Molly Goatwax

Once, in a Blue Moon box

Over a bowl of gnocchi with spinach and artichoke pesto, I surveyed all the cans and boxes that had spilled from the pantry. Huh. I thought to myself. If my larder is so overstocked that the shelves collapsed, then I have too much. Into a Blue Moon beer box went cans and cans of hominey, chick peas, salmon, cherries, lentils, soups and hashes. Chomping on a bit of Tipperary, I went to the internet to find a local food drive. Nowhere close, and open today (that part of The Sign was important). None of the phone numbers to which I was referred by several inquiries picked up. Huh. I thought. If it were the cold holidays then I would have no difficulty giving this fine box of food away. People don't get hungry just a few times a year. So after marzipan and tea I loaded the box into the car and drove it down Roland Avenue to an Episcopalian outreach center. The ancients running the thrift store in the basement told me that the Espicopalian church closer to my house would be happy to receive the donation for the family baskets they distribute to the needy. So after I bought two wonderful silk blouses and a pair of perfect silk shorts all for five dollars to help the outreach center, I drove the box of food back up Roland Avenue to the jolly yellow church with the red doors. Although surprised and busy, the rector was gracious enough to recieve it and the parable of the bursting pantry. Then I found a blueberry pie on sale at the Superfresh for three dollars. Only after I was loading it and some nut brown ale into the 'fridge at home did I remember that this evening we'll have the second full moon this month.

On top of it all

The seedy bread got moldy before I could eat it all and I burnt my bagel. But what really has me down in the dumps is that Hubby has once again gone to Las Vegas and sitting in his place on the sofa is a plush toy harlequin bear that resembles Bill Clinton. Poor recompense, that.

Apathy

Just as one thinks they are getting a handle on things, the fates step in to remind us that we are really just spectators at the edge of entropy. Case in point; a week after the kitchen cabinets were finally, after a year, installed...the pantry collapses. I could take this opportunity whilst it is cleared out to paint the inside from black to white-it was a darkroom for the dentist's x-rays-but a force almost as powerful as entropy has set its clutches on me.

Not much of note

This week I have been cleaning and cleaning. Sweeping, scrubbing, scouring, wiping, washing and sorting! My frenzy reached a crescendo of vacuum revenge on clouds of cat hair when Hubby walked in and shouted for it to stop. He asked me what was up with all the cleaning. I told him I was making our home ready to welcome another child. Hubby coughed and staggered a bit, and then he got all squinty-eyed and green about the gills. He demanded an explanation. Simple. The ten year old wants to have a pal in for a sleep-over. His part is to put up some more doors.

Ready to take the offensive

Does anyone out there have a church organ missing its main pipes? Our neighbor has attached to the roof of his rear porch windchimes of gargantuan proportions and, needless to say, they have been disturbing my beauty rest. Oh, you may find the random tinkling of windchimes magical and soothing, but to an already unsettled mind they present an unwelcome intrusion. I can hear them in every room of the house. It's not as bad a non-stop yappy dog, you say. Narf. Let's see how he likes Hawaian polka music spewing from cleverly designed garden speakers at dawn.

A mission

My mom and dad have been reposing under my chest of drawers since we moved into the dentistry. They don't mind, they're both dead. But it kinda gets to be a drag when I confront them at my feet every morning as I select my socks and underpants. I think it's about time to pack their cremains into the trunk of my newer convertible and drive them to Chicago. I will drive them to the bench I caused to have planted and named for them and leave them there. Very discreetly. Then I will stop by Miss Lis's new apartment (if she's in town) and beg a muffin. Yes! I am hatching a plan!

My life as a gleaner

Having failed to find a suitable garden bench of cement or iron in my price range, I found a whole chair by the side of the road and took it home for a bit of old alkyd from under the porch mixed with some chromium oxide. I caught a confused rabbit sniffing to make sure the delicate green color of new growth was artifice under the yews. Then I went driving around looking for some broken car glass in the gutters from smash 'n grabs, but I think the new mayor has been vacuuming up the streets lately. There was none to be found. That project will have to wait. This morning a trip to the thrift store yielded sheer curtain panels at half the tagged price, the lace edges of which got cut off and adhered to my "paintings".  Maybe I'll gell the centers onto a table before a coat of leaf green to put beside the chair... And, oh! I inveigled the painter-across-the-hall at the studio to cut an opening in one of my poplar panels so that I can get the Philadelphia letter slot to accept notes in my art. I am hoping for notes of large denominations. So many new and exciting adventures! A whole world of objects to subvert! What will I find tommorrow?

Mrs. Goatwax advises

The art school is holding their commencement exercises today. I am wearing a school tee shirt but will not be attending, as I promised (for a sizable sum) I'd never darken their doorstep again. My sincere and hearty best wishes to those of you who are able to pick up your degrees from the exchequer and put them into the empty cases you were awarded at the ceremony. Now, gentle alumni, pay attention. You graduated from your institution of higher learning. You did not graduate it, it did not graduate you, unless they put lines up your sides indicating your volume in pints or liters or arranged your body parts in a row, smaller to larger. You can simply say that you graduated, or you can say that you survived. Good for you. You may now proceed to the champagne fountain. Next! Sculpture is a noun! Sculpt is the verb!

Happy Mothers

Well, I waited and waited. Finally, I got up out of bed and made my own coffee. This happens every year. The slug-a-beds will be fetching my beer and savories round this evening, then. Maybe I can get the short one to wash the car.

Ever green

This morning I wandered the manicured grounds of the old Garrett mansion, a bit of a walk from the house. I marveled at the marble urns, the Tiffany canopy over the north entrance and the clever hidden stairs off the port cochere. I ambled through the terraced lawns and observed the grottos and streams. The place seemed oddly deserted, the only souls in evidence were a couple of ancient retainers disappearing into ground floor doors. I could have gone in for a tour, to see the rooms and collections, but for some reason decided to put it off for another day. It's a good thing. On the walk back into my more immediate neighborhood, I greeted the old hippie gardener I see at various houses about the place and he said to me; "Not to be forward or anything, Ma'am, but your fly is down."