Goodbye, WAPELLO

During the summer of 1995, before my junior year of high school, I got my first car, and therefore, my first license plate: 426 CWI.

Since that time, I traded in my Blue '88 Pontiac Grand Am for a Green '99 Buick Century (shortly before our wedding in 2001), and subsequently traded that in for our present Brown '06 Buick Rendezvou (shortly before the boys were born in 2008). In both cases, the license plate was taken off the old vehicle and put straight onto the new one.

So, even though I haven't lived in Wapello county since August of 1997, I've had "WAPELLO" on my license plate as long as I've had a car. I even remember when I moved off campus in the 2000-01 school year, and I became an "official" Polk county resident, I called the Wapello county courthouse. "Just send the car registration form & payment to us, and we'll automatically forward the registration to Polk county next year." So, even though the registration paperwork and the sticker came from Polk county each year, the license plate itself remained the same.

 It seems like about 3-4 times every year, I would have someone ask me, "are you from Wapello county?" or, "are you from Ottumwa?" I didn't mind; in fact, it was kind of fun. I think this is how I found out that a couple in my church (Ray & Jeanne Taylor) used to live in Ottumwa; also, when we bought Ben & Joe's mattresses just back in March, the manager of Mattress Discounter in Des Moines told me that his folks used to own a furniture store in Ottumwa, because he saw the license plate.

However, it all came to an end.

My birthday is in March, so my car registrations are always due by the end of April. After paying this year, and without warning, two new license plates unceremoniously showed up in the mail box. This is the "newer" kind with the more reflective surface and without the raised numbers & letters. Oddly, it is now in the letters-then-numbers format instead of the numbers-then-letters format.

So, as of the 3rd week in April, 2013, I am no longer "from" Wapello county. Truly, the end of an era.

Old faded plate on top, new dark plate on bottom. (No, I don't want the whole world knowing my license plate.)

Wedding Day Laundry

5-25-'01 ... our Wedding Day! [Insert Standard Mushy Comment Here]

Our wedding was in the evening, so I had no need to wake up particularly early that day. I had already moved into the Faith Apartment that Debbi & I would eventually be living in at 226 College Ave. in Ankeny.

I woke up that morning around 7:00 but was still kind of tired from hanging out with "the guys" the night before. I decided to start a load of laundry, and went down to the laundry room/utility closet and threw a load in the washer, and went back to my room and went back to sleep (there was only 1 washer and 1 dryer for the whole 8-unit apartment).

I was startled out of sleep about an hour-and-a-half later by a knock on the door, followed a few moments later by a more urgent sounding knock. When I answered the door, I recognized the girl at the door as another tenant in the building, but I didn't know her (she was about 2-3 years older than me, and not affiliated with FBBC in any way, just a "non college" couple renting).

She said, "Can you come downstairs and move your laundry over to the dryer? I need to get my wash started because I have a really busy day today."

I stood there for a couple moments thinking of all the things I could say to "zing" her . . . something like, "Oh, I'm so sorry... don't worry about me, my wedding isn't for a few hours . . ." Those of you who know me, however, know that when I first wake up I'm not really awake for about another half hour. So I just went downstairs (undoubtedly in a zombie-like manner) and switched the laundry without saying anything at all, and was just-enough awake to not be able to go back to bed. In hindsight, I wish I had said something, because this story isn't as interesting as I thought it would be when I began typing it.

"You Know, Guys . . ."

"You know, Guys, __ _ ___ ____ _______ . . . __? _ _____."

There are probably about 10 or so people in this world that can finish that quote verbatim, no assistance whatsoever.
It's probably - nay, certainly - the most famous quote spoken in FBBC's Dorm 230 during my two years there (1997-98 school year; 1998-1999 school year*).


In the early part of the fall semester of 1998, the famous
Major League Baseball home run record chase was in it's full glory. This was the race between first baseman Mark McGwire of the St. Louis Cardinals and right fielder Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs that resulted in both players breaking Roger Maris's long-standing and highly coveted record of 61 home runs (62 home runs needed to break the record). [Side note: McGwire broke Maris's record on September 8 against the Cubs and finished with 70 home runs. Sosa finished with 66. Barry Bonds now holds the record, after hitting 73 home runs during the 2001 season. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Major_League_Baseball_home_run_record_chase

Well, this memory must have been from just before or just after September 8th. On a typical afternoon several of us dorm guys were sitting in room #1. This was the room of Brian Peterson, Mike Meyers, Brent Fincham and Travis Brogden (I think). I know Chris Ellis was also in the room along with myself, possibly Jared Johnston and a few others, along with the guy who is the focus of the story -- we'll just call him "Driftwood."
We were just having a friendly chat about baseball. Someone in the room must have been a Cardinals fan because there were some pictures of Mark McGwire up in the room, and even (I think) a border along a window made up of small pictures of either McGwire or Sosa - one for every home run they (respectively) hit. I say that because it explains why someone may engage in a discussion about McGwire and or Sosa.
So we had a standard back-and-forth banter about all our views on the issues. There was a lull in the conversation, and a moment of 10-20 seconds of silence. That's when Driftwood decided to add this gem:

"You Know, Guys . . . if I was Mark McGwire . . . 62? I dunno."

The silence was deafening.

After what seemed like an eternity, I remember Brent Fincham being the first to speak up: "You didn't really finish your thought there, Driftwood . . . pretty much no point in talking at all."

I think I was laughing on the inside so hard that I just got up and left at that point. If you were there, please add to my memory by leaving a comment.

(* For the sake of full disclosure, I should point out that I technically only lived in Dorm 230 for 3 semesters, as I transferred from FBBC to Iowa State for one semester - Fall of 1998 - and then transferred back to FBBC for the Spring 1999 semester. I did visit quite often during that term though, and had lots of friends there. It was during one of these visits that this episode took place.)