Fall

Fall is probably my favorite season.  Kelly and I love just about everything about fall.  We love that you can shut off the air conditioning and open up the house to let in the crisp mornings.  College football kicks into high gear with conference play.  The Big Ten conference may not impress many people this year but the rivalries that fall brings never disappoints!

Cider mills open for business after 9 months of down time.  I have learned that everyone has their favorite cider mill.  Most of these are the ones that we spent time at as a kid (personally, nothing will beat a cup of cider and a hot donut from the Franklin Cider Mill).  There is something about apple cider and a donut that brings us back to being a kid!

Fall also brings Halloween displays out of the attic. Anybody who has been by our house has seen our ever-growing Halloween display (this year we added a “monster in a box” and a motion-activated scarecrow).  Kelly grew up in Jacksonville, Florida on a dead end street where Halloween was not a big deal, so very few kids ever came to her house for candy.  This is completely different from our current neighborhood where kids run between houses to maximize their candy collecting potential.  I am sure some of them keep mental notes from previous years as to what houses give out good candy so they can map out an ideal route to hit all of the great homes.

Probably the best part of fall in Michigan is the amazing change of colors that we get to witness.  We often take the awesome display of color for granted because we have the pleasure of seeing it every year; however, it only takes one out of town guest who does not get to see this every year to knock us back into appreciating the beauty around us.  As we are coming closer to peak color I urge everyone to spend time outside, enjoy the awesome fall weather that we have been having, and most of all eat lots of delicious cider and donuts!

Stay tuned because Dr. Tyler will be guest blogging soon and will be choosing the topic from those submitted on Facebook!

Thanks for reading!

Dr. Groth

Two Truths and A Lie by Dr. John Dumas

Some of our Trivia Tuesday contestants have been asking me to give a few more details on the 2 Truths and a Lie that we posted last week for the trivia question so here it goes:

#1 – I have 3 US patents. True statement.  I do currently own 3 patents on orthodontic brackets that have been in the works for about 6 years.  I still have one patent pending and hope to have the bracket system to the market sometime soon!

#2 – I have a tattoo. For those who thought I had a tattoo….I’M SHOCKED!!!  No ink for me!

#3 – I survived a category 5 hurricane – also a true statement.  In 1992 while serving as a General Dentist in the United States Air Force, I was stationed in Homestead Florida with my wife when Hurricane Andrew rolled thru town.  The hurricane was originally categorized as a category 4 but later called a category 5…one of the most powerful storms to ever hit North America.

 Dr. Dumas’ office after Hurricane Andrew

Sustained winds hit 175 mph with maximum winds thought to be over 200 mph.  It was so difficult to categorize because all of the monitoring devices were destroyed during the storm.  I was the disaster team Triage Chief at the time of the storm and my wife worked at the local hospital which was the only hospital south of Miami to stay open during the storm.  We rode out the hurricane (about 5 hours including the eye) in the hospital which was completely devastated by the storm.  24 babies were delivered while under emergency power due to the changes in atmospheric pressure, many of them named…..you guessed it….Andrew!

The dental clinic at the base where Dr. Dumas worked after Hurricane Andrew

My role as the triage chief had little value as the Air Force base was almost completely wiped out and the local community had little to no medical capabilities.  Never did we simulate a disaster that came close to the scale of Hurricane Andrew!  South Florida was forever changed by the storm.

A typical suburb site after Hurricane Andrew

I returned 10 years later and much of the area looked just as it did after the storm.  What was once an important Air Force fighter base, now only houses DEA flights guarding the southern coast from illegal drugs and (ironically) hurricane chasers for the National weather center.

And now you know “The rest of the story”.