Just a typical Friday night in Missoula, wearing a lampshade on my head

Friday really kicked off the weekend in a semi-specactular way. Wait -- let me rewind to Wednesday, when I received an email from my Purple People-Eater friend in the photo. Her crazy (no, really -- she's nutty) neighbor roped her into modeling in support of an art auction benefiting Living Art, a nonprofit that tries to improve the quality of life for those facing illness and loss through creative expression. The auction would be featuring unique, artsy lamps and mirrors. The models would be a kind of walking advertisement for the show, parading around the preview area dressed in fun outfits and evening wear...and wearing lampshades for hats.

When my good friend Barney the Purple Dinosaur sent an email looking for others to join her and her shady ways, I, of course, had to say yes. Not only was I getting to wear a lampshade for a good cause -- and not just a drunk cause -- I would get to wear evening wear, possibly from the collection of Crazy Neighbor. The purple dress on my friend? A highlight of Crazy Neighbor's collection.

Crazy Neighbor (or CN, for short) is an older lady, probably in her 70s, who lives in the apartment above my friend and shares an entryway with her. CN has loads of stuff on their front stoop...a small wooden rocking chair, wreaths, old magazines, tables, shelves, an altar of sorts. Since she leaves her front door open most of the time, I had previously been able to get a peek at the stairs leading up to the apartment. Like the entryway, her stairwell was just cluttered with stuff, random, random stuff.

Wednesday afternoon, I went upstairs with my friend, two other neighbors who were participating in the lampshade escapade, and CN herself so that we all could select outfits for the Friday night event. What I saw at the top of the stairs was not to be believed. It was seriously the most surreal experience of my life. If I tried to describe in detail what I saw, you would not believe me. For once, I'm not overstating my claims: CN's apartment was pretty freaking weird.

We're pretty sure CN has that compulsive hoarding disease. For one, she's seen all over town carrying bags back from Goodwill, weekly, if not daily. For another, holy crap -- her apartment is about to explode at the seams! Everywhere you look, there are old Barbies, shoes, hats, dresses, scarves, candleholders, more dresses, beads, plastic lizards, lampshades -- and, oh my god, is that an entire 6-foot-long rack of clothing in the center of the kitchen? -- glassware, clocks, coats, gloves -- just total sensory overload. No exaggeration: she had an 18-inch wide aisle in her living room in order to navigate amongst the stuff; otherwise, the stuff was piled to the ceiling.

So, that was weird enough. Adding to the bizarre atmosphere of our "shopping" expedition in CN's apartment was the couple we were with, who, to be fair, are a typical Missoula couple. I mean, what woman in Missoula doesn't know her husband's dress size and women's shoe size?

Anyway, my purple friend definitely got the prize among the dresses available to us. I tried on one of CN's dresses -- a tight, short, sequined purple number with a scooped back -- but I just looked like a prostitute, which really wasn't the look I wanted to go for. Luckily, I remembered where I put my fringed dress and satin gloves, last worn on Halloween 2000. For some reason, I packed those in a very accessible place when I moved; I was just dying to have a reason to wear them again, I suppose.

One of purple friend's joined us Friday evening -- in a lovely gold dress that made her look like an Oscar wearing an itty-bitty lampshade hat -- and we stood around the preview area Friday night, making small talk with people who were there to preview the auction. After a bit, we moved out onto the street, where we had a number of pictures taken of us by complete strangers. It was a really nice time -- people were happy to see us and curious about why we were wearing lampshades, which got them into the auction preview area. Of course, one snotty little group did make a snide comment when they were passing us: "I thought they were drag queens!" Drag queens wish they could look as good as us, buddy.

The strangest part of the experience for me was the fact that we were stone-cold sober. Who wears a lampshade sober?

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And to completely change gears...the comments section here has been all wonky for me this week, preventing me from posting a reply to y'all's comments. I don't have anything huge to say, just that I think we should start an Anti Catcher in the Rye Society; I, too, think it is one of the most overrated books out there. I think that one irritates me most when it's named as someone's favorite book (celebrities are often guilty of this; perhaps they identify with Holden's self-absorption?); I have yet to find any redeeming qualities in it.

I, too, have re-read some high school books as an adult and discovered that I actually like them (rather than just feigning affection to please a teacher). The list is a short one since I'm not much of a fiction person to begin with -- The Awakening, The Great Gatsby, and, my favorite, Heart of Darkness. You know what's not on there? Hemingway, in any way, shape, or form. Gah. Another Esteemed American Author I cannot bear.

Speaking of high school books, what high school class reads Lolita?!? What is that in-class discussion like??? You know what else Nabokov wrote about? Butterflies -- something I should do one of these days. He even got a species of blue named after him. There aren't any insects named after me. :( One day, one day...

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P.S. to JMB -- I've been meaning to ask for the longest time about Spring Fest -- how was it? Had you been to Live Oak before? Did you camp? My exboyfriends used to go to Magnolia Fest together every year -- that's where they discovered Seth -- but they couldn't ever go to Spring Fest because it was smack in the middle of tourist season (same for me). Tell your brother-in-law that he needs to play Western Montana!