I bought my Toyota Solara this day in 2002. I purposely picked that day because the Maryland Terps were playing Tubby Smith’s Kentucky Wildcats that night and I wanted to always have that association in mind with my car purchase. I correctly assumed that Maryland would defeat Kentucky and purchased the car earlier that day from Koons Toyota in Annapolis. (This marked one of the few times that I’ve ever correctly assumed anything wrt the Terps basketball team winning anything. Maybe the trick then, is to buy a new car to make that happen.)
Maryland defeated the Kentucky Wildcats that night in the NCAA Regionals and would eventually go on to win the National Championship that year. The Toyota logged over 260K miles and never once left me walking. So that all worked out pretty well.
But there are some sad, nothing-lasts-forever footnotes to this little vignette. As I noted the other day, the Terps missed this year’s NCAA March Madness Tournament for the 4th year in a row. Tubby’s Texas Tech team also missed the tourney. And then on Thursday, the Melwood folks hauled my Toyota away after I donated it to them. Good while it lasted but those glory days and cars do have a way of passing you by and being passed along don’t they?
In the picture above it may appear that I am smiling but in actuality I was growling at Cheryl the photographer to hurry up and take the damn picture. It was getting late in the evening and I had a long drive to get back to the Point to be there in time for the start of the game. After taking the picture, Cheryl had it imposed on a calendar which she subsequently sent to me. For several years after 2002, I would save the photo each new year, toss the old calendar and staple the photo onto a new calendar. Talk about photographs and memories! Or more appropriately – talk about being an anal/desperate-for-something-to-be-proud-of-Terp-fan!