Here's an oldie: This is a letter that I sent to the rest of the guys following our Michigan trip in "Aught Four."

Note: This may be potentially offensive. Read on at your own risk.

I'm sure that there were giggles and guffaws as we packed up camp and I volunteered to take the cans back for deposits. My thought was that I would set the money aside and get something "camping related" that we could use for next years trip. That won't be the case.

Why the giggles and guffaws, some might ask? Well, I'm glad that I decided to only wait a few days before attempting to return the cans. You see, the way the process works in Michigan is that we take the cans to the grocery store, where there is a machine specifically designed to count cans and print a "voucher" for the deposit to be returned. You feed the cans in, one by one, and when you're done, it prints a receipt with amount and count.

But why the giggles and guffaws?! The process isn't difficult, and once I got rolling, things were moving along nicely. I got a count of about 150 beers from the camping trip, give or take a twelve-pack, I'd say. That's not bad. Roughly thirty beers apiece. With a man down for about a day, the average goes up for the rest of us.

What was the giggling and guffawing, though?! Well, it goes back to the man down thing. You see, in REDACTED's valiant effort to not spoil mother nature's green carpet, he graciously found a trash bag to puke in. Unfortunately, the "trash" bag turned out to be a "can" bag. To make matters even more fun, SOMEONE thought it would be a good idea to tie up the bag nice and tight, put another bag around it, and tie that bag nice and tight. I'm sure that person was the giggler. If there was a partner in the effort, he was guffawing.

This double-bagging had the effect of a perfect terrarium, complete with some colorful growths of fungus and a tremendous odor. When I tore the inner bag open, I think that several primordial species were inadvertantly destroyed. All that was left was the stench of their decay, some pink chunks, white foam, and unrecognizable food particles. Oh yeah, did I mention THE STENCH.

I managed not to retch. Joe Rogan from "Fear Factor" would have been proud that I didn't have to use the patented Chuck Bucket. I even managed to air out the bag and eventually returned every can.

So, I thank Giggler and Guffawer for the lovely parting gift. I can only fondly imagine what that bag would have been like had I waited until a week of ninety-degree weather and some high humidity before opening the brew.

What did I buy with the fruits of my iron-clad stomach? Junk food, of course. And some industrial-strength soap.