I’ve got a minor problem over here in Poverty Sink and you may be able to help me out, if you’re of a mind to.  First off, though I’d like to offer my opinion on the little zephyr that blew through these parts on Saturday February the 24th.  I’ve already heard war stories and tales of trials and tribulations suffered by the attendees of the coffee and oatmeal crowd over at the coffee shop I frequent.

All I’ve got to say is “You should have been in Odessa back in the fifties.  That’s back in time when a grain of sand was the same caliber as a BB.  Them were the days!”

Margaret and I emigrated to the sand trap in 1952 and helped to civilize Ector County to the stature it enjoys today.  We managed to outlast the tribulations and our struggles are due recounting.

Each morning you could look off to the northwest, and if you saw an advancing cloud coming out of New Mexico it was not a rain bearing formation.  As a matter of fact it was not a cloud atall.  It was a sand dune advancing to eclipse any snow slide on any mountain on earth.

The street lights that were still standing were turned on and all hatches were battened, but to no avail.  Those speeding granules could blast the enamel from the teeth if you smiled for over ten seconds.  Not many people smiled in the decade of the fifties.

Should you venture to travel to Andrews, upon your arrival you could count on your chrome bumper losing its luster and your license plate as bald as a cue ball.  Comparing the blow we endured that Saturday is like calling a whirlwind a tornado.  Many dermatologists drew wealthy putting patches on noses that were over abraded.  Skin peels were removed from the menu at all the beauty shops.

Those trips were not often completed unless the traveler took along a jerry can of petrol for transfusion at the halfway point of the twenty-mile jaunt.

Admittedly, you could break even on your return trip.  Speeds have been clocked at sixty MPH heading back to Odessa, and that was with the vehicle in neutral and a foot on the brakes.  The problem with that was trying to decelerate to the legal limit when you got back to Mini Skirt Junction and elected to stop for a cup of coffee and sightseeing.

Now, I suspicion that you might think that I’m just another one of them old timers who tell of walking to school barefooted in the snow, back when the world was young.

It grieves me to see my reports branded as balderdash and poppycock, but my sandblasted soul is impervious to the slings and arrows of those who dare doubt my honesty and integrity.  All I can add is, “You had to be there!”

Now, back to the problem you might be able to help me with.  When I went out in my front yard on the morning of the 25th to pick up the sycamore limbs from my premises I stumbled across an item that I was unable to identify at first.

Once I did, howsomever, I upgraded our little blow a couple of notches to a possible six on the revered one to ten scale.

I’m unable to pick it up, or even move it, but it is a massive anvil that the wind blew in.  If it’s yours, and you can provide an accurate description, you may claim it.

Be sure you bring someone along to help load it.  I do expect a reward.

Let me hear from you.

My phone number is 254-893-5063, my official postal address is: 333 W AYERS AVE – DE LEON TX 76444-2113, and you can e-mail Charles@CharlesChupp.com.