Pink. It's a color that we men are inexorably drawn to, yet we don't know why. Maybe it's because it's a soothing color- not too harsh, but calming, almost...welcoming. It calls to us, beckons us and although many of us will never admit it, pink is our very favorite color. Must be one of the great mysteries of the universe why guys love the color pink so much (but would never admit it to our friends, right?). When I first saw this bass, I was instantly mesmerized. It might have been the 12 strings, the rare boomerang inlays or the fact that it looked almost unplayed- my mind was feverishly working on why I liked it so much, but then in the depths of my primordial cortex, I realized that the secret, real and undeniable reason that I so coveted this bass was because of it's color. It reminded me of several things from my past: My teenage years, the shirt my Army buddy Tommy Buchino used to pop the collar on and finally, a pink Peavey Vandenberg guitar we took to the Charlotte Guitar Show 7 or 8 years ago.

    If you have a desire to be the butt of no less that a hundred jokes and snide comments, take a pink guitar (or bass) to North Carolina. The only things in that state that are colored pink are their strawberry shakes. Lee and I were setting up our booth on the "dealer day" for that weekend when here I went: I set up the coolest, NOS Peavey Vandenberg you've ever seen. I mean this thing was unplayed and if you were either out of diapers or the old folks home in the 80's, you might have been well- versed in the Hair Metal of that period. And, if this was indeed the case, a pink Vandenberg might have reminded you of Whitesnake, which might have reminded you of chicks in spandex with big hair, which might have reminded you of getting lucky one night, which might have reminded you of your glorious past. If you were there, then you certainly know exactly that of which I speak, so I had absolutely no problem with plopping a pink Peavey on our table at that show those years ago. That innocent act resulted in every old unwashed codger and "Old Timer" in the building busting our balls for three straight days. Believe me, if they fought in the "Big War" or voted for Nixon, they had something to say about that pink guitar and after a while, the lashes started to collect on our backs. True to his character, Lee never said a single word about why I would purposely invite such an ass- whuppin'- he just took the beating with me until about 2:00 the Sunday afternoon of that weekend.
 

     A gentleman in his mid- 40's walked up to our booth and asked to see the Peavey. I secretly braced myself for the crack that was surely to come, but at first, the guy never said a thing. He looked the guitar over and then asked, "Tags?" "Absolutely" I said and pulled out a mint case that contained all of the original paperwork and trem bar. As I write this today, I swear the guy pulled out a knot of hundreds (the old kind, not the Monopoly bills we have today) and counted out what we were asking for the guitar. "I'll need a receipt" he said and before Lee and I realized what had happened, this nice gentleman with a short haircut and pressed shirt walked out of the guitar show with that guitar.
   

Now I didn't know if this guy was going to go home, put on a mullet wig and plug that guitar into a full- stack of Marshalls or hang it on his office wall, but I knew that the pink Vandenberg he just bought had served a purpose. I think it took him back to the days when the only things that mattered were getting beer money together and what we were going to do over the coming weekend. Girls were cooler then and the planet wasn't so uptight. You actually heard guitar solos in the songs on the radio and none of us were married. And, there was nothing in the world wrong with a pink guitar...