36 Comments
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Heather Cadenhead's avatar

This is quite a story, Katie! 😆 Loved reading it.

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Matthew Smith's avatar

I do the same thing with my waterbottle! Not the grandiose effect of a car, but it does feel just as special. Btw you are really cool Katie, embrace it🤪

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Katie Marquette's avatar

Ha, thanks Matthew! You're pretty cool too ;) You need to find a sticker for your water bottle that represents your barefoot mountain climb.

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Wendi Nunnery's avatar

This is the best thing on the internet today.

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Katie Marquette's avatar

Ha, thanks Wendi! :) <3

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Ruth Gaskovski's avatar

Oh what fun! I have heard of many methods of creating an IRL meeting via an online network, but the first time that bumper stickers were used as an instigator! :) I'll save your post to add to my "further reading" section in my upcoming IRL community piece (in December).

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Katie Marquette's avatar

Oh thank you Ruth!!

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Katy's avatar

I love this! My first car was a ‘73 BW Bug in the mid 90s and it was also the last car I let myself put bumper stickers on until now. As I got older I told myself they were tacky and silly, even though I admired them on other people’s cars. But in the last year, I decided to just admit that I loved them and they are fun! I started with one that says “Keep honking! I’m sitting in my car crying to the Cranberries 1993 hit single ‘Linger’!” and it all went uphill from there 😂😂

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Katie Marquette's avatar

Love it Katy!! Long live Bugs. I am totally going to have one again someday, I'm determined. (Also will always blast the Cranberries)

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Penelope's avatar

Where did you get that fabulous sticker? 😻

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Penelope's avatar

"Do you have to? do you have to?" ;-D :-D I intend to learn to play and sing that song in time for St. Patrick's Day next year.

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Hannah's avatar

This is one of the craziest stories I have ever heard

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Katie Marquette's avatar

I only realized how truly crazy it was in actually writing it down here xD

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Elizabeth Charlebois's avatar

I LOVED reading this story and seeing the bumper stickers on your bug, but in the last few months I have seen some threatening and derogatory bumper stickers on cars and trucks that have made me feel worried about and for my fellow citizens and myself! I'd rather NOT know who the person in front of me at a stop light would like to shoot, see dead, tied up, or beaten....

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Katie Marquette's avatar

Oof, totally fair! I guess I just want to hope for the best in people.

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Penelope's avatar

Amen, I prefer happy, fun, and funny stickers, but not the awful ones that might as well have been ripped from the YouTube comments section or the ugliest corners of Twitter/X and Reddit.

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Mary Tappe's avatar

okay two things. one, this was an amazing story, thank you for the encouragement to be yourself! sometimes i feel like i left the me who was okay with showing who i was to the world in 9th grade and ive been trying to find her little by little as an adult but its a challenge!

second, per the bumper stickers haha, are you from southern maryland?

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Katie Marquette's avatar

I'm from MD, but closer to PA -- I did go to college in Southern MD though :) Let that 9th grade self fly!

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Mary Tappe's avatar

i saw your Seahawks sticker, as a kid our swim team used the SMCM pool every night

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Emily Phillips's avatar

Yes! We have loads of bumper stickers on our passenger van!

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Penelope's avatar

I wish the Easter Bunny would bring me kittens 😺😻

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Katie Marquette's avatar

It was one my better gifts. I asked him to come out to help me with groceries, and handed him two kittens instead :)

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Penelope's avatar

I only have 1 bumper/rear windshield sticker (Our Lady of China), but I have a lot of stickers on my electric guitar case to show off my eclectic musical tastes (Taylor Swift, The Police, The Crüxshadows), music retailers I have patronized (Sweetwater, Harry's Guitar Shop, D'addario Strings), and the name of the guitar (Iris). :-D

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Katie Marquette's avatar

That's awesome Penelope! And I love your diverse musical taste :)

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Penelope's avatar

I recently ordered a new guitar, a new guitar case, and some new stickers to get started decorating it 😺😻

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Penelope's avatar

Now I just wish that more bands made more stickers. Some bands have lots of stickers (official and unofficial), but some bands just don’t (for example, I wanted to show off my love for my favorite all-girl rock band The Go-Go’s, but I couldn’t find any Go-Go’s stickers ) Attention all bands, please make cool stickers. I’ll buy them and so will lots of other fans.

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Penelope's avatar

Aw, thanks

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Emily Hess's avatar

I don't put stickers on my mini van...but my sewing machine and water bottle are both absolutely plastered with them. Some of my favorites are from a micro brewery that had sticker labels on their beer cans instead of print...I peeled them off and cut off the part with the art I liked.

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Katie Marquette's avatar

That's such a genius idea from that brewery! My sister actually designed beer labels for a while - it's totally an art!

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Adrienne Morris's avatar

This was so fun! But I have a cautionary tale: My husband loves the Chicago Cubs and before they won the World Series, he got a special license plate that said SOON with the Cubs emblem--then he put it on my hideous white minivan. People stopped me all the time to talk about the Cubs and left disappointed. But the worst was that one day I was in a hurry for a teacher's conference at my kids' school and I tried visualizing a close parking spot ( I was New Age back then) . Well, I got so excited when I found one that I plowed into the teacher's car parked next to me. EVERYONE in town knew about it because of that damned SOON plate. :)

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Katie Marquette's avatar

HA! Yes, it is hard to be anonymous :)

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Rebecca Stoker's avatar

I love this

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Katie Marquette's avatar

Thanks Rebecca!

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Keturah Hickman's avatar

This is lovely! I used to travel with a yellow bicycle on top my car -- I have crazy stories from that -- once I was driving in the middle of a busy, bustling city and a bunch of arms started waving out of nearby van. They recognized me from a picture I'd shared on my blog of my car! But a crazier story is how once my mom advertised some protein bars on a FB group, and when some guy was looking at them, thinking about purchasing some, he stumbled upon my FB and liked how my profile looked . . . So messaged me and asked me out lol! It didn't go anywhere, but is still a fun story. One never knows how they will meet friends, old and new!

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Katie Marquette's avatar

That's amazing! The world can be delightfully small :)

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Jessica Risma's avatar

“Possibly listening to Taylor Swift” 😂& 🙋🏼‍♀️

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