Anyone need a good anvil?
In the old Looney Tunes cartoons, Road Runner and Coyote would be fighting and, inevitably, an anvil would show up and Road Runner would end up dropping it on the Coyote’s head.
I know how the Coyote feels. There are times I feel an anvil has hit me on the head, too.
Take Saturday night, for example. Greg and I were at an antique (read “junk”) auction, in search of a kitchen table for a college apartment. We didn’t find a table but we did enjoy seeing the parade of items, such as old advertising signs, and how much they fetched. It was amazing, we thought, that items we considered junk were, at least based on the price they fetched, valuable.
After an hour or so, Sutton and I were ready to leave. Greg shifted in his chair, however. “I’m waiting for something,” he said.
It turned out what he was waiting for were anvils. Large, iron and obviously heavy, there were seven anvils up for auction and, for some reason, Greg was interested in them.
“An anvil?” I said. “Why do we need an anvil?”
“Don’t know,” Greg replied. “Just always wanted one.”
I know this begs the question as to what you use an anvil for. And that’s what I asked.
“If you need to forge metal or break up something, you can use an anvil,” Greg said, listening intently as the bidding on the first anvil – apparently the star of the bunch – topped $300.
Thankfully, at least for me, that was more than Greg wanted to spend on an anvil, at least with me sitting next to him.
“I think you need to think about this purchase,” I said. “We don’t forge a lot of metal around the house, you know.”
I guess my questioning provided enough distraction so he wasn’t willing to bid on the remaining six iron behemoths.
I had escaped the falling anvil, at least for now.
We left shortly after the anvils were sold though I could tell Greg wasn’t pleased. His anvil dreams were smashed, so to speak.
The next morning, I spotted Greg intensely searching for something on the computer. Turned out, he was looking for an anvil.
“Do you know a new anvil can cost more than $1,000,” Greg asked.
“Whew,” I replied. “I’m glad we don’t have any use for one.”
Score one for the Coyote this time.
