We raked the rest of the leaves at the Houghton Lake Group Home yesterday but I suspect that the GG might’ve wanted to do a bit more detail work today. It was not to be. It was not snowing enough to dump significant inches in the yard but the snow was persistent enough that I think he decided to bag it. He worked on fixing a stuck kayak paddle and the microwave button (knock on wood) and a few other pickety little things instead.

Our drive home today? We didn’t take either the I75 SUV Speedway or the somewhat more sedate Lansing Route (aka US127). Instead, we headed over to the Reedsburg Dam and then headed south *west* of the Lansing Route on back roads. We were flying by the seat of our pants navigating via a plethora of new and old technology: the GPS in the Frog Hopper, Google Maps on my iPhone (service in and out), a much disparaged (by Stormy Kromer) State of Michigan roadmap and the latest Michigan Gazetteer.

It was fun but in the end, we were glad to get to I96. It snowed most of the way. A weak sun beamed down on us for a while but she did not stop the snow. The roads were fine. It was light snow, temperatures were above freezing (barely) and the ground is still warm. The only ice was on the Frog Hopper’s hood, leftover from the snow we got at HL this morning.

Here is the GG’s recollection of our trip today: Longpoint Drive (on Houghton Lake), REEDSBURG DAM!!!, Merritt, Butterfield, Moddersville, Leota, Lily Lake, Lake George, Farwell, Beal City, Winn, Vestaburg, Riverdale, Elm Hall, Crystal, Hubbardston, Matherton, Pewamo, Westphalia, Eagle, Lansing, Williamston, Webberville, Stockbridge, Chelsea, Ann Arbor. Butternut is in there somewhere too. It was the cutest little barely-hanging-on-by-its-toenails type settlement in the Great Lake State but I can’t exactly remember where it fits in that whole chain of villages and little cities. I do remember that it was just north of M57 (a fast-moving state highway) and that the reduce speed sign was covered with snow and I wasn’t sure the GG saw it so I reminded nagged him to slow down.

I love that when I was backing the Frog Hopper into the Landfill Driveway, we received a text message from Lizard Breath, who was thinking about us driving in weather and wondering where we were. I also love that, as I was backing the Frog Hopper into the driveway, our loverly young next door neighbor was walking her dog and, when I waved her to go in front of us and told her that I was terrible about driving the Frog Hopper backwards even with the backup cam, she said that she admired my backup skills.

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