top ten this week’s

Follow the Food Trucks

Food trucks and a farmers market? Sounds like a perfect combination for a summer night out on the town! Boyne City is hosting its annual Food Truck Rally Thursday, July 20, from 5-9pm at Veterans Park (207 N. Lake Street in Boyne City). Food and beverage vendors come from across northern Michigan, including Short’s Brewing, BC Pizza, Sabores y Colores Tacos, Mitten Licken Donut Co., Snickerdoodlz, Bee Well Mead & Cider, Walloon Lake Winery, and many more. The Third Degree—a Petoskey-based band playing classic rock covers alongside their own original songs—will provide live music for the event. The $10 entry fee gets you one drink ticket and a custom koozie. (A $5 donation is recommended for ages 13-20, and kids 12 and under are free.) Proceeds benefit the Boyne City Farmers Market, which operates Wednesdays and Saturdays throughout the summer at Veterans Park. For more details, visit boynecityfarmersmarket.org.

Symbols of Peace

Forging for Peace Project blacksmiths return to the Glen Arbor Arts Center on Sunday, July 23, from 11am-3pm to help raise funds for nonprofits focused on peacemaking. Following in the footsteps of German blacksmith Alfred Bullerman, Scott Lankton and fellow blacksmiths are making the first Peace Nails in Michigan, marked with a dove, the international symbol of peace. With a donation of $100 or more to a Forging for Peace charity or nonprofit, you will receive a handmade Peace Nail. Learn more at lanktonmetaldesign.com/forging-for-peace.

Hey, read It! Wild Things 4

Acclaimed author and journalist Laura Kay is at it again in her third novel, Wild Things. When we first meet Eleanor “El” Evans, she’s living every romcom protagonist’s nightmare: She’s been stuck in the same dead-end job for years, merely tolerates her petty roommate, and is irrecoverably in love with her friend, Ray—a cool and confident lesbian—who is oblivious to El’s heartache. So, when another friend, Will, inherits a countryside cottage (which they charmingly dub Lavender House) and convinces their group to renovate it, El jumps at the chance for some much-needed change. Keeping her feelings hidden from Ray, though, is a challenge she wasn’t quite expecting, especially when El is sleeping next door! Is a once-in-a-lifetime shot at love worth the risk of losing everything? (No spoilers here, but we promise a happy ending!) Witty, warm, and totally relatable, this read is feel-good fiction at its best.

2 tastemaker Oryana’s Dark Chocolate Raspberry Raw Pie

Everyone knows Oryana Community Coop is the go-to in Traverse City for healthy and delicious food, whether you’re doing your weekly grocery run or popping into the 10th Street Café for lunch. But we hadn’t tried out their catering before, and now we’ve found a whole new reason to love the shop. We needed a vegan cake to impress some guests, so we called up the catering department for their bakery special order menu. In a word, the Dark Chocolate Raspberry Raw Pie was divine. Dusted with coconut shavings and sans any animal-product ingredients, this torte-like dessert was just as rich, creamy, and chocolatey as we hoped it would be. The $40 cake served six hearty helpings with plenty of leftovers. (Oh darn!) Best of all, we didn’t even have to turn on the oven. To get yours, call Oryana Catering at (231) 3462822 Monday through Thursday (72-hour notice required) or visit oryana.coop/oryana-cafe/ catering-menu.

An Artful Harbor

Bay Harbor is the type of community that looks like it was painted with an artist’s brush, what with the harbor’s turquoise waters and the stunning homes that line the shore. It’s no surprise that for more than 20 years, they’ve been bringing artists from across the country to the Bay Harbor Arts Festival, which runs July 22-23 this year. Juried fine artists and green market artisans alike will mix and mingle on the Marina Lawns along the waterfront, offering something to suit every creative sensibility. Festival goers will also enjoy live music from Kanin Elizabeth and Make Believe Spurs, along with fun activities like the Cottage Pottery Travel Studio (which allows kids and adults to create their own piece of art) and Wingin It Fairy Hair—the sparkly hair equivalent to face painting. The festival runs 10am-5pm Saturday and Sunday. Get all the details at bayharbor.com.

Students Lead the Charge on Mental Health

Grand Traverse Regional Community Foundation’s Youth Wellness Initiative (YWI) has found that teens in the fivecounty region continue to struggle with mental health. The YWI is made up of high school students from Antrim, Benzie, Grand Traverse, Kalkaska, and Leelanau counties, and the 14 YWI participants distributed a survey to their peers—collecting data from 530 students at 20 schools in the region. Their key finding is that “high school students in northwest lower Michigan are experiencing significant mental wellness challenges today, including anxiety and depression.” Other findings indicated many students do not have anyone to talk to about their mental health concerns and that they are reluctant to seek help. The YWI has recommended school districts pursue more mental health education opportunities, counselor or therapist support in schools, and finding ways to get students outside, as the majority reported time in nature helped them de-stress. To learn more about the survey and results, visit gtrcf.org/

Stuff We Love: Glamping in Our Own Backyard

It’s our Great Outdoors and Camping issue, and there are some of us out there who love the great outdoors, but the camping…not so much. However, we do think we could get on board with glamping—aka glamorous camping— especially when we don’t have to hike

