FOOL FOR THE CITIES

A new Friday* series featuring things to love about life in the Quads. (Which was supposed to arrive in your inboxes yesterday, but I goofed something up.)

Listen, there are a lot of things about Iowa to be unhappy about right now. (And let’s not get started on the country.)

But I can’t help it; I still love living here—in this very unsexy, yet quintessentially American, Mississippi River town of Davenport, Iowa. (By the way, I’ve noticed that when Hollywood needs to make a joke about the Midwest, or needs a stand-in word for “nowhere-yet-everywhere, USA,” they’ll use Peoria, Ill., … or Davenport. The guy trying to cross the border in that one episode of Weeds - remember him? “Davenport.”)

I hate that as tides have turned over recent years, Iowa to the rest of the country now looks like we’re just a big ol’, bigoted blot of red on the map.

2024 election results from politico

So I’m going to start featuring, and celebrating, some of the things I love about living here.

As I begin to highlight people, places, and/or things I appreciate about life in Iowa (and/or the Quad Cities area, meaning crossing the river into [blue!] Illinois), I promise these posts will not read like the gratitude-journal entries you see on some people’s Facebook feeds. (No judgement. But my posts will not end with “hashtag blessed.”)

Anyway, here goes!

One of my favorite things about life in the QC is ………..

The fact that we were cool enough to ‘earn’ one of these!

(a RAYGUN store)

screenshot from RAYGUN’s website

I don’t know how it happened.

I mean, I know there are lots of cool, quirky, and hip things about Davenport—but how lucky are we that the brilliant people behind this company see it that way, too?

I’d always associated RAYGUN with hipper locales. Before we had one here, on the occasions I might have reason to be in Des Moines, Iowa City, or Cedar Rapids, I’d make it a point to swing through and read the headlines—er, browse the t-shirts. So my sense of local-self-worth has enjoyed an uptick since this purveyor of hilarious, Midwest-based, timely-as-all-heck merchandise opened downtown on Second Street (a.k.a. Motor Row) in late 2022.

As owner Mike Draper told the Des-Moines Register,

…. the company has had its eye on Davenport for a while and decided to open there due to the city's downtown development and the eclectic neighborhood.

“The building is great, the neighborhood is cool, and just down the street is Raccoon Motel,” Draper said.

[ed note: yep!]

Now that there’s one in Davenport, I do have to limit my trips there so I don’t spend all my money. (Although I did buy myself the black one [third item below] from the hidden-message snowflake line on Saturday so I could wear it to the Scott County Dems fundraiser that night. And just as I’d hoped, the creator [who is, full disclosure, a dear friend] showed up in hers, too. I twinned with a Davenport celeb!

Something happen in the news today? It’ll be on a RAYGUN tee tomorrow.

another timely tee example

Can you see the hidden word?

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Do you, too, enjoy reading—or wearing—RAYGUN’s funny (and sometimes serious) taglines?

Which one(s) do you own? Have people commented on them, (good or bad)?

Let me know in the comments!

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exit music: hap tip to FOGHAT

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I’m proud to be a member of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative, a group of independent professional journalists and storytellers who share an interest in our state. See our impressive roster of writers and check out a recent issue here.