Dead ball foul. No men on the field.

I'm with 11 other women in Gaylord, Michigan on our 23rd Annual Girls Weekend trip. The men in our lives surely think they know what goes on at Girls Weekend. Mud facials and mani/pedis. Hours in quaint little shops enraptured with scented candles and useless dust collecting shit (my brother in-law's term). Drinking Cosmos and watching RomComs while sharing way too much about the intimate attributes of our lives at home. You know, the type of weekend women love and men fear.

Well, I may be breaking the code of sisterhood here, but I'm too proud of my lovely and diverse group of friends not to share a little glimpse behind the veil with you. Here it is. We don't really do all that. No salon-style makeovers. No Meg Ryan film festivals. No reports on whose men pop little blue pills. No shopping. Ummm, okay, that last one was a lie. Just checking to see if you're still with me.

What did this exceptional band of sisters do? By day we went beer hunting, seeking the rarest of trophy brews, stopping to buy dust-collesting shit only when these shops impeded our progress to the next brewpub. Admittedly, there were many impediments! We took our hunt so seriously that we walked out on a bartender after learning his only tap was Bud Light. Seriously, dude? And we watched more sports all weekend than most of the men we know. MLB ALDS. NFL. NCAA.

The cottage was full of Wolverines, Spartans, Chippewas, Hurons (not Eagles!), and Badgers. Those of us not playing euchre encircled the TV, flipping between the Michigan and MSU games, analyzing the effect of Alabama's and Oregon's and Texas A&M's losses on the playoff picture. We took sides and argued passionately over who's to blame for the Wolverine's current woes. Even within our small group the loyalties were complex:  Dave Brandon apologists, Hoke-Is-A-Really-Nice-Guy fans, Rich Rod-Got-Screwed supporters, long term memory-impaired Lloyd Carr lovers, and the I-Don't-Care-as-Long-as-Michigan-Sucks faction. The only thing missing was a a cloud of cigar smoke. We haven't had a good stogie on Girls Weekend in over a decade.

Just another Saturday night on Girls Weekend: beer, junk food, Michigan
and MSU football on the telly, and a year-round Christmas tree.

So there it is. Not as frightfully fru-fru as men may imagine. Basically we're everything the male voices of sports talk radio preach that we're not. The kind of women who love a good sturdy beer and a day of endless sports, not the women who give their men cold shoulders and endless whining if a game is on TV. Just try to keep up with my gang in a brewpub, with a deck of cards, or on game day. You'll hear us roar!

**Coming up this week, I'll delve into the ongoing tragedy in Ann Arbor. After playing slightly better in the heartbreaking loss at Rutgers, I didn't have the will to ruin my weekend with friends venting about Michigan. There will be plenty of opportunity for that all season long, won't there?