Project 3867: It's All in the Details

Keeping it clean

Annnnnnd... we are back to cars.

You can't ignore the two bays and ample parking space on the property. But what service is missing in CP? 

Dave has lamented the need to have his truck detailed: someone to go in and clean it from top to bottom. Vacuum the interior, wipe the dash, and polish the chrome. 

Take care of the details. 

And people are funny about their cars. I'm in several Bronco owners groups and some lose their minds if someone breathes on their trucks wrong, let alone washes it wrong. 

One bay will be dedicated to being a soft touch, done-by-hand car wash. Softest shammies, squeaky clean windows and mirrors, polish up the black walls on the tires, get the chrome sparkling. 

The second bay would be dedicated to car detailing, getting every speck of dirt picked up, every goldfish cracker removed, and back to you with a new car smell. 

Inside, the shop will be dedicated to extras so the customer can maintain appearances: phone accessories, cleaning supplies, even mini trash cans and air fresheners. A peg board for local mechanics to shill their businesses.

I'd even resurface the parking lot with sparkling blacktop and bright lights that make the cars gleam. I really want to resurface that blacktop. 

Edited to add: I wrote this series early in 2025 as I was brainstorming ideas and concepts for the property at 3867 West River. Sometime in October, the site has a new tenant, and it appears to be back to being a garage. Best of luck to the new tenants!

Why Art Matters: The Random Pursuit of Knowledge

Wagner's Ring Cycle, as depicted by Bugs Bunny

So I'm in the throes of doing competitor analysis, and Hillsdale College is practically insufferable in the haughtiness of their noble pursuit of academic and intellectual pursuits. 

This opinion is pretty rich coming from someone who graduated from a party school with a marketing degree. BUT I was a double major, with a minor!

What I'm wondering - and this is a mashup of a Why Art Matters and Typing Out Loud - is if it is more respectable to obtain your knowledge from studying the classics, such as Socrates and Descartes? Or is it equally okay for a more modest collection of knowledge bites to occur, such as the series Uncle John's Bathroom Reader?  To paraphrase Elaine Benes scolding Jerry on Seinfeld, "Your knowledge of fine art is limited to Bugs Bunny cartoons." 

I suppose it is more direct and earnest to go straight to the source, but there is a joy to organic curiosity, or as I have described it, "falling down the rabbit hole." 

This year, I have been keeping a journal, cataloging something new learned every day. It has not been easy, and I am currently behind. It all started when I drove by the Big Rapids airport on January 1, and Will randomly asked me what the airport code was. I did not know. 

When I worked at Walgreens in the late 80s, we had to wear a button with the slogan "If I don't know, I will find out!" which reflected the corporation's enthusiastic approach to customer service. I liked it because instead of a chastised approach to ignorance, it framed the pursuit of finding out as a mission. 

How Glass Onion led to deck chair restoration. Before...

After!

Because of this wonder, I paused to watch birds swooping and flocking, only to find out that it was a murmuration of starlings. The song Glass Onion clued me into what a dovetail joint is, which led to  Facebook binging videos of furniture restoration, which also led to obtaining free furniture from the Marketplace to be restored. I cannot wait to start working on upcycling my free wicker furniture! 

Many years ago, a casual reference to the Stonewall riots on the show Mad Men led me down the rabbit hole of the many facets of the civil rights movement from the 60s that weren't covered in high school US history class. It wasn't just about the Vietnam War - this was about women's rights, migrant workers' rights, the rights of African Americans, and, for Bob Benson, who showed up hurt in Joan's apartment, the rights of the LGBTQ members of society. 

I'd be interested to know what professionals in the field of education and academics think. Is this considered surface bites of pop culture, no more nutritious than a McNugget, or are you eager to see the spark and cultivate it to something richer and more substantial? 

I type this as Duo Lingo's bird of knowledge is applauding day 2 of my learning some awkward Spanish. 

The Cereal Project: Cameron Frye Figurine

Cam as a Funko

Lego version of Cam, Sloane, and Ferris

And a Minecraft skin

I'm kind of bummed these already exist, but this demonstrates how iconic Ferris and Cameron are as characters. Take Cameron's brown hair, make it gray, take Sloan's doll, put a Detroit Tigers cap on it, and there's your dad and daughter team. 

Typing Out Loud: Enjoy Your Stuff

But I still love presents...?

The time is nigh for making the annual wish list for stuff under the tree and in the sock. I still love presents but there are people out there struggling to make ends meet. And I'm the team leader for not only the Replenish food bank Giving Tuesday initiative, but I'm also in charge of the Christmas storefront for the department's swag. 

I'm already tired of shopping. 

I was late in doing my Marie Kondo cottage cleanup. The rules up there are simple: if it's something we haven't used in a year, out it goes - no clutter at the little house on the river! Since we've barely been up the last two months, we were able to look around the house with fresh eyes, and this weekend, we got clutter off the counters by hanging, tossing, or putting it away. We were up two weeks ago to clean up leaves and winterize by putting the outdoor furniture away. And by away, I mean putting that set at the curb with a free sign, and it was gone within a half hour. 

That made clean-up easy. 

Another phenomenon that happened was cleaning the cupboards to make a food donation to Replenish. Because they do reject donations of expired foods, I paid close attention to the dates on my packages and cans. 

Oops. 

One of the funniest moments in the show Married With Children is Peg feeding Marcy some very stale popcorn while watching their shows. Marcy openly questions the freshness of their snack, and Peg holds it up and declares, "Marcy, it says 'BEST' by 1979." 

Welp, I made a package of "best by 2017" brownies, and that freshness date is there for a reason; those brownies are thick as a brick, and went down just as hard. 

So I will be doing another vigorous cleaning of our cupboards, and using up the near-expired or just past-expired foodstuffs in a variety of dishes in the coming weeks, and reminding myself not to hoard my stockpile in the future. 

So, where does that get me for Christmas? 

Not wanting much, to be honest. I'm horrified by how much we haven't used, enjoyed, or consumed of the things in our house. Going back to Peg Bundy, there was a Christmas episode where she sent the kids up to the bedroom to get a clean shirt from the closet to re-wrap for Al. 

Dave could honestly do that in my closet, and I would be delightfully surprised. 

Today's attitude would give way quickly to a mad desire for the Black Friday Tieks, as I have been known to go to bed with my credit card in hand for the midnight release. But Friday morning will inevitably give way to shuffling through the ads and talking myself out of buying one more trinket. 

This is still so cute

Maybe it's time for another house purge. Instead of wanting another teapot, I'm enjoying one I have had for more than 20 years. It still pours. 

Lipstick on the Mic: The Bangles

 

In the 80s, they were Everything

The Bangles formed in 1981 in Los Angeles and are known for their jangly, Beatlesque guitar sound, which is often referred to as the Paisley Underground style. The classic lineup consists of sisters Debbie and Vicki Peterson, Susanna Hoffs, and Micki Steele. 

The band really is a who's who in rock - Micki was a Runaway before she was a Bangle; Vicki is in the Continental Drifters with sister-in-law Susan Cowsill; Debbie has recorded and toured with indie artist Matthew Sweet; Sweet has collaborated often with Susanna Hoffs, who has also worked with Norah Jones, Neko Case, and Brian May. There are further entanglements with the Go-Gos, Bette Midler, Chrissie Hynde, Cyndi Lauper, and Girlschool, making theirs a true musical sisterhood. 

They were the cool girls of '80s rock with outstanding songs like Be With You, In Your Room, Following, Hazy Shade of Winter, Going Down to Liverpool, and the number one song of 1987, Walk Like an Egyptian. 

Marriage, motherhood, and diverging interests led to the breakup of the band after the release of the stellar Everything album. They reunited for the Austin Powers soundtrack, contributing the catchy Get the Girl.  On the strength of that single, they recorded one more album, Doll Revolution, in the 00s before Micki retired to rescue animals and do session work. They have since brought back their original bassist, Annette Zilinskas, for additional albums and tours. 

November 2025: The Fifth Monkee, George Furth

This guy had an odd range in his repertoire

You gotta hand it to theatre kids - they will do anything to create a character. 

George Furth (who I believe had his name misspelled in the credits for one episode as Firth) appeared in two episodes of the show, first as a jealous suitor competing with Peter for Valerie's affections and the second as a creepy occultist attempting to bring Ruth Buzzi's husband back from the dead. 

But a guest appearance on a rock and roll sitcom is merely a drop in the bucket for this guy. 

After graduating in the early 1950s with a bachelor's degree in theatre from Northwestern, he made his way to Broadway and the Actors Studio, debuting on stage in 1961, a play titled A Cook for Mr. General. He then worked collaboratively with Stephen Sondheim on musicals such as Company and wrote several plays, including Twigs, The Supporting Cast, and Precious Sons, as well as a book for The Act. He was a librettist, which is the person who writes the plot, responsible for drawing the story along between songs. 

Shall I go on? 

On the small screen, he appeared in shows such as Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman;  I Dream of Jeannie; That Girl; Green Acres; Batman; The Odd Couple; Happy Days; All in the Family; Murphy Brown; L.A. Law; Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman; Murder, She Wrote; and Little House on the Prairie. 

Little HOUSE?

On the big screen, he was in The Boston Strangler, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Myra Breckinridge, Blazing Saddles, Shampoo, Oh, God!, The Cannonball Run, The Man with Two Brains, and Bulworth. 

His last IMDb acting credit was in 1998; however, his last writing credit was in 2004, penning lyrics for the musical The End, which was reworked under the title Last Call. Furth passed in 2008 after a long, strange, and interesting career. 

As a Generation Disappears

Aunt Doris

Ciocia Tina

It's been a sorrowful year as I lost my Aunt Doris, my mother's sister, in May, and Ciocia Tina, my dad's sister, yesterday. 

With Doris' passing, this means my mother is the only one left in her immediate family; Tina's passing means that my father's immediate family is now gone. Generationally, all that is left are widows/widowers: Uncle Jerry, who was Tina's husband; Uncle Stan, who was married to Aunt Doris; and Aunt Donna, who was married to Uncle Bob, who died back in 2011. Nonnie and Uncle Bill both died within a few years of each other.

There was a horrible situation where technology failed me, as the message I got from my mother's phone translated as "Hi, your mom just died. Talk to me..." after I had missed calls from my sisters and Dave; for about 10 horrible minutes yesterday, I thought my mother had passed. 

So I know how I will react when I get that news. Typing this a day later, my stomach still hurts. 

These losses make me feel like both a child and an adult. There's a shift in the universe, where I feel like my generation is stepping onto the on-deck circle, ready but not ready to take on the ultimate leadership role. I'm also getting nostalgic, thinking back to those moments when I was a kid, just one of the cousins hanging out in the kitchen for a sandwich and a glass of Kool-Aid, waiting to go outside or down to the basement to play. 

My memories with Aunt Doris are sparse, as she married my Uncle Stan and moved to Texas in the mid-70s. Memories are of her living in the big blue house up the street from where we lived. I thought the house was the ultimate in luxury, as it had a sewing room, a hallway leading to different rooms, a second bathroom, and a laundry chute. But I thought the house in East Jackson was more fun, with a big hill to roll down and lots of neighborhood kids to play with. My cherished memory was of the blue denim jumper she made for me when I was in kindergarten, where she went crazy with all the new stitches featured on her machine, with loopy red, yellow zig zags, and green waves. 

When under Tina's care, there was a hands-off approach to minding us, allowing us to experience the freedom to be absolute brats to each other while playing kickball in the field behind the house or making our audition tape in the red playhouse, singing Bruce Springsteen's "Fire" into a black cassette deck and microphone. 

There was always a gift on birthdays or at Christmas, usually money, giving me the freedom to choose something for myself or tuck it away when I would need it later. My ever-responsible father would usually take it to deposit it into our savings accounts for later. I may not have appreciated it then, but now, as I am typing, I realize that nest egg slowly accumulated, and the $10 saved from my 12th birthday was part of the deposit I put on our first house, having drawn that money from my Kelsey Hayes Credit Union account back in 1997. 

Then I remember the Christmas break trip to Lansing, where the aunts gave each of us $10 for the Chuck E Cheese arcade after having taken us shopping and to the movies. While I had a good time, I also remember wishing, after dumping quarter after quarter into Pac-Man and Paperboy, that I had the $10 back. 

Or the time a substitute teacher insisted I had to ride the bus, mistaking me for the other Melissa in our class. I had a deep desire to ride the school bus and was more than happy to obey. My mother, frantic that I was nowhere to be found, called for everyone to help her find me. My aunt said she would be over as soon as she got Brian off the school bus. Welp, she found me, waving goodbye to her and Brian as the bus pulled away. That resulted in her running after the bus, Brian in tow, all while pregnant with my cousin Kevin. 

I imagine my father has already greeted you in heaven, with a "What are you doing here, sis?" 

When my mom visited her on Tuesday, Tina was weak, in pain, and I imagine, ready to join her immediate family again. I do wonder if there is joy in passing. She lost her father so young, barely a teenager, someone she hasn't seen in 65 years. When you die, is there a greater consciousness where you are a part of everything, or does God ease you into that, aware that the first thing you want to do in the afterlife is just see your family again? 

I'll see you again, Aunt Doris and Ciocia Tina.