The Great State Rivalry part 1

I dislike the frequency with which I write here, to that end I want to write at least 10 minutes, non-stop a day, everyday. It should be easy, you know? Like just 10 minutes, anyone could do that.

Loo keeps me pretty busy. we have a lot of fun and do lots of things. We went to the great bear music festival for a day, which was all folk music and fun, more fun than I thought. I think that is one of the reasons I like Loo so much is she pulls me out of my shell so to speak and gets me to go to things I would never go to on my own.

have I told you about the state rivalry? People here, some people I should say, have this inferiority/superiority complex about the state of Michigan being cooler than California. I can tell how effective that is because it hardly phases me. The way it usually happens is my manager at work will randomly walk up to me and say, "Hey California," which is my nickname because of the many like named people, we have two Ryans, a Brian and a Ben. From across the backroom , amidst the blasting of air tools and hoses those names all sound alike. The Manager likes to give orders to everyone at the same time and it gets confusing, so they call me California.

"Hey California, did you know our asparagus is the best in the nation? Way better than California's asparagus."

And then I said, "I was unaware California even made asparagus. Besides I personally don't like that so I don't really care."

"Oh yeah, our asparagus is amazing. You know what else is amazing?"

"No."

"Our strawberries here are way better than California's strawberries," he said. Now the gauntlet had been thrown down. I have been going to the Oxnard strawberry festival for years, and most of the strawberries that are made for the USA are made right there in Oxnard. I figured I knew a thing or two about what a good strawberry tastes like.

"I don't know about that, our strawberries are very tasty."

"Well, ours are better. Have you ever tried one?"

"No. Have you ever had a California strawberry?"

"Yeah in the store. The taste doesn't compare."

"You can't compare farm-fresh to store-bought."

"Our strawberries are very small, like a raspberry and full of juice. The juiciest thing you've ever tasted. In a couple months it will be the season and you can try some Michigan strawberries and judge for yourself."

"Looking forward to it."

That was a month ago or so. I went to a pick-them-yourself strawberry field out here in Michigan with Loo and her mom. All the while being told how our California strawberries don't compare to Michigan strawberries by every Michiginian who heard about the rivalry. I get to picking, and it reminded me of picking strawberries with mi amigo hispano hablante, or my Spanish speaking friend. I picked strawberries to see what it was like. He picked like ten times as many as I did, but it was tough work.

Michiginian strawberries are quite small, some of them are the size of raspberries, but most are twice that, or five times smaller than your standard California strawberry, which are quite large. We picked about 2 pounds worth of these berries. I don't remember what we paid, but we loaded up the car and headed back.

The conversation shifted between answering 4th grade brain teaser car game questions and inquiries about what would happen when the Michiginian strawberries trump the strawberries of my home in terms of flavor, juiciness and texture.

As we approach home people are getting excited. When we arrive home everyone is focused on getting the strawberries prepped at the expense of everything else, like unloading other groceries, which I did.

When I entered the house everyone was gathered around the sink washing strawberries off. Once that was done they placed the strawberry in their open mouths and bit down. Then they rolled their eyes and made moaning sounds, followed by, "Oh, Brian you have to try this!" And, "Oh these are delicious," and "Just when I think they can't get any better..."

I washed the strawberry off, opened my mind to the possibility of tastier strawberries than home, waited for my objectivity to emerge, closed my eyes, and plunked the berry into my mouth. I bit down.

The berry gushed its juices into my mouth, far more than I expected or was accustomed to, some of the juice leaked between my lips, down my chin, across my throat and into the collar of my shirt. As my teeth passed through the flesh more juice arrived and splashed all over my tongue. I felt the flesh and skin and seeds wedge between my teeth. The juice was unsweetened, and for lack of a better word, blandish. I chewed it up and swallowed it feeling that familiar strawberry aftertaste on the end of my tongue.

"I'm not impressed," I said.

"Well, you probably picked a bad one," Loo's mom said.

"Do me the favor of selecting a good one for me, please," I said.

In a concerted group effort the Michigan team rooted around the two pounds of strawberries to find the best of the bunch, the one strawberry that would prove, irrevocably, the dominance of Michigan strawberries over California's strawberries. Someone picked a berry up for the other to study while they kept rooting for a better one. Once that was done a second berry was held up against the first. Some silent deliberation ensued before they all agreed that this one berry was the quintessential Michigan Strawberry.

They gave it to me as though it was a ruby. I took it and repeated the same procedure as above. I closed my eyes, cleared my mind, sunk my teeth into it and felt that unfamiliar juice gush out into my mouth and splash onto my tongue. This one was a little sweeter, I could taste it. It was a tasty berry, but there wasn't much to it--one bite and it was gone.

"That one was alright," I said.

"This was a bad batch," Loo's mom said and than frowned.

"Yeah," they all agreed. I repressed a smile about how quickly it had changed from "these are AMAZING," to, "this was a bad batch."

Maybe it's true that these berries were a bad batch, but we picked them right out of the ground from a bonafide strawberry patch in Michigan.

The Mi. berry was juicier, and smaller, but not as firm or as sweet as the giant Ca. berries which can sometimes take three or more bites to devour. So I'm going to keep an open mind, but for this round the score is California strawberry: 1 Michigan strawberry: 0

Besides this state rivalry thing has the added bonus of people trying all kinds of tasty strawberry desserts and treats on me. I have had strawberry shortcake, strawberry pie, strawberry medley and etc. Remember that the next time a situation like this presents itself. You could go along with it and say, "Yummy!" or you could build the tension with a "that's alright I guess." and get them to try to convince you otherwise. Tasty desserts could follow.