I found a butterfly wing...

...on my way to work. It looks a little mangled, but still beautiful. (I think it's a painted lady wing.) Coincidentally, I've been working on a painting in those colors, and it's *almost* finished. Almost...it has room for a butterfly wing, I think.

...This morning as I was leaving home, I could hear some smokey sax music coming out of one of the other apartments. Made my day feel very, very Film Noir for a moment....
...*Smokey sax riff* I was leaving for work on a sweltery August day. I had a backpack full of fairy dolls and a Shecky the Monkey King comic book. I looked at my reflection in the art-deco mirriors...black, and a little red. Black like my boss's disposition if I don't get myself to work on time...I passed the usual crew of shady characters...squirrels and mugger geese, waiting for that split second of inattention to put the drop on unsuspecting travellers. But I was wise to them. I snuck by while they were swarming on an inoffensive old lady who didn't watch her croissant close enough...

MsEff...to be continued...

Maus Noir...*Continued*

...I got to work, got myself a cup of joe. Joe wasn't happy about that, so I dumped it out and made some fine, pure, uncut 100% pure Amsterdam coffee. My hands shook as I got the sugar and cream in--the habit bit hard this morning, and this was my third cup today. Poeple tell me I've got to cut down, the coffee shakes'll kill me someday....but you gotta live life on that sweet, dark, slightly bitter edge. With sugar, baby, with sugar...
I started going through the bills. This joint gets a lot of them--Damn nonprofits. While I shifted the piles around and thought of way to pass each and every particular buck, I checked my e-mail. I always love that warm, fuzzy glow you can only get from deleting 17 "Get free Porn now" messages. I got messages from Larry the New Yawker, from my connections in New Jersey and Across the Big Water, schmoozed with my colleagues in beautiful scenic Milwaukee...and thought of those people having vacation fun in Toronto. But for me, it's all work today..endless work, the endless routine of endlessness that consumes my waking days. I needed a change...

But wait!!! What was that?

Someone slipped a note under the door. "The Redhead will tag you! Beware!!"

It could only mean one thing...

Ilona was on the loose again. And this time, she wasn't taking ollie-ollie-ozen-free for an answer....

Ms Eff. Still more to be Continued...

Still more Maus Noir...

I knew I had to hide, and hide well. Someone knew too much. Someone knew that Ilona was It, and she was out to get me. Well, she'd have to find me first...

I ran to the Tunnel, where I knew of a stash of the finest copy paper in the city lay, waiting to get used for hundreds of copies people would glance at and throw away. I had used the boxes as a makeshift fort for those times when I needed some cover to think of plans, figure out how clues fit together, maybe have an Icee unmolested.

As I dove into the dusty paper hideaway, clutching my Shecky the Monkey King comic book and a hard-won can of Fresca, I thought I heard a faint chuckle. My nerves twanging, I whirled around, comic book at the ready....


Ms Eff...to be continued...isn't that annoying?

Maus Noir, Best hider on her block...

...Best hider, that is, until I heard that giggle behind me. I froze in place, Fresca in one hand and rumpled Monkey-comic in the other.

I knew that laugh...

(No, it wasn't Jabba the Hut. Pay attention! Sheesh!)

Ilona stood before me, head thrown back with her mocking laughter, finger just inches away from Tagging me. She'd found me. I didn't know how, but she found me...

I did the only thing a cornered Maus could do--
"Hey, did you read the new Shecky the Monkey King comic? Shecky loses his loincloth in this one!"
And as Ilona tentatively reaches for the salacious pulp comic, I shake up the Fresca can, point the top and yell,

"Don't move!!! I'm not afraid to use this!!!!

Ms Eff, cliffhanging again..when will it all end?
Will Ilona get Fresca'd? Will Fledermaus be Tagged? Will people get sick of this and start throwing tomatoes?

The exciting conclusion...

..."So!!! You threaten me with Fresca?!?!" Laughs Ilona. "How can you,whe I have your copy of Shecky the Monkey King?" Ilona held it up to her face, laughing with the dark and sinister laugh all broads get when they've got the drop on you.
"Oh no--Sheckyyyyy!!!" I stood still, but my mind was doing the Grand Prix. Is there a way to avoid being tagged and still save my comic book ? I staled for time...
"Yeah, you have my comic book...but did you know they'v got a sendaway order for "Catalina Caper in the back?"
"No! You're lying!!!"
"It's got the Creepy Girl song you covet...so back away slowly and put down Shecky, and we can negotiate..."

We stared back and forth at each other...
Ilona...Me Lilona..me...Ilona..me, faster and faster, like a Star Trek episode...

until Kirby, the resident building engineer, charges in, yelling, "Hey, Michelle, I got Mr Hanky's Christmas special on your computer upstairs!!"
"Whuh?"
And with a victorious *poke* Ilona tags me.


Noooooooooo....

*I fall to the ground....tagged.*

Well, my life has changed dramatically since I've been "It." And Ilona keeps phoning me up and singing "Creepy Girl" at me, making it worse. But one day my time will finally come around again, and I can right those wrongs, and regain my Best Hider on the Block status..and utter those precious words....


Tag. You're it.


Ms Eff. The end.