Craving

I'm in love with Michigan produce. When Roland was grocery shopping he saw some blueberries from Michigan (Bangor to be exact). He felt compelled to buy them because I love blueberries and they were, in fact, from Michigan. He also got some cherries. I doubt those came from Michigan, but that's ok, I'll just pretend.

I tried to be objective and compare the Michigan blueberries to the pint we had a while ago from an undisclosed location. I sampled a few blueberries plain and also had some on my cereal in the morning. I've come to the firm conclusion that the blueberries from Michigan were far superior to those from wherever the others were from. The container had fewer of the squishy berries you have to throw away, less of the teensy weensy still-a-bit-bitter berries, and just tasted better. I've taken to have a little cereal with my blueberries and milk.

The cherries, wherever they were actually from, are going to be from Michigan in my head. Given that Traverse City claims to be the Cherry Capital of the World, it seems appropriate. It also probably has something to do with the fact that growing up a family from our church had a small cherry farm and would bring some for coffee hour after the service. They were as fresh as you can get and absolutely awesome. I ate the whole package Roland brought home in two days. I'm thinking of asking him to stop for more.

It did make me miss our annual fall trip though. We used to go up north for a long weekend every fall. In October, when the weather was cooler and the leaves were colorful we would drive up the coast of Lake Michigan and stay in Traverse City and Mackinaw City. Would try to plan it for the last weekend when all the shops on the Mackinac Island were open so there wouldn't be so many crowds. We would walk around the shops both there and in Mackinaw City. We would find new and interesting places to eat and pick up a ton of fresh produce from farm stands along the way. We would especially pick up a bunch of pumpkins for carving. Anne always had a sweet Halloween party not only giving me an excuse to sew up a costume but also to carve stupid amounts of really cool jack-o'-lanterns. It was something I looked forward to every year and I miss it now.