In this blog:
Evangeline Goldberg
Remember this: Four Great Religious Truths
Wiley’s Corn Beef Casserole
Notes from Joy
The BOOB Girl Books
Evangeline Goldberg
Beulah Buttsrock took her now official job as Hall Monitor seriously. She zoomed around Meadow Lakes Retirement Community, silver tinsel dragging behind her walker, Dollar Store Hall Monitor badge pinned onto her blouse, tiny pieces of stray tinsel decorating the carpets on every floor.
Joanie, head of housekeeping put her hands on her hips, stared at the hall carpets and shook her head. She had become queen of the monster hall vacuum.
Beulah scolded people standing too close together. She shook her finger at men in the library bent over jigsaw puzzles together and she made the small group getting mail scatter like birds when a cat came by.
The BOOB Girls, Marge, Hadley, Robbie and Mary Rose avoided her as if she were more dangerous than the Covid-19 virus she was championing.
Pitiful.
They were siting in the dining room, spread out around table 12, when Mary Rose thought of something funny.
“We need Calamity Doodles here to take out and take on Beulah,” she said.
Hadley smiled, “She could do it.”
Robbie looked up from her computer. “And Evangeline Goldberg could sit on her.”
They laughed.
“Okay,” Marge said, “I’ve heard these names. Tell me about these two ladies.”
They looked at Robinson Leary. Robbie, retired English professor from Creighton University, was their storyteller. She could tell the story, but Hadley and Mary Rose would definitely add their two cents worth.
“It was 2010,” Robbie began, shaking her head at how long it had been. “In fact, our story started out with the words, ‘Patty Whack was no fun at all.’” She looked around. Mary Rose and Hadley nodded and smiled.
“Patty was dullness personified in her black dress, hair in a grey bun, clunky shoes, gigantic wristwatch and a huge black bag. We didn’t like her.”
The other two nodded again. Marge leaned forward to hear better.
“Then,” Robbie said, “there was Evangeline Goldberg.”
Hadley spoke up. “Evangeline was huge! We could hear her coming before we saw her.”
“Her clothes could have been made by Omaha Tent and Awning,” Mary Rose added.
“She still put her hair up in pin curls,” Hadley told Marge.
“She wore aprons with the day of the week on them,” Mary Rose said.
“But it was always the WRONG day of the week,” Robbie and Hadley said together.
“But.” Robbie said, taking back her role as storyteller, “Evangeline made the best cinnamon rolls in the world! And one day she thundered into the dining room with a basket of her cinnamon rolls and gave us a ‘come to Jesus’ lecture on friendship.”
She looked at Mary Rose.
“She talked about friendship and letting Patty Whack know we wanted her as a friend.”
“She gave us the basket of cinnamon rolls and told us to take them to Patty Whack and make sure she was a part of the BOOB Girls,” Hadley added. “To make sure she knew she was wanted, even though we didn’t want her.”
“Sooo,” Robbie said, drawing out the word, “we got a bouquet from Hy-Vee and traipsed across the lawn to Patty’s patio apartment.”
“And when we got there,” Mary Rose said, moving forward on her chair and looking Marge straight in the eye, “we could see through