Still Discovering Ann Arbor

Last night we were invited to a goodbye party for our friends Meghan and Melissa. Meghan received her PhD last year here at U-M. She recently got a job at U. of New Hampshire. Sunday they will pack up their belongings along with their sheepdog Blue, and head east to start their new lives. We met them through other friends of ours at the Y. I'm going to miss their cheerful faces at the Y, especially in the middle of winter when I desperately need cheer in my life.

So while I'm happy for them, it seems like it's another chapter of life in Ann Arbor finished. And they always end the same way - they leave. Being in a college town just works that way. People come, people graduate, people leave. Don't get me wrong, we have a lot of friends that will remain here for a long time. But many of our friends have been on the train that just slowly moves through.

Alright, enough of that, and on to the subject of my post. The party for Meghan and Melissa was held last night at the Argo picnic shelter. This is on Argo pond, which is a pond that eventually leads to the Huron River (past the dam). We had never been on this side of the pond. We always see the other side when we are speeding down Main St. on our way to M14. Anyway, we were reluctant to even go to the party because the temperature outside was in the high 90's and humid. Not our idea of fun to be sitting side by side with other people at crowded picnic tables. With a hot grill nearby.

But we went anyway. And there, not more than a 10 minute drive from our house, was a picnic shelter right on the pond. There were 2 labs in the water paddling their way to tennis balls thrown in by their owners. There's a canoe livery right there that you can rent canoes and kayaks by the hour or the day. And there's a great trail that so many runners were using even in the extreme heat yesterday. And the heat and the crowded picnic tables? Nope. There was a nice breeze and the shelter blocked the hot sun. The picnic tables were full of people, but not packed with people. The grill that helped cook the brats, hot dogs and burgers was a good 30 feet away, so you didn't feel the heat at all. And besides the food on the grill, there were lots of great salads and yummy desserts. Stein was happy because they had a keg of Oberon (his favorite summertime beer).

I kept saying to my friend Sybil, "We've never been here. It's so nice here." And she went on to tell me that she sometimes runs there and it's a really great trail to use and so pretty. I thought back to my last post when I was talking about tastes that I've had of the cities I've visited. Yet there are so many tastes still to try in the city I live in. Just when I thought we had tasted most of Ann Arbor, a new one came our way. We will definitely go back to the nature area at Argo Pond. It's a lot nicer on the other side.

Have a great weekend everyone!