Best-selling Book | NICE TRY MIKE!

Discover the exploits in my new book that might change how you think of life forever!

THINK YOU HAVE HEARD IT ALL? NOT QUITE! READ ON.

Have you ever wrestled a bear? Have a pet alligator? Get shot? Beat up or stabbed? Broke 34 bones, just trying to have fun? I DIDN’T THINK SO!

Read about these adventures as Mike ping-ponged through life while trying to balance on the edge. Yes, with good old sex, drugs (some even prescribed), and rock and roll. No cliché there.

Then, stir in motorcycles and fast cars, and live life on the edge, and you come up with a disaster. Maybe even a controlled catastrophe waiting to happen, making time to fall in love twice and be lucky enough to marry them both. No, not at the same time!

STARTING TO GET THE PICTURE OF REAL LIFE IN THE FAST LANE?

Mike will keep you laughing from cover to cover while keeping you amazed at his adventures through life. You will also be entertained by his unique writing style of talking directly to you: good and bad decisions. Even a bad decision is better than no decision. Sometimes, no true adventure started with “Here, hold my salad.” You know the answer to that one.

This book is a real page-turner, and reading the foreword will get you hooked. Warning: this book isn’t for the faint of heart because it’s a story of Life in the fast lane while trying to keep your balance while living on life’s edge. If you weren’t living on the edge, you're taking up too much room. It’s true that you only go around once. If you do it right, that’s enough! Just ask Mike.

Brand new 1972 Super Glide.

About Me

I NOW live in Northeast Wisconsin and, of course, am a Green Bay Packers fan. Since my wife died in 2014, I have been rebuilding my life ever since. Trust me, after the death of your wife, you need to rebuild your life because everything you know is gone.

Where the hell does the time go? It seems the older you get, the faster time goes. Don't you think so? Enjoy keeping busy with my local Masonic organizations at the North East Wisconsin Beja Shrine Center. I am incredibly proud to belong to a unit of our Shrine called Vets and Patriots. I'm not a vet, but I am the patriot part. Lots of the guys are vets. They are the best bunch of guys I have ever been associated with. They bend over backward to help me all they can. The best fun is all the parades we do during the summer and occasionally a couple of Christmas parades. We do 12-14 parades yearly during the summer, which takes up your summer weekends.

The first parade I was asked to join, I thought I would be a big shot and be in a parade. I couldn't have been more wrong. In the first block, you realize why you are there. THE KIDS! They love seeing us. Part of our unit rides mini bikes. You have never seen a smile on anyone’s face like an older fat guy riding a mini bike! They have the biggest smile you ever saw, entertaining the kids and adults with their maneuvers. Pure fun. That’s why we do it. For the kids! It is just a pleasure to be a part of it all.

Fezzy Bear

In the golf cart with “Fezzie Bear”, Jim is driving. Believe it or not, my friend Darren is inside, and he always surprises the crowd when the bear waves at them. Shriner’s Children’s Hospitals are an entire healthcare system with about 21 hospital or clinic locations in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. That number is growing by the day. Our Shrine explicitly supports two of these 2 locations, Chicago and Minneapolis. That makes me happy and makes the parades even more fun for me for us to be in. It is truly an honor to belong to this origination and be a Mason.

Since the first Shriners Hospital opened in 1922, the healthcare system has improved the lives of more than 1.5 million children by providing world-class pediatric specialty care. Today, Shriner’s Children’s Hospital is a unique healthcare system with a reputation for finding answers and giving families hope.

At our locations in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, children receive quality care for orthopedic conditions, burns, spinal cord injuries, and cleft lip and palate, regardless of the families’ ability to pay for services.

For the past twenty-plus years, we have had an inflatable Shriner for parades we nicknamed “Sammy.” But he finally wore out after all the years. John suffered through those hot summer days inside that inflatable for many years. A few others did it, but heat stroke was always possible. To top it off, the entire vinyl Shriner was black. No heat buildup there!

We have an eight-foot inflatable bear called Fezzie Bear for the parades. The kids love him. Slowly moving along in the parade, we are close enough to the crowds to constantly hear feedback from the people and the kids. They get so excited to see "Mr. Bear." They are genuinely shocked when they see him move. He can move because there is a person inside the bear! It's a hot job, but the guys love the job.

The best part of the unit is that we always stop for breakfast when we head to a parade. We have a radius of about 100 miles where we parade in the towns. Everyone piles on the bus and enjoys the camaraderie of the guys. One thing is true: you had better have thick skin with us, or you won't survive all the jokes from each other on the bus! We all watch each other's back. The best tradition is after the parade, and we are packed up on the bus heading home. We always stop for ice cream. The bus will pull into a gas station or a quick stop place, and we will take turns buying for everyone on the bus. Sometimes, it's ice cream bars or sandwiches, but it always hits the spot after a hot summertime afternoon in the parade. The felt fez gets hot on your head. To combat the heat of the guys, put a fan on top of his to stay cooler on those hot days.

My biggest fear is that with my failing legs, I might be unable to get up on the bus next year. That will kill me. I told the guys that if I had to, I would ride in the golf cart trailer pulled by the bus if needed. It might be hard to keep the fez on my head. Somebody suggested just pulling me in my wheelchair. That would be ok, but I wouldn’t fare well with those sudden stops. Besides, I don’t think wheelchairs are designed to be pulled at 70 mph, which is something about high-speed instability.