10 miles to our campsite. Enter: Under the Stars Mobile Glamping. This NoMi business brings the campsite to you with their bell tent rentals. (They also offer luxury picnics and indoor slumber party setups!) May through October, you can book one of their waterproof canvas tents, which comes with bedding and pillows, ambient lighting, area rugs, and custom décor. If you still want to sleep in your own bed, opt for the lounge rental, which swaps nighttime gear for seating and cocktail tables. Pricing starts at $300 depending on the size of the tent, number of people, and whether you want an overnight or lounge setup. Delivery is free within a 40-mile radius of Wolverine. Start planning your adventure at www.underthestarsglamping.us

bottoms up Trattoria Stella’s Kick Your Knees Up

“Honey Flow” is almost here! Harvest of the sticky goodness begins in the next couple weeks and goes through late fall The honey bees had a great spring and early summer season in over 250 pollination locations across Northern Michigan. Hilbert’s Honey Co specializes in raw honeycomb that comes straight from our hives, to our packing facility, then to your table Get your sweet fix at our 5 Mile location in Traverse City, on our website and many local businesses

“Treat yourself” takes on all new meaning when your pre-dinner drink gives back to the community. Enter: the Kick Your Knees Up ($15) cocktail at Trattoria Stella in the Village at Grand Traverse Commons. A longtime staple of their curated beverage menu, this summer sipper starts with Michigan gin—lately, it’s Mammoth’s gorgeously floral version—shaken with house lime cordial and thyme-infused water. To finish, it’s served in a coupe glass and arrives ice cold with a fresh sprig of thyme and a splash of Northwoods Soda’s hand-crafted tonic. As an added bonus, a dollar from each pour is donated to Norte Youth Programs, a local nonprofit that supports healthy kids through cycling. (You can also contribute minus the booze with the Spoke of Genius mocktail!) Enjoy a cocktail with a cause at 830 Cottageview Dr. in Traverse City. stellatc.com

Falling Farther Behind

By Stephen Tuttle

Time for our semi-regular unofficial update on how the climate versus humans fight is progressing. We humans have thus far avoided a knockout blow, but we are way, way behind on points.

Let’s start with our normal advisory: Climate is weather patterns existing over a wide area for an extended period of time. Weather is what’s happening in our backyard right now. Climate impacts weather; weather does not impact climate.

The National Weather Service (NWS) maintains temperature records based on land monitoring, ocean buoys, and atmospheric satellite readings plus less technical data going back to 1850. They’ve recorded all-time high daily temperatures this month in half a dozen states, including Florida and Arizona. (As a former Phoenix resident, I can testify summer heat there was already borderline intolerable.)

According to the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer, which compiles global temperatures, July 6 of this year was the hottest day ever recorded for our planet at 63 degrees Fahrenheit. That doesn’t sound all that hot until you consider that includes nighttime temperatures and the fact that it is currently winter in the southern hemisphere. It broke a two-dayold record which had broken a one-dayold record, so it seems there is a pattern.

(And, yes, for those nitpickers out there, about 125,000 years ago, in between ice ages, scientists believe temperatures were at least one degree Celsius warmer than they are today. They also believe sea levels were a whopping 30 feet higher than they are today. But accurate, contemporaneous record-keeping did not exist back then.)

Both Florida and Arizona are included by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Centers for Environmental Information as states being at risk of being uninhabitable by humans within 50 years if we don’t dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Florida’s problems will be threefold. First, it will get very hot. Second, sea level rise will inundate coastal areas, as is already happening during high tides. Third, and more troubling, that sea level rise is already starting to leach into their groundwater through the porous limestone on which much of south Florida rests. That will keep getting worse until potable water becomes scarce.

Southern Arizona has a more straightforward, two-pronged issue. First, it just keeps getting hotter and hotter. A record 425 people died in extreme heat there last year, and the state is on pace to equal or surpass that this year. The heat puts enormous strain on their already fragile power grid, and air-conditioners running 24/7 actually make things hotter, especially at night. And they will ultimately run out of water. The aquifer on which the greater Phoenix metro area sits has at least 10 percent less water than was previously thought according to hydrologists at Arizona State University. That water is being accessed seven to 10 times faster than it is being recharged. And, as we’ve noted before, they’ve already been forced to reduce their allotment of Colorado River water.

Other climate news isn’t so encouraging, either. According to the World Meteorological Organization, an arm of the United Nations, the world’s glaciers are now melting and receding at an accelerated rate. European glaciers lost at least three feet of thickness in just the last year, and Antarctic sea ice is at the lowest levels on record.

NOAA also reports sea levels rose twice as fast in the last decade than they did in the previous decade, faster even than their computer models predicted. Some coastal areas, especially on the East and Gulf Coasts, will be flooded within the next half century.

Despite our efforts, or at least talking about efforts, greenhouse gasses continue to increase at record levels according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Carbon dioxide levels are nearly 150 percent more than before industrialization, nitrous oxide almost 125 percent, and methane, the worst of all the greenhouse gasses in creating climate upheaval, a whopping 262 percent increase. The industrialized world keeps talking about less while producing more, including here in the U.S.

There are glimmers of progress and hope. Solar and wind technology have advanced sufficiently, and the policy group Energy Innovations says either tech could economically replace all but one of the country’s 210 coal-fired plants. Toyota has announced new advances in lithiumion batteries, and, even better, they are developing a solid state battery that will power a vehicle for more than 700 miles, take less time and energy to recharge, be less destructive in the manufacturing process, and include many recyclable components.

Even more promising in the long term, scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility (NIF) became the first to create fusion ignition that produced more energy than the experiment used, a first, tiny step toward nearly endless, safe, clean power.

We are moving forward…it’s just that climate change keeps moving faster.