Buried Belvedere up for grabs

This is the Online column, written for The Southland Times)

It sounds like the tagline for the next big Hollywood horror movie: she’s been buried for 50 years, now it’s time to dig her up on live TV.

However, there’s no scriptwriter coming up with ideas for this one, it’s all real.

“She” was a brand new gold and white 1957 Plymouth Belvedere Sport Coupe, buried in a time capsule in downtown Tulsa, Oklahoma, to mark Oklahoma’s semi-centennial.

Maps, photos, gas and oil and other items were added to the time capsule and the contents of a woman’s purse, including a bottle of tranquillisers, cigarettes and an unpaid parking ticket, were put in the Belvedere’s glovebox.

Tulsa’s citizens were asked to guess what the population of Tulsa would be in 2007 and those entries were also buried with the car.

June 15 marks the 50th anniversary of the burial and that is when the the car and artefacts will be excavated. The person whose guess is closest to Tulsa’s 2007 population — or their closest identifiable heir — will win the Belvedere.

And now for a different kind of horsepower: If you’ve got a spare 6 minutes prepare to be amazed by the talents of Andreas Helgstrand aboard Blue Hors Matine in the finals of the freestyle dressage section at last year’s World Equestrian Games.

I thought it was a pretty brilliant performance but it seems the judges thought it was good enough for only a silver medal. Anky van Grunsven and her trusty steed Keltec Salinero took out the gold.

Those horses are better co-ordinated on the dancefloor than most people I know.