I'm over summer, at least the part that precedes Leo season. Like a total Leo, I don't take any interest in astrology until it's my time to roar and preen and reign over my little creative realm. Michelle Pfieffer said it best as Catwoman in Batman Returns: Meow. This is when my brain becomes a big idea machine, a little delulu on long daylight hours and ripe berries and iced coffee. Good thing, too. I've got about a dozen proposals in progress for art projects due within the next few weeks and my studio is getting a glow up. Next month I'll invite you over for some rare open studio days.

Until then, here are 10 quick paragraphs on taking/leaving.

The secret smoker moved out of the neighborhood. I can tell because I am no longer finding snack-sized Ziploc bags full of water and lipstick-stained cigarette butts, presumably tossed out a car window, on walks up and down the rollercoaster hill.

The family that took up so much space with their commitment to leash-free dog walking and shouty trail runs and sports equipment often left strewn across someone else’s open lot also moved.

​My friend Hope says the Free Flowers, take only 1 or 2 sign we encountered on Sunday outside a nearby wedding venue is most definitely PNW-passive-aggressive. It’s a lesser-seen variant of the sign people put out on the street with whatever they no longer want. Usually there is a table and the sign says FREE in big letters with leave the table in small print. There’s a semi-permanent pile of truly oddball free stuff down the street that occasionally gets rearranged now and then with a little more merchandising panache. It must work because someone finally took the inflatable kayak.

We failed at getting rid of a heavy piece of furniture, twice, with the put-it-by-the-street method. I tried getting cute with the sign, riffing off a neighbor who offered up a dishwasher displaying free, doesn’t work, like my ex. Unfortunately, more project potential than your ex didn’t result in any takers and Goodwill turned it down, too. I’m often surprised at what gets snapped up right away when I put out boxes of free stuff but I really shouldn’t be. Our neighbors’ discard piles is how I ended up with a string of trout party lights and a plant stand that is almost level and a color inkjet printer and a brand new tarp. Y'all, who in the rainy part of the PNW gets rid of a big ass tarp still in its packaging?

The sectional in the above photo was not very likely to find a new home, either, but it resulted in a fantastic tableau while in New Orleans for Kolaj Fest. I’m unreliable when it comes to sending holiday cards and a smartass when it comes to the family update letter, but this pic may make an appearance as a photo card mailed with no explanation or names. If you’ve ever sent me a photo card of your kids, who I probably haven’t met, with only their first names and no other helpful information, I’ll just say we’re even in advance.

I made a collage and left it behind in New Orleans because 1) at 72-inches-wide, it was too big to realistically fly home with and 2) I created it on the back of one of those slightly generic home decor photo prints found on the walls of all vacation rentals.

I did come home with fragments of two broken beer bottles still adhered to their transparent labels. It's too late to deny being occasionally enchanted by straight-up trash so I'll also tell you that I came home from yesterday morning’s walk with the heavily oxidized metallic bottom from a tin of chewing tobacco.

Things I did not collect on recent walks: the shell of a robin’s egg in that pretty blue hue; some light purple plastic clothesline clips that get more interesting as car tires continue to deconstruct them; the paperboard box that is practically embedded in the street and it’s only there because I’m secretly wondering about the best time of day to go collage on it with no one noticing.

What is it about Fireball? When did it replace Bacardi as the convenience store impulse alcohol buy of choice? Last time I walked around my childhood neighborhood, I counted at least a dozen mini Fireball empties on the side of the road. An inebriated person with a walker and a small dog in tow approached me at Collage-O-Rama a couple of months ago to bum a few crayons the way you'd ask someone outside a bar for a smoke. I chose a handful of colors in a coordinated palette and added them to the grocery sack that was carrying two unopened Fireball minis and some loose change. It’s one of those random interactions I remembered when I found an empty half-pint bottle the other day along with someone’s double vape pen around the same place that the neighborhood dogs like to leave their shit. It’s a lot to juggle, I know, when you’re trying to hold a leash and tie a poop bag and get a little numb after work.

I recently acquired a couple of paper storage cabinets that were from Rainier Beach High School’s old art building. Amongst the dust bunnies and papers lodged behind the drawers was a brittle pencil drawing (above) of a cover design for Helix, an underground Seattle newspaper published from 1967-1970. Here's a scan of an issue from 1969. The feminine urge to be part of an underground publication, amirite? Maybe I'll reach out to some folks. Maybe I'll just mount the drawing and frame it behind some UV-protectant glazing.

A little bonus trivia: when I was in high school, there was some kind of beef involving the school newspaper, possibly between teachers, that resulted in a group of us publishing a weekly alt for a little while. I wasn’t involved in the conception of the project but I appointed myself as the movie reviewer so that I could rent movies for free from the video store. Yes, I am be-kind-rewind years old.

Postscript: You may notice that this email didn't come from Substack. Abstract Pancakes will no longer be published there. Newsletter subscribers that find me through Substack are transferred here.