Boy, Did She Have a Beef
This letter is for Paul Dean, a delightful writer. Please keep him on your payroll forever!
His article about convertibles and their history [“Just Can’t Top This,” June 25] brought back memories of my aging youth and the late-’50s hardtop Ford Fairlane Skyliner convertible my husband bought for me.
With a family of five to feed, I found it considerably cheaper to buy meat in bulk and have it butchered and frozen in our own freezer. I had just purchased a 4-H steer from a neighbor and had it sent to a local packinghouse, where it hung curing for two months. I picked it up and stored it all over that convertible, but when I got home I could not get the top to come up. It got stuck about halfway to the top, and I could not get the meat out!
It took some hours to find a mechanic to come to the house and fix the car. It doesn’t take imagination to know what transpired.
I lost most of that prime beef, and I did not have good thoughts about that car, regardless of how attractive and sophisticated I might look driving it around. I sold it the next week for a Ford truck.
ANN REINER
San Diego