We don't do the outdoors very well at all. Beaches bore us. The thought of camping gives us the jitters (see: bears, the Donner Party and the "Blair Witch Project"). We once encountered a ranger's flier warning about "problem" mountain lions on a hike some years ago in Sabino Canyon in Arizona; then and there we decided that nature should perhaps best be treated as some sort of vast flyover country. So we approached our recent vacation in northern Michigan as kind of a test, the same way you might retry a food that you've always hated (like lima beans) just to see if your tastes have changed with the passing of some years. That's when you realize that your scorn for lima beans never really went far enough. We admit that we take away some fond memories from the Michigan adventure (a family get-together with lots of terrific in-laws, and a tasty cherry pie from the Cherry Hut), but they were all easily overshadowed by a humiliating canoe fiasco down the swampy Platte River, with a stopover in a hellish place called Loon Lake (Google it). Our wife's relatives tried to interest us in kayaking, jet skis, fishing and a more challenging canoe ride down another river involving white water and black flies. Bless their hearts, but as a city boy we don't try to get them to meet us in New York to joyride the subway, do we? The whole ordeal in the country—the Smackdown Near Motown—was almost redeemed when we spotted this hot-water heater Jesus on the property belonging to a local plumbing company. If the Gagosian or any other gallery is interested, this fine example of outsider art can be found alongside Route 31 near Beulah.