A Novel Idea

About 6 months ago, four lost kids made a mistake to try to take on Las Vegas.

That silly venture hatched an ambitious life plan to try to take on the American behemoth: for the remainder of life - visit a place where people want to go in the summer, and go see a place where no one wants to go in winter. There were no ground rules for the summer destination. There were rules for the winter location:
- No one could have been there before
- It had to be a second or third tier city
- It had to have a basketball team
- Preferably the weather had to be terrible

The Vegas Four grew back to the more righteous Group of Eight on an epic email chain that stretches into the hundreds of mailings and is still appropriately titled "Re: Vegas". It survives to this day as a virile and pungent reminder of youthful exuberance and wasteful indiscretion. What it also represents is a true spirit of wonder and adventure. Amid the frequent references to boobs and booze, our group of domestic explorers makes me proud. While we seek to indulge and enjoy, we also seek to understand this life.

In about three weeks, we will land in Detroit, Michigan. We will take in a Piston's game, see some music, indulge in libation, escape to Canada, and most importantly try to find out what the hell is going on in Detroit. I mean who wants to go to Detroit?!!? RIGHT?? Aren't we creative? Aren't we trail blazers?

Well.....

Maybe it's not such a refreshing idea...

From some research, it seems that Detroit has begun to attract those with our similar intentions. Urban spelunkers have been visiting abandoned warehouses for years, chronicling the death(or at least serious illness) that Detroit is experiencing and also being silly.



Journalists and photographers have been taking advantage of the scenes created by the degradation of a city. And Time Inc has gone a step further. About the same time we were hatching our plans, Time bought a house and "embedded" journalists in southeast Detroit. They have an extensive blog touching on all things Detroit, recognizing the historic and "American" value of the once great manufacturing center.

So while we may not be the tip of the arrow, at most, we can be part of Detroit's reemergence. And at least, we will leave some of our money and a good bit of our integrity.