Everyone knows Michael Aratani, right? aka Music Guy Mic aka MGM ? For those of you who don’t already know Music Guy Mic is a well known Ebay Ukulele seller. He goes to the festivals and is very loved in the uke community.

I became concerned a while ago when his posts started to getting a little crazy. Then I heard he was shutting down his store because of health problems.? We were just hangin’ out at the NAMM. He took me and Noa, my brother, out for dinner, talked about buying every single model from every builder. He was totally fine. And now he can’t even type?

As I step into Mike’s house (parent’s house) it reminds me of the old days when Mike ran his store out of here. There is a young boy setting up ukes on his “house work bench”, aka washing machine padded with towels. His poor mother, lol. Mike is still Mike, but just more sick. He isn’t as cuckoo as his typing makes him seem. He is just his regular crazy self, which is good to see. He says to me, ” You were the one that helped me get started.” That makes me feel good because Mike has really helped a lot of people. And he had come far from when we first met. He first came to our Kaneohe store with yellow eyes and horrible breathing. He had just gotten out of the hospital and nearly died. A problem with his liver. He had overcome that though for years now. His health stabilized and his ukulele business went through the roof. He also managed to help me build a third level storage and remodel the bottom level of our old store in Kaneohe. I would give him cost on things he needed , and in the past few years he’s returned the favors many times.