What Killed Detroit?

Charlie LeDuff is the best writer in Detroit and on Detroit and maybe the best newspaper writer in the country. If you haven't read his big Mother Jones piece ("What Killed Aiyana Stanley-Jones?") from a couple months ago, check it when you can :

No one cared much about Detroit or its industrial suburbs until the Dow collapsed, the chief executives of the Big Three went to Washington to grovel, and General Motors declared bankruptcy—100 years after its founding. Suddenly, Detroit was historic, symbolic—hip, even. I began to get calls from reporters around the world wondering what Detroit was like, what was happening here. They were wondering if the Rust Belt cancer had metastasized and was creeping to Los Angeles and London and Barcelona. Was Detroit an outlier or an epicenter?

Moving on up

There's been some great content being generated in the comment section by our thousands of readers that needs to be showcased here under the bright lights of Michigone's main stage.

First off, this amazing tale of Yzerman and urine and ladygarments:

I've heard Yzerman pee before. Yup, true story.

He was a client of mine when I worked at a high end lingerie store on Michigan Ave. He would call me 5-6 times a year and I would send him lots of hot lingerie for his wife Lisa. One time I called him and he answered while in the bathroom. He just told me to hold on while he finished and flushed. I think I heard him put the seat down too. What a gentlemen.

He was always very nice and sent me a Christmas card every year with a nice tip in it. "Thanks for all of your help this year. Merry Christmas, Steve Yzerman" I didnt keep any of the cards(much to Zach's dismay) because honestly this was pre ZJ and I didnt know a thing about hockey then. I was just happy he boosted my commission. But I'm learning and I can now throw down with any Hawks fan that comes my way. Baby steps.

My ex-girlfriend famously thought his name was "Eisenbaum." Zach's girlfriend is best friends with him. Unfair is life. I guess I'll have to overcompensate with my Paul Newman-like good looks and Paul Newman-like salad dressing empire.

Speaking of condiments, trivialstuff takes on a weighty matter:

Carry out place gripe: Is there a reason that all of these places that now use squeeze bottles to put mayo on your sandwich, wrap, pita, etc have to completely drench the sammy with mayo. They carefully measure out all your other ingredients, but the minute you ask for mayo the flood gates open up.

I mean I can't quite bring myself to order sans condiments, but I also don't need 6 servings of mayo. I always order "lite mayo" now, but even that causes confusion. Because someplaces actually have "lite mayo". So do I want that, or just not very much mayo. Dan was once asked by a friend on their way visit us in East Lansing "Do you live near Abbott Rd, or Abbott the dorm". Dan's response was "It's funny you should ask that question because the answer is Yes". Dan wasn't in the clearest state of mind. But I digress. The answer to the lite mayo quesion is also "yes". I want you to add a little bit of flavor to my turkey sandwich without increasing the Calorie content by 78 percent.

The thing is, I don't know why they feel the need to rock all that mayo anyway. Or am I just abnormal, and everyone else considers it standard to go back and forth over a sandwich with a squeeze tube of mayo 5 or 6 times.

I think we need to change the condiment conversation. Let's automatically go with less mayo unless someone asks for extra. You can always add more. It's gonna be a lot harder when I finally get agitated and ask you to remake my sub or scrape off those last two tracks of mayonnaise.

TS, I've got a solution for this problem: when the sandwich artist is finished with the first line of mayo, tell them to stop with the mayo: "That's good." That's all you have to say: "That's good." What are you doing while they spend 30 seconds flooding your sam with unwanted mayo? trading stocks, closing deals, splitting conjoined twins?

On Yzerman and "Hoarders"

I was in Boston and this guy was from Toronto and what does a guy ask another guy: so, uhh, you must be a Leafs fan, eh? "Nah, Wings fan." Oh really, me too, how come? "Steve Yzerman."

Guy was obsessed with Yzerman, lived breathed died Yzerman. Subjected himself to the ire of his family in Toronto and friends in Toronto and neighbors in Toronto to cheer for Yzerman. Spent a solid hour describing his favorite games and moments and memories of Yzerman. Flew back home to Toronto to be at the Hall of Fame when they were inducting Yzerman.

I was in Boston and this guy was from Baltimore and what does homeboy ask me: "so, uhh, you watch the NHL?" Yeah, Wings fan. "Oh really, I'm a Blues guy." Oh, sorry, I guess we can't talk anymore, I hate the Blues. "I understand, but I do love Yzerman." And now I'm the best man in his wedding next week. (Not true, but I didn't know how to end this paragraph.)

I know it sounds ridiculous, and it probably is ridiculous, but I honestly feel like I am a better person today because of the time I spent watching Yzerman and wanting to be like Yzerman. So many games, so many hours, so many years watching a guy do his job so well. Without Yzerman in my life I'd probably be selling horse while snorting horse and betting on the NHL (Not true, but that'd make for an interesting blog.) With Yzerman in my life? I'm finished my Ph.D. and developing fuel cell technology that will likely save Detroit and the environment and all that is holy. (Not true, but at least I'm writing a blog, put this on the fridge ma dukes.)

(All four of those paragraphs were just prelude to a complaint about reality television (really)(sorry.))

Here goes: my only problem with reality television is some of the people who watch reality television and my only problem with some of the people who watch reality television is when they say: "I just watch this because it makes me feel better about my life."

I swear that every conversation about "Jersey Shore" or "Hoarders" (or that new show "Jersey Shore: Hoarders"--isn't it a crazy fire hazard that that juiced-up obsessive compulsive has ten thousand cans of hair spray in his crib?!) ends with someone saying, "I only watch because it makes me feel better about my life" and me saying, "Dear Yzerman, please teleport me away from this place and into your tender embrace."

How exactly does that psychological process work, how does watching dysfunction make you feel better about your life? I gawk at car crashes all the time but I still don't have a car.

Not that I'm judging, I can't say shit, I'm the guy who just told you that my great moral leader is a hockey player. But I can say honestly that I've never had any kind of curiosity about Stevie's life off the ice (I assume he's married and whatnot?)(I have heard he loves to play golf, but I cannot think of a single other thing that I know about his life)(I hope he still keeps a house in Michigan, if only to microscopically artificially inflate real estate prices)(who wouldn't want to say Yzerman owns the crib next door?)

And Yzerman is the kind of guy you actually could watch to feel better about yourself. Watching Yzerman play hockey made me feel better about myself because he showed me what excellence is, what consistence is, what humility is. Watching Yzerman reminded me 82 times per year (+7 +7 +7, etc.) that I have the potential to be great. He gave me joy, he gave me hope, he made me aspire.

Watching drunk people or sick people can be interesting but feeling superior isn't feeling better. We are exactly where we were before the show started.

Yes we can.

Detroit Mock City

I don't have time right now to write my thrilling conclusion to yesterday's post about why eating out ruins lives and how we should fix it, but this video from my brother is just as good:

See what had happened was

Paul Clemens wrote a memoir a few years ago called Made in Detroit that I had a very mixed reaction to for reasons that I cannot recall whatsoever. But it's an interesting read and I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to try to understand Detroit and if anyone wants to read it I'll reread it with you. He's also written a new book called Punching Out: One Year in a Closing Auto Plant. Allow me to excerpt the excerpt from the Metro Times:

"I've been called a vulture by more than one company," Clark said. "That's OK: Vultures have to eat. I feel like I provide a service, just like all the people making the calls off of my newsletter are providing a service to the plant. You're closing — what are you going to do, just walk off and leave it?" The business never ceased to amaze him. Earlier in the year, he'd been at a closed plant in Massachusetts. "I'm on the fourth floor," he said, "inventorying some equipment. We're going to tear the end off of the building, move the equipment out, and then tear the building down — within the month." He was hired by the company that had closed the plant to "sell the equipment off their job site," he said. "So, I'm on the fourth floor, inventorying this equipment, and I hear this errerrerr — strange noise. So I walk to the stairwell and go down to the first floor, and, I swear to God, there, on the first floor, is a guy buffing the floor. Of a building that's going to be torn down the next month. The only two people in the building are him and me. And I stopped him and said, 'What are you doing? This building's going to be torn down in a month.' And he said, 'Really? I wondered.'"

It was, Clark said, force of habit. "That's why people sit in the shadow of a plant that has closed down and twiddle their thumbs waiting for it to come back," he said. "'The biggest employer in town is closing' — that's one of the most common statements in that Plant Closing News. 'The biggest employer in town is closing.' Single-employer towns are losing their single employer. Waiting for it to come back. 'Tain't never gonna come back, McGee."

Click here for the book. As soon as I get it I'll write about it.

Against cooking and restaurants and leftovers

I know that cooking has become America’s fifth major sport (unless competitive eating has already taken that place) and that once again I’m alienating myself from the culture by saying this but: I hate cooking and you’re all crazy.

(Not that I’m on some macho bullshit, I’ll meet you halfway, I’ll wash every dish in your crib, I’m a retired professional dish technician (summer of 1998) but I’ll Favre and get back into the game and strap on my dishtowel (I wish I had a better comparison to make than Favre, dropping his name probably doesn’t instill a lot of confidence in my sanitary habits, and somehow makes “strap on the dishtowel” sound filthy.) But rather than subjecting ourselves to all that wouldn’t it be easier to go out and get giant burritos and then, drunk on grease and joy, roll ourselves unevenly home down the sidewalk like human-sized avocados? Is that too much to ask? Wouldn’t that be more fun?)

I realized when I was leaving Boston that in the previous six months I had gone to the grocery store one time (I had purchased ten dollars worth of stuff, ten cans for ten dollars (pinto beans, black beans, Chef Boyarglee.)) For breakfast I’d usually have a bagel or bagel sandwich ($3), for lunch I’d usually have a salad the size of a bathtub ($10), and for dinner I’d usually have something like the small bag of pretzels and small bag of almonds ($3) from the convenience store. If I did that every day, it’d be about $450 a month, which seems like a lot of money but doesn’t make me sick to my stomach with regret. But it also doesn’t take into account my ten dollar a day (minimum) caffeine habit (thank Yzerman that the spot by my old office had free iced coffee refills) or going out to dinner with friends (when arranging a restaurant-based large group event, the instigator should just ask you: hey, do you want to spend $60 to sit next to the least interesting person in our social group for two hours while trying to text outsiders covertly without looking like a jackass? Yeah man, I can’t think of a good excuse right now, so that sounds wonderful, good looks on the invite, sign me up.)

My cousin is a consultant for a lot of restaurant chains and he once told me that America spends something like 700 billion dollars every year eating outside of their homes. That’s a lot of bread (in the Big Sean sense and in the Panera sense.)(Also, that figure could be absolutely wrong, I tried to confirm if my memory was accurate but I’m tired.) And then there's these related numbers from 2006:

In 1901, according to a 1997 Bureau of Labor Statistics study, the average family spent almost half of their budget on food. Just 3% of that went to meals away from home. Today, we only spend an average 13.3% of our budgets on food--but 42% of that money is spent in restaurants.

So we've got this dual process of innovation where we've gotten a lot better at cranking out very cheap food in America but we're also eating stuff made by people who don’t share our DNA a lot more than ever before.

Problems with the latter: eating out is usually more expensive than cooking at home and often a lot more expensive than cooking at home. Eating out can be a lot less healthy than eating at home (I used to work with a lady who would alwaysalwaysalways describe the giant portions at a nearby takeout spot as generous: “ooh, they’re so generous, what a generous amount of chicken, they’re very generous with the roast beef, I love how generous they are.” Generous because we’re paying them. Generous because they’re not cardiologists. Generous because they’re not the one who is going to get blinded when the button on my khakis rockets heavenward after I just spent an Ottomon Empire-sized chunk of my afternoon choking down a Greek salad the size of the Aegean Sea (someone please cut the cord to my keyboard.)

And I know what you’re thinking (and this is where the macho bullshit comes in) and, no, I won't do it. I’m not eating half of the salad and saving the other half. I’m not getting it put in a box and taking it home. Not that I’m opposed to leftovers, I love leftovers, I can eat the same thing over and over for days. And maybe this will change now that I’m back in Michigan and everyone drives everywhere, but before that I couldn’t handle the process of getting the leftovers put in a box and leaving the leftovers on the table and realizing and turning around and going back in to get the leftovers and walking the leftovers eight blocks to the subway and holding the leftovers for 20 minutes on the train and everyone staring at you going, “you couldn’t finish your salad?” Like the takeout place guy, the guy who gives his leftovers to the beggar on the street is not generous. He’s just tired of carrying the box.

And I know what you’re thinking: “You’re right about everything, I’ve never agreed with someone so often, my head hasn’t bobbed this much in a four minute span since the first time I listened to Jay's “Hard Knock Life.”” And I appreciate you thinking that. And for the first time in my life I have an actual solution to what I’m complaining about and a way to make life better. But I need to go out to lunch. More tomorrow.