Friday, March 13, 2015

The tally so far

I've been keeping a mental tally of how Michigan is shaping up. I suppose it's because I'm skeptical that I will be as happy here as I was in Washington. Either way, here is the score as well as the points I'm judging on.
1. Recycling
Point against Michigan. All recycling facilities are privately owned. If you want to be environmentally conscious, Michigan wants you to work for it and drop your recyclables off yourself. Otherwise, everything goes in the same bin. This is awful, especially when you are a habitual recycler like me.
2. Appreciation of sun
Point against Michigan.  It is a gorgeous day today as I write this. We are the only people at the park. If this were Washington I'd be surrounded by kids grateful to finally have a nice day that's warming! But nope, yesterday was equally barren. It's strange. Where are the stay at home parents?
3. Maple syrup festival
Point for Michigan. I gotta say, this warms my moderately evil heart.  This Saturday I get to revel in delicious, boiled sap sweetness that has a festival devoted to it! Eric thinks that this means that I will no longer be a syrup snob but what he fails to realize is that my snobbery is not a regional thing. It is a fake versus real thing. Aunt Jemima is a fraud and shouldn't exist. My Maple syrup didn't need to be from new England, it just needs to be from an actual maple tree.
4. Board prices
Point to Michigan. It is far cheaper to board a horse here than in Washington, I will grudgingly give them that.
5. Pi Day
Point against Michigan. Only the teenage bagger boy at the grocery store knew it was Pi day. (This might be unfair, no one in Florida or WA state ever knew it was Pi Day either.
6. Meat
Point against Michigan. The Kroger that I rely on currently for groceries (a relative of Fred Meyer, a store I quite enjoyed in WA) has a sorely lacking meat department. I waited for 15 minutes to get service in seafood (with 3 pages in the meantime and I ended up having to go find someone myself) They also don't even have cases of meat, just packaged already waiting to go. This also means that there are no stuffed burger patties made on site, just frozen ones. FWP maybe, but I enjoyed having that luxury.
7. Middle of the week activities for young kids
Point against Michigan. None of the parks or museums have toddler activities during the week. Everything is on the weekend!!  NOOOOOOOO.  Additionally, there is very obviously a lack of stay at home parents in the area. I did find a moms group for stay at home parents but there's yearly dues and they're super organized, which kind of scares me away because the moms that gravitate toward REALLY well organized (like, having an executive board and committees kind of organized) are usually not the type of people I get along well with or feel comfortable around.
8. Maple Syrup
Point to Michigan. I'll be able to make my own!! I'm excited. The amount that I'll be able to collect and boil down will probably just about equal what I use through the year, so that's pretty awesome.

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