This is a quiz. There’s a lot riding on the answer. I would think that the focus group for this quiz may be more skewed than the general public but that won’t much matter for my research. It is a one-question test.
Question: If you saw a California vanity license plate with this as the plate number: 39KBASS, would you know what the vain person driving this car is referring to with this plate. It doesn’t have any bearing on the answer but the plate would be one of those cool “new school/ old school” black and gold ones.
I’m going to leave giving you the answer to the question until later, just to keep your attention for a while longer…hopefully. The one clue I will give you is that it doesn’t mean 39,000 large or small mouth bass.
Never before in my 7 decades have I ever considered vanity plates for my vehicles. Cars were just for transportation. I never had sports cars, high performance cars, muscle cars, or anything like that. So why would I want to put a vanity plate on a mini van or an older clunker station wagon.
Now as a septuagenarian, I find myself ready to get vain enough to go down the personalized plate path (how’s that for stumbling on some alliteration).
Allow me to back track a bit, a couple of months ago I mentioned in my welcome column that I was looking for a conversion van to replace my 15 year old Prius. This van was going to get me to many more bluegrass community events much more conveniently than my Prius. I had already gone down the RV route and moved on from that. To make a very long (and probably boring) story short. I looked at a couple of vans and after having difficultly climbing into them, I scrapped that plan and went ahead and bought an SUV. Without naming names it is a Japanese model named after a vast region in Australia. Now this car will get me around with room for everything from Linda, our dog, beers and tequila and very importantly my bass. I’m geared to go anywhere now. It is adaptable easily, for sleeping in the back with the seats down. Did I mention that Subaru (oops) has accessories that add tent space to the rear covering the windows. Also they have tents that fit on the roof but if your confused, let me assure you, I’m not going there.
Now back to the story, call it gentrification if you like but I have decided I want to add to my new ride with the vanity plates. This took a great deal of mindfulness attained from the same kind of meditative state I often use which consists of using an earthy now legal medicine chased with tequila. This methodology has enabled me to facilitate Amazon’s further financial growth, as I tend to buy things when practicing this technique.
I told you that to tell you this. I do plan on driving to more bluegrass and music events. Some camping and others just driving to jam or listen. I hope to see you on the road this next year.
I darn near forgot to give you the answer. The astute among you and the bass aficionados probably have figured it out but here it is for the rest of you. My dirty blonde Kay bass is a 1939 vintage, thus 39KBASS. Look for it on highways near you.
Catch you on the 2nd day of the New Year. By then the days will be getting longer and I might not be rambling as much.
