Manhattan, Kansas, otherwise known as the Little Apple, was a college town of 40,000+ when the students were in town. Kansas State's color was purple and so was most of the town. I played three sports every year, but was now Junior Varsity instead of Varsity. I still played trumpet and I made my way from last chair to first chair as I began to focus my energies on music. My allegiance to sports waned. I joined a comedy troupe and the student council. I did Theatre and Forensics. I sang in a show choir and I joined a punk rock band called the Fuzzbuckets. I dated a girl named Stephanie for three years and developed many a close friendships. Also, my brother moved away to Nebraska to attend Doane College. The first time I visited him he paid for my lunch. Our friendship also flourished. When I was seventeen I received my first guitar as a Christmas gift. I moved to Boston when I was 18 years old. My father was a preacher and my mother was a Nikken distributor. I didn't really have a favorite baseball player. My favorite album was Southern Culture on the Skid's 'Dirt Track Date.' Stephanie made me a stuffed pillow shaped like her leg which quickly replaced Maxwell as my favorite stuffed… animal?