Yard sale minks.

My next-door neighbor V could barely wait to show me what she found at a huge church yard sale this past weekend.... not one, but two mink capes. Genuine mink, one in a butterscotch color, the other in a very light brown. Both of them were hanging up on a rack with jeans, sweaters, and jackets. V couldn't decide which one to get, so she bought both of them. (For just a few dollars each, she enjoyed being extravagant.)

The last person on this earth that I thought I would ever see in mink is V. She is a friend to every animal, every insect, every reptile. She takes in every stray, feeds all the raccoons, pets the snakes at the local Nature Center, and truly has never met a creature that makes her say "Yuck." So why did she buy those mink capes? Two reasons. The first-- she figured that only she would appreciate the pain and torture the poor minks went through to get from their four-legged life to their shoulder-hugging death. The second reason-- one of those capes will be the start of her costume for our Halloween party next month.

So now, of course, V is hoping that the temperature gets a lot cooler before Halloween gets here. I told her that I would turn the thermostat down at our house so she wouldn't be too hot underneath her mink cape.... it would be worth the chill just to see V wrapped up in one of those mink capes.

V's husband is out of town for a few days, and he called up that afternoon after she had gone to the yard sales. He asked her how she had spent her morning, and she told him about the big rummage sale at the church. When he asked her what she bought, she told him "Nothing."