
Get Out: Hit the Road

Rooted In Community: Farmers Markets in West Michigan

All across the country, millions of people are addicted, but this kind of addiction doesn’t come as a pill or a powder. It comes in the form of a controller in your hand and a huge flat screen TV in your face. I’m talking video games, those interactive pieces of entertainment that have been a haven for social outcasts, nerds, geeks and 12 year olds to all meet and insult each other online.
When it comes to vices, strips clubs might top the list with their dark atmosphere and what-happens-here-stays-here mantra. Here are places in West Michigan where you can indulge your vice.
Let’s face it, most of us just can’t help but indulge in our spoiled side. Why not spend all day at a spa or cook your skin for a few hours to get the perfect tan, because you deserve it.
Shops and lounges where you can sit down and enjoy some cigars or hookah.
Shoe hoarding is a serious condition. One that calls for more shoes.
As a bartender it’s obviously pretty difficult to make any money if you’re surrounded by sober people. We understand, and it really is our job, to make sure that people get responsibly “turnt up,” as the kids say.
It's pretty exciting to wake up on a day when your assignment is to amass as many vices in the day as possible. I mean, it’s not often that one gets to ask their friends and strangers if they know where to score various illicit drugs and dirty love with a legitimate excuse. The only rule I’ve given myself is that pot must come from a drug dealer and not a dispensary.
With the advent of more complex beers, we enter an age of more alcoholic beers. Beers so strong that you’ll be just as likely to wake up cradling your twin mug beer-chugging hat that you thought would be great to drink from as you would the body pillow that’s normally there. These beers weren’t made to destroy you, but have too many and they will.
In 2012, Michigan joined a growing number of states that allow marijuana to be used for medical purposes. Not just for any cramp or cold, however. There’s a pretty succinct list of conditions that are allowed to be treated by the green herb. Many people wonder how they can get a medical marijuana card. We're here to give you the rundown, so you don’t get rundown instead.
When it comes to dessert vices, we all have our unique preferences: peanut butter-topped, sweet and salty, cold and creamy, baked into a pie or cake… You get the picture. It's hard to choose just one indulgent treat with broad appeal.
The Howard Johnson on 28th Street off of US 131 might not be the most glamorous place to spend the night, but at least it has smoking rooms.
If you only commit one of the seven cardinal vices, at least treat yourself. Gluttony is the most forgiving sin, right? If your vice comes in the form of thousands and thousands of calories (and we mean thousands of them), there are plenty of opportunities in West Michigan to loosen your belt a little. Oh, who are we kidding? You're gonna need a new belt.
When it comes to drinking, there's the blackout variety, and then there's the simple pleasure of sipping whiskey out of a rocks glass. These distilleries know that certain liquors should be savored, thereby producing them appropriately.
Casinos are a get-'em-all-in-one destination for vices. You can gamble (obviously), drink, shop, gorge on buffets, get busy in your hotel room and some even allow you to smoke inside.