Thinking about Tom Selleck, a lake monster and Her

The Lake Manitou Monster

I started covering this story when I was a young reporter on MTV (no, not that lame Music Television), I'm talking about the now defunct Manitoulin Television. I'm still sorting out my feelings for my time spent at Manitoulin TV with my therapist. Perhaps I will blog about that in the future. They were good times and bad times and a time when a young Terry lost out on the person who ended up being his one true love. But I was too stupid and too career driven to realize all that I really needed was right in front of me. If I wasn't so stupid. If I wasn't so stubborn. If I had just pulled my pants up five seconds earlier, things may have been different. I may have ended up, well, happy. I haven't thought about her in a long, long time. I miss her... Anyway, this post isn't about her. I digress.

Much like TW: Undercover, MTV covered hard-hitting issues and events of the day on Manitoulin Island. You may think that covering news for an island is kinda lame, but I should remind you that Manitoulin Island is the LARGEST fresh water island in the WORLD. That's right. Not just North America, but the entire world. It was a young reporter's dream and it was there that I won my first Golden Haweater Award while exposing the truth behind who really owned the Magnum Express. Let's just say, he had tight shorts, a bushy moustache and didn't like being woken up early in the morning by a gassy cameraman (sorry Zeke) stowing away in the lower decks. In case you didn't figure it out, the owner of that boat was Tom Selleck.

I just want to say one thing about Tom Selleck. While I admire his body of work (for those of you who think of "Quigley Down Under" as a poor Indiana Jones, I invite you to take a second look), I've got some real problems with him as a man.

I was out on assignment one day, covering the repainting of the bridge that connects Little Current to the mainland when Zeke and I stopped at a french fry truck for lunch. Anyway, I was next in line and I was trying to decide between ketchup flavoured chips or dill pickle flavoured chips when Tom Selleck totally jipped in line and not only took the last bag of ketchup chips, he ALSO had the audacity to buy the last bag of Humpty Dumpty Cheddar Corns. Said he needed them for the long boat ride back to his cabin. Grade A Hollywood jerk. We thought we filmed the whole thing, turns out Zeke ran out of battery. Lucky Tom!

Anyway, that led me to my first encounter with the Lake Manitou Monster. We decided to follow Selleck out to his cabin and maybe throw rocks at his cabin and break a window or two when Zeke and I stopped to pee. As I was finishing up, I looked up and realized something was out there. About 50-70 yards offshore. By then, Zeke had charged his battery enough to catch a glimpse of the monster. But as quickly as he was there, he was gone.

I knew that when I finally got my own series, we'd do a story on that there monster. Although not as famous as Nessy, the Lake Champlain monster or the freakishly giant Cool Creek Crawdads, this thing is bad. Just ask Stacey Felix -- who lost his legs to the creature. Or Rick Drake, whose son had a promising career with his David Bowie tribute band, "The Major Tom Express," until he was swallowed whole in the summer of '92. It's said that on a clear and quiet night you can hear the faint cry of Suffragette City coming from the depths of the lake. That song can really get stuck in your head. I don't mind, but a lot of other people out there sure do I can tell you that. At least he's not singing "Blue Jeans."

So here's the episode I pulled from the vault. Enjoy...