Awnings. What are they?
That is a question I have been pondering for some time now, and I believe the good people of Moose County deserve an answer. An awning, for those who do not know, is a piece of fabric that extends from a building. It provides shade. It also provides shelter from rain. These are facts.
Koko has been staring at the awning over the back terrace of the apple barn for three days with an intensity that can only be described as philosophical. When a Siamese cat of his intelligence fixes his gaze upon something, one does well to pay attention. My moustache began tingling almost immediately, which, as my readers know, is never without significance. Yum Yum, meanwhile, stole a swatch of awning fabric from my desk and batted it under the refrigerator. I believe she was making a statement about textile quality in Pickax. Who can say?
Are awnings expensive? Yes. I recently had the canopy over the barn’s entrance replaced — billed, quite reasonably, to the Klingenschoen Fund as a historic preservation expense — and the cost was staggering. Nearly four hundred dollars. For fabric. I could have purchased birdseed for six months with that sum, though I suspect the squirrels would have stolen it all within a week. They have been organizing. I have seen them watching the barn.
Pickax has seventeen awnings downtown, which is remarkable for a community of three thousand people that has also produced four arsons and two unsolved murders this calendar year alone. Does anyone else find it curious that the fire at the old Dingleberry building started directly beneath a new awning? I happened to be walking past that evening, purely by coincidence, and my moustache was practically convulsing.
Who maintains these awnings? Who inspects them? Why are some striped and others solid? These are questions no one is asking, and perhaps that is the problem. Koko knocked a book off the shelf this morning — *The Sun Also Rises* — and I believe his message was clear.
I have written about awnings now, which is more than anyone else in this county has bothered to do. You are welcome.
Awnings.
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