the snowman. I then decided to assemble a team to set out in the cold with me and wait for the dangerous snow beast. I figured Tim and Mike could fight the dangerous snowman and since Gerrard was so slow, I could outrun Gerrard if need be so the snowman would catch up to Gerrard first which would allow for me to escape. I had things pretty well planned out. Because no one knew what the snow creature’s intentions might be I had Mike bring along a baseball bat so we had some means of defense besides hope and snowballs.

When we arrived at the park last night it was cold and quiet. The clouds had parted revealing a glowing white full moon. There was a large snowman in the park and luckily there was a snow fort built near enough to the snowman so we could hide and observe the creature and hopefully avoid being switched. Unfortunately, the fort was not big enough for all four of us so I persuaded my younger brother Mike that he should find another place to hide. He is not too bright so I suggested that he make a snow angel and lie still in the angel indentation and that the rest of us would cover Mike up with snow. Mike made a show angel. We immediately covered him up with snow and packed it down tightly so it didn’t look like a snow grave.

Ted, Gerrard and, I hid behind the walls of the snow fort waiting for the creature to start its demonic movements through the park. Then a gust of wind blew up and at the same time we all saw the hands and arms of the snowman monster move. “Did you see that?” I said.

“I can’t believe this,” responded Ted. “I thought this was just a dumb story that Gerrard’s great grandpa made up to scare little kids and big sissies like Gerrard.”

“Well your grandpa believes in leprechauns,” retorted Gerrard. “Who could believe in people dressed up in green running around with a pot of gold? Everyone knows people with money work on Wall Street and run around wearing black suits and they keep their money in ATM machines. I know because I saw them using ATM machines when I went to New York as a kid. Or was that Mt. Pleasant? I get those two cities mixed up a lot. I think it was the city that has the bridge that goes to Canada.”

“Would you guys shut up,” I said. “That thing is still moving out there and I think it is creeping our way. Where’s’ the bat? We need to clobber that thing before it gets us.”

“I think we buried the bat with Mike,” answered Ted. “We’ll have to ease over to Mike and dig him up in order to retrieve the bat.”

I had a better idea. “Mike!” I hollered in a whispering voice, “Take the bat up to the monster and bash him in. I can see the monster is going right for you now so hurry up you slow poke.” Mike did not rustle under the snow. He was either too afraid to act or he had gone to sleep right when we needed him to defend us. You just can’t count on family for anything. I knew then that it was up to me to motivate Ted and Gerrard to attack the snow monster and save us all. I motioned for Ted and Gerrard to ease along over to where Mike was buried. I followed them.

When we reached my brother Mike we unburied his face. I slapped his face a couple of times but he did not wake up. Mike is a light thinker but a very deep sleeper.

“He does not look too good,” observed Gerrard. “Is he still alive?”

“Right now that’s not important,” I responded. “The important thing is that we need to save ourselves. Besides, if Mike is completely frozen we can sell his internal organs on the Internet and make a fine profit. Anyways, I’ll still have Ted here as a brother in case I need a kidney or something one day.”

Then Gerrard held up the baseball bat and said triumphantly, “I found it.”

Then suddenly there was a tremendous gust of wind and the snowman started waving its arms and hands frantically like Frankenstein’s monster. The snowman came at us and I led the charge for about half the distance to the monster and then I let Ted and Gerrard lead the way with Gerrard holding the bat in one hand held over his right shoulder. When Gerrard got close to the snow monster he smashed it in the head with the bat. With one swing of the bat the head of the monster disappeared. Then Gerrard knocked off the dangerous branch arms from the beast. Gerrard had to stop because he was having an asthma attack. After a few seconds Gerrard was fine. Then my brother Mike woke up and came over to congratulate Gerrard for defeating the evil creature.

I was truly glad that the ordeal was over and the creature was now just a cowering pile of snow. I was glad the snowman had not gotten to me because if it switched people for being bad then I would have been switched a lot because I have been a bad boy several times this last year.

SOME CALL IT ROAD KILL; WE CALL IT SUPPER

Along Michigan Highways and byways, there are tasty treats waiting there for all of us human carnivores. Carcases and hunks of meat are just lying there to be eaten by the first person or thing, that passes by.

Many people believe that the many thousands of furry morsels are the result of animal mutilations by aliens from another world. Still, others believe that the large number of tar fried critters is the results of excessive speeds on long and lonely Michigan highways where, only the concentration needed for text messaging while driving at excessive speeds, keeps many drivers sane.

One restaurant in Northern Michigan that specializes in road found meats is called the Shoulder Side Brisket and Biscuit. Each morning before going to the restaurant he owns and manages, Chef Louie DeCorpsey heads along the highways of Northern Michigan with his Special 008 Department of Natural Resources licence to pick up the recently deceased dinner bargains.

Over the years, Chef DeCorpsey has served up the most incredible meals made from the strangest of animals. "Most of the time," Chef DeCorpsey explains, "I don't know what the stuff is I'm picking up. Sometimes I get whole steaks. Other times, it's just hamburger. If it's been lying around long enough, it may already be turned into a nice bisque. The only problem I have is that sometimes with the larger animals there is a lot of windshield glass embedded in the meat. Getting out the glass is time consuming however, for the price, I can't complain."

Chef DeCorpsey passes on much of his savings to his customers. His $1.99 Gag Me With A Spoon Skunk Soup is a favorite with the local people. One elderly lady commented "I haven't had such good skunk soup since my granny used to make it during the depression".

Raccoon Raspberry Cream Pie and Squirrel Turnovers are among the favorite desert dishes served up at this little gem of a restaurant located in Northern Michigan. Of course the Porky Pine Nettle Tea will send quills up your spine.