Going Ham Over The Wienermobile

When I was in college, my friends and I had a weirdly enthusiastic obsession with the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. It was half out of stupid, ironic college guy humor, and half out of being sincerely excited at just the thought of a bus sized wiener on wheels rolling around. It became the standard of wished for transportation. We even used to test the group's potential girlfriends with questions pertaining to the Wienermobile. 

To say I was excited when I saw the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile last year at the Cooper River Bridge Run is quite the understatement.

When I recieved a generic press release from the drivers of the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile, I lost it. I was in another office talking with coworker Thursday morning when I recieved the email on my phone. I startled everyone in the office with my eloquent exclaimation of "HOLY SHI@, IT'S THE WIENERMOBILE!" There was no time to explain to the frightened, confused faces I left as I ran back to my office to craft my reply. It had to be good. I might only get one shot to take this off my bucket list. I replied with:

I was trying not to sound too overly enthusiastic, like I was some life-long Comicon fanboy that was going to stalk them and kidnap them in the Wienermobile. I just got really excited and wanted to see this thing. In no time I recieved a reply. My heartrate shot through the ceiling.

Deserves a ride!? DESERVES A RIDE!? I was losing it. I can't explain why I was getting so excited at the possibility of riding around in the Wienermobile. I have no family history with it. I'm not related to any of the Kraft family, of Kraft Foods, that owns Oscar Mayer. Maybe it was that I'm still an idiot and haven't yet let go of what I thought was funny when I was in college, and this was my unconscience effort to relive the glory days, or, maybe it was the fact that I was just offered a chance to ride in the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. You wouldn't be excited?

I was going to ride around in the Wienermobile. I started texting everyone I knew. It was a little obnoxious I'm sure but I didn't care. 

Everything was coming together better than I had ever hoped. 

As if there would be anywhere else to drive the Wienermobile in Charleston SC.

I met Sam and Kacee at Colonial Lake and had to stop myself from hugging them like they were long lost family. I hopped on board and after laughing uncontrollably for a few minutes, I began to hear about what they did with this thing. 

Each year, 12 fresh college graduates are chosen from an applicant pool of over 1500. 30 are then flown to Green Bay Wisconsin to be interviewed. The 12 picked out of that 30 then train for a few weeks, becoming a close knit team and then taking off in pairs to six different regions all over the country. These guys travel around the country for an entire year in one of the oldest, most successful marketing schemes in the US. Who doesn't like the Wienermobile? You can't see the Wienermobile and get mad. The second you see it, you smile, elbow whoever you're with and simultaneously take out your phone to take a picture. Even if the Wienermobile T-boned your car and totalled it, you would probably laugh and show all your friends the pictures you took of the wreck. I got to witness first hand how excited people got as we drove around downtown. Kacee and Sam laughed at how hard I was laughing everytime we pulled up to a store front that had large windows and I saw the reflection of our ride. 

If there's a lesson here, I'm not sure what it is. I do know, that I was as excited as I've been in a long time, and getting to ride shotgun in the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile has definitely made the top ten most amazing events in my life. Maybe that means I need to get out more, or maybe, that means that's just how awesome riding a big ole Wienermobile can be.