Dock Out 2009

October is here and soon snow may start falling in northern Michigan. That means it's time again to head up to Hillman to take the dock and boat lift out and put the boats to bed for the winter. My dad and I had a very enjoyable long weekend doing just that.

Fuel for the weekend. Courtesy of my mom who is the best cook I know and always makes sure we're well fed (It's amazing that I'm not 300 pounds). Her chili is one of my favorites and when you combine that with ritz and franks and cold beer, it's enough to make me eat myself sick...which I did.

Rice crispy treats for desert. Made by you know who. So simple, yet so perfect and delicious. I averaged about 10 a day over the weekend.

Bloody Mary's. It takes a lot of shit to make a bad ass cocktail (expletives added for effect).

Slug on fish head. The fish head was found on my boat cover. Most likely the fish was eaten and the head either dropped or excreted by a seagull. I thought it was kind of cool and set it on this old railroad tie to photograph the next day. The next day it was on the ground with this big slug suckin' on it...circle of life...

Deer Scull. This deer died by the lake last winter. Over the summer the birds and bugs and what not cleaned the bones completely. One thing I really noticed was how tiny the cranium was in comparison to the eye sockets and olfactory cavity. It's probably all that pea brain can do to process the input from it's nose and eyes.

Mystery scull. Maybe a fox, maybe a dog, maybe a chupacabra. Whatever it is seemed to have been shot in the head execution style as evidenced by the round hole in the scull. Found by my dad near the tile field.

Cloudy. This was about the best the sky looked all weekend. We were dodging rain drops trying to get the boats put away and sneaking in wakeboard sets...pretty much the story of the summer. For the last set of the summer we went out 50 yards from the lift, got rained on hard, back in to cover up and hide under the cedars, back out 15 minutes later for a few laps. Sure, we could have packed it in but, we had to wait out the rain just to stick it to crummy weather we had this summer.

Dock Stack. It should be noted that this stack is perfectly level in all 3 axes. Trademark of my dad, "the pile master", and enemy of holes everywhere. No, we're not trying to land the space shuttle on this thing. But, it's nice to know that you could.
Well done.

Shiny Nautique. All waxed up and ready for a long winters nap.