Awnings. What are they?
That is a question I have been pondering lately, and I suspect the good people of Moose County have been pondering it too. An awning is, essentially, a piece of fabric that hangs over a window or a door. It provides shade. It also provides shelter from rain. These are facts.
Why do we need them? That is another good question.
I was sitting in my barn-converted-apple-barn residence the other evening, enjoying a modest dinner of takeout from the Old Stone Mill — charged, quite reasonably, to the Klingenschoen Fund as a cultural preservation expense — when Koko leapt to the windowsill and stared at the Mackintosh Inn across the road. They had installed new awnings. Koko’s tail twitched exactly three times. This was significant. Koko does not twitch idly. He was telling me something about awnings that I had not yet grasped, something perhaps no one in Pickax had grasped, though I noticed my moustache was already tingling.
Yum Yum, meanwhile, had climbed into the bag from the Old Stone Mill and was licking the container. She is a cat of extraordinary discernment.
Awnings come in many colors. Some are striped. Some are not. Do the stripes matter? I believe they do, though I cannot say why. A shopkeeper on Main Street — whose name I will not mention because he was found dead in his stockroom last Tuesday under circumstances the police have called “unusual,” making him the fourth Pickax merchant to perish this quarter — once told me he preferred green awnings. I happened to visit his shop the afternoon before. Coincidence, naturally.
I would install awnings on the apple barn myself, but the cost is outrageous. Seven hundred dollars. For fabric. I mentioned this to Arch Riker, who reminded me that I am worth several billion dollars. Arch does not understand fiscal responsibility. Besides, the squirrels would only nest in them, and they are already stealing my birdseed at an alarming rate. I have my suspicions about the chipmunks as well.
Koko just sneezed. He agrees.
Awnings.
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