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Welcome to the online home of Erma Bombeck award-winning humorist Mike Ball. Mike's column is a syndicated weekly feature that pops up in newspspers all over the United States. If your local paper doesn't carry What I've Learned So Far... call or email the editors, give them a link to this site, and tell them to get with it!
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In another life, Mike is the founder of Lost Voices, a nonprofit group founded to bring creative writing and roots music programs to incarcerated and at-risk kids. He was recently named USA Today Kindness Community Hero for this work.
A Fourth of July Primer
Well, here it is – the Fourth of July Weekend!
Sweaty Americans from sea to shining sea will be dumping something like 150 million bags of crushed ice over 1.1 billion cans of beer in coolers, throwing a diet coke or two in for the wife, and heading for any place where they can find a little bit of sunshine and a lot of other sweaty Americans. It's how we like to celebrate our nation’s independence.
Most of us know that our country was founded on the inalienable right to wear tank tops and flip-flops, eat brats, play Frisbee, and develop heat stroke. In the interest of our long-term success as the ultimate lawn-party nation, I thought we might take a few minutes here and go over some of the finer points of the big day.
Another Special Father's Day
This past weekend was the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year. Each year thousands of latter day Druids celebrate the first instant of the summer season. They congregate to share, discuss and revel in their spiritual awakening at sacred places like southern England's Stonehenge or east Ann Arbor's Denny's.
With the Solstice falling on Saturday, there was a pretty aggressive Summer Solstice party here at the lake this year, as measured in BBD (Beers Before Dark) units. I didn't actually make it out to join the celebration, but judging from the happy revelers washing up on our beach wearing Jager Bomb tee shirts and beatific smiles, it was a big success.
No Requiem For The Red Wings
The Detroit Red Wings did not win the Stanley Cup this year. Yikes! Our Wings are the most magnificent sports franchise since Ogg's Cave Clubbers dominated the old Neanderthal Leagues and won twenty-one straight Pleistocene Cups. How could they possibly have lost?
For those of you who do not live in Michigan, or for those of you who do live in Michigan and who are not Detroit Red Wings fanatics (we know who both of you are and where you live...) I should give you a little background.
In ice hockey, the highest achievement possible is winning the Stanley Cup. This is a trophy named after a nineteenth century British Governor of Canada, Lord Stanley of Preston, Earl of Derby and Count of Crosschecking. After watching an impressive hockey contest back in 1893, Lord Stanley apparently figured that the players must be pretty darned proud of their accomplishments, and really thirsty, so he bought them a big silver cup to carve their names on and drink Molson out of.
The best hockey teams in North America have been doing that ever since.
Donna
Yesterday, one of my favorite people left our world behind.
Her name was Donna Lemon. She had a gentle voice, kind eyes, blue hair, and a sometimes unnervingly knowing smile. She also knew enough about finance and economics to fill the kind of books people carry around just so other people will think they are smart enough to actually read those books.
Since the day I moved in next door, Donna's husband Harold and I have enjoyed a special friendship, something along the lines of the wise and infinitely tolerant elder and his younger protégé who doesn't know enough to keep his head out of the paint bucket.
Guess which one I was?
35 Years of Tigers
A couple of weeks ago my family made our first trip to Comerica Park to see a Detroit Tigers game. I have to admit that while we're all long-time Tiger fans, I have not been in a big hurry to go down there - and only partly because I resent having to apply for a home equity loan to pay for a couple of plastic cups full of lukewarm beer.
My biggest issue with Comerica Park is that I really loved the old Tiger Stadium, a place where you could save a few dollars and buy "obstructed view" seats. This meant sitting directly behind a steel I-beam support, so pretty much all you would see of the game was that beam and the hot dog vendor.
Even so, there was always a lot of noise in that old park, the hot dogs
were pretty good, and on your way in and out you got to feast your eyes
on the greenest green you'll find anywhere in the world - Tiger Stadium
grass.
