All, Those of a certain age (like me) will recall a time when "Wednesday is (pasta by a certain manufacturer) day." Indeed a restaurant near where we live maintains that tradition with what it calls "Warehouse Wednesdays", on which their spaghetti which normally sells for $10.99, costs only $5.99. It is a great place to have dinner before walking to the nearby baseball stadium to watch the most famous team in minor league baseball history take the field. If they can have Wednesday as spaghetti day, I am ready to declare "Friday is MAP Day!" Who's with me here??? But I digress. Today we are proud and pleased to announce that effective May 24, 2015 a total of 253 new venues (maybe more!) will be available in the MAP program. Assuming each and every one of our current 112 partner venues chooses to renew with MAP for next year (and why wouldn't they!?), that means 365 destinations! That's one destination for every day of the year! I sense a new marketing slogan here! Maybe we can pick up one additional destination so as to cover the coming leap year... What do I mean by "maybe more?" Well, I've yet to begin the drive to recruit additional venues for MAP for next year. So perhaps we can expand beyond 365, and the leap year 366, and to who knows where. Along those lines, if you have potential MAP partner venues in your library's service area, please reach out to them to explain the benefits the program can bring. Or provide me with their contact information, and I would be glad to do so. If you've looked at the http://michiganactivitypass.info site recently, and I know you all have, you will see that there are a total of 123 venues included. 112 of these are current partners, and 11 are the state historic sites that will be available on May 24. The "map within MAP" is nicely filling up with green balloons. While we are still a bit sparse in some parts of the state, ie the far western U.P., the I-75 corridor in the northern L.P. as well as the far southwestern corner of same, you will see those areas populated with green balloons, too once we begin the data entry process of the additional 253 venues. We are also looking at a revamp of the user software, so that beginning May 24 library patrons will be given a choice as to what type of venue they would like to search for, ie campground, art museum, performing arts venue, etc. Good stuff! Thank you for your promotion of and participation in, the Michigan Activity Pass program. Sincerely, Jim Flury Jim Flury Technical Services Manager The Library Network 41365 Vincenti Court Novi, MI 48375 248-536-3100 x133 Fax 248-536-3098 jflury@tln.lib.mi.us