Moon madness continues

In an effort to keep the forest from swallowing the road, crews have been cutting back the treeline, leaving ragged stumps and naked stalks jutting up like broken bones. Someone took inspiration and propped a deer skull atop one of these, like a mile marker from a Cormac McCarthy novel. Such have been the days.

A young patron was trespassed by the police after a fight outside the library doors. We pointed fiercely, sending teenagers sailing away from the glass and back into their seats as if casting spells from our fingertips. The next day, a drunk and angry father paced the floor in front of the desk, his elbows raised like a wild creature. "Cause he's a COP he can tell us we can't come in here?" "Yes. And also because I said so." "Who are YOU." "I'm in charge." I stared at him as he paced, face relaxed and heart slamming, and the moment he banged out the door, my fingers were on the phone. We watched the patrol cars fill up the parking lot, and I said, "This week is stupid. It's kind of awesome."

Key vs. Chevy

The cupboards ran dry after a month without groceries. I laid out a jar of port jelly, a container of rice filled with weevils, and a bag of stale tortilla chips. Couldn't think of an improvisational dinner, so we packed up the kids and made the trek to town.

Winding back home that night, we blew a tire and pulled over on the dirt shoulder as it started to rain. "Sabotaged by axe murderers!" I exclaimed, nose pressed to my window eagerly. "Nope. Evidence points to ninjas," said the man, indicating a piece of metal jutting from the tire. "Well, they didn't think that through all the way. They're probably a mile back, running to catch up."

Upon extraction, the metal in the tire turned out to be this.

Yes, that is a key. I don't even know how that happens, outside of being shot from a crossbow by Adam Savage. Such an act of extreme improbability can only suggest that we are at the beginning of a cascade of events wherein I will wind up in singed leather pants and hanging over a pit of sharktopuses while reaching for the key, which has fallen onto a ledge just out of reach. What a pain in the ass.

Artwork and squirrel tendencies
I ordered plastilina and aluminum wire so that I can start sculpting again, and began hiding $20 bills for a plane ride to faraway who-knows-where. Maybe I will fly to Oahu to pour bronze this fall. Maybe I will ride off to San Francisco or New York or Toronto and eat pastries in a city cafe. Maybe I will have to buy three new tires after we run over a chopstick, a comb, and a nail file. Hope springs eternal.