The Return

Little Bo Peep has lost her _________?

A) sheep
B) marbles
C) girlish figure.

It’s probably no surprise to you that the answer is D, All of the above. Lemme ’splain.

Kathy & I had spent a great night in a rainy city, having a delicious Italian meal (I had an amazing rabbit ragout on these thin, wide, perfectly-cooked noodles I could eat for the rest of my life), and then going to see the restored version of Renoir’s Rules of the Game (which is SO much more engaging than I remember it being when I saw it in college…but I dozed off through many a masterpiece there, yes I did). All of this is to explain why we were walking to Penn Station at a little bit before midnight.

And there, about half a block ahead of us, I saw a figure emerge from I know not where. A figure with linebacker shoulders and treetrunk legs, in a pink frilly dress that juuuust about covered the ass… with poofy white bloomers underneath. Add a shepherd’s crook and you’ve got Little Bo Peep. Well, make that Big Bo Beep.

As luck would have it, Peep entered the station, too. Once inside, we checked the schedule. Our train wouldn’t be boarding for about a half hour, so we decided to kill some time. “I don’t know about you, but I want a better look at that transvestite,” were, I believe, my exact words.

So we walked through the station, and sure enough, Peep appeared, wandering seemingly aimlessly. Kathy & I passed her, and were going to circle around a stairwell, intending to catch a glimpse from the other direction. Kathy said to me quietly that her closer look from behind – something about the wrists – suggested that Peep might actually be a girl. This prospect was even scarier, to be honest. If Peep was indeed female, she must have been a throwback to the females of prehistory, downing trees and eating triceratopses with one gulp. But then we turned the corner, and underneath the mane of pigtailed blonde hair we saw…

…oh, that’s DEFINITELY a guy. Old and leathery, he looked like Charlie Watts on Let’s Make a Deal. And as we walked away, I looked at Kathy and said:

“Looks like I’m blogging again.”

Rob