Oh lord. Is there anything like driving Up North? It is a rite of passage for a Michigander. And you will never get it right -- even though you'll do it many, many times in your life.
It's hard to get it right because there is always traffic when driving from the Detroit area to Up North.

We all know the best day to drive northbound is a Saturday. On Friday, everyone is going up and it's crazy. On Sunday everyone is coming down and it's crazy, and depressing. The smart thing is to head up Saturday morning, stay at your dank cottage on Saturday and Sunday nights and then drive back Monday morning, come into work late and give your boss some feeble excuse. A sick grandparent is preferred. Just make sure you haven't used a dead-grandparent excuse in the past.
My drive Up North had a twist. My friend and I attended the Dukes of September show at DTE Music Theatre on Friday night. We met up in Lapeer, where he lives, so we had the chance to take my favorite route to DTE -- all back, paved roads -- completely avoiding I-75. We take Lapeer Road south, turn west onto Oakwood Road, then head south on Baldwin, which takes you all the way to Clarkston Road. Then you head west just a couple miles and enter the venue going south on Pine Knob Road. That's a swell way to enter, but the problem is that DTE officials won't let you exit the same way. It's a deal the venue made years ago with the few people who live on Pine Knob Road, who don't want a hundred cars coming down their road at 11 pm. 
On this Friday night that didn't matter. We weren't headed back to Lapeer, we were headed Up North  to Interlochen, to see the exact same show on Saturday night.
So when the Dukes of September show ended (with Donald Fagen's wonderful Steely Dan song, "Pretzel Logic") we headed out of DTE, got on I-75 and drove like the wind -- a very tired, red-eyed wind -- till we reached our state campground in Interlochen. The only problem is that upon arriving at 3:30 am we couldn't check into our reserved site. So we slept in our car for about four hours. That's also a rite of passage, if you enjoy wrenched backs and crinked necks. We woke up, still too early to check in, so we drove up through Traverse City and all the way to the top of Old Mission Peninsula. We eschewed the wineries (beer is more than OK, thank-you) parked the car and took a hike through the woods to Grand Traverse Bay. It was beautiful. It's always beautiful to emerge from the woods to find a pristine shoreline, gentle waves and a blue horizon. It gives you a fleeting chance to pretend you're an explorer, and tell yourself that you just might be the first man to view this great body of water. I have an active imagination -- sue me. I took a dip in the bay water in my whitey-tighies (no families around, thank God) and we headed back to Interlochen to set up camp. The quick, chilly dip in the bay allowed me to skip a trip to the squalid camp showers.
Saturday's "Dukes" show was just as good as Friday's, if you really want to know and you probably don't. Warning: The Interlochen venue does not sell alcohol.
I had to return to work Sunday night, so we were forced to bite the bullet the next day and fight the traffic southbound on Sunday afternoon.  We wanted to avoid I-75 so we started angling down to the Detroit area. The trouble spots came when driving on M-115 through Cadillac, where traffic backed up at the main intersection in town. Cadillac Lake is right smack-dab inside the city limits so it does create a drag on local traffic.
I really don't know how people make this Up North drive every weekend of the summer. But once you commit yourself to the cottage life -- and it will soon define you -- you must go Up North every, single weekend. You must.
By the way, the next batch of bad traffic we encountered was all the way back on our beautiful Hall Road, where construction barrels closed two lanes. And guess what -- no crews were working. Hey, it was Sunday. The workers were probably partying Up North.

Driving on Gratiot Avenue can be crazy, no doubt about it. It's the main vein of Macomb County and it can certainly get your heart pumping. There are all sorts of weird things going on. Follow this bit of craziness, regarding drivers who are on eastbound 696 and hope to reach Macomb Mall (and are too lazy to take the Gratiot exit off 696):
As soon as those drivers leave 696 and get onto eastbound 94 they must quickly cross all of the lanes to reach the left-lane exit to Gratiot. Once they get onto Gratiot, they must quickly cross all the lanes to turn left into Macomb Mall.
That nexus may be the most avoidable spot in Macomb County.
And on Monday, at about 4:30 p.m., I saw not one, but two, insane acts on northbound Gratiot. One guy, driving south of Masonic, in a burgundy souped-up classic car, gunned it to about 70 mph in the fast lane, then cut across all the lanes to make a right-hand turn into a restaurant parking lot. A couple cars had to brake to avoid hitting him.
Just a minute later, near Macomb Mall, a male pedestrian was trying to walk across northbound Gratiot -- not in a crosswalk -- with people driving 45 mph right at him. A couple drivers had to come to a complete stop to avoid hitting him.
I wish I could take public transportation.

It’s simply one of the most famous cars of all time -- anywhere on the planet.
The Ford Mustang. And the newest version is as attractive as any that came before it. And that dates back to 1964.
It’s obvious that Ford doesn’t want to offend the Mustang purists. It took the company a long time to do away with something as simple as the pull-out lever for the headlights. And a video screen for audio and climate controls doesn’t quite seem right in a Mustang.
Remember Lee  Iacocca? You probably bought his book. He was one of the early pioneers of the Mustang. And when he was promoted to the top job at Ford in the early 1970s, he decided to make a smaller, more fuel-efficient version of the muscle car.
The starting MSRP price for a base Mustang is $22,200. The gas mileage is estimated at 19 MPG in the city, 31 MPG on the highway.
Here’s what the Kelley Blue Book has to say about the interior of the new Mustang: “The 2012 Ford Mustang’s interior is a great place to spend time. Traditional design elements from the first Mustang include a soft-touch one-piece dash pad, bright chrome accents and brushed aluminum trim. Highlights include a 160-mph speedometer, Ford’s MyColor configurable dash that allows the driver to choose from 125 color combinations, and an 8-inch color touch-screen for the optional navigation system. Thanks to an extensive use of sound deadening material, the 2012 Mustang’s interior is exceedingly quiet even with the roaring V8 engine. We like the Mustang’s front seats very much, finding them both supportive yet snug enough to hold one in place during aggressive driving.”
You can be sure there will be several Mustangs — from different generations — rolling down Woodward Avenue during the upcoming Dream Cruise.
According to Wikipedia, the Mustang was on the Car and Driver Ten Best list in 1983, 1987, 1988, 2005, 2006, and 2011. It won the Motor Trend Car of the Year award in 1974 and 1994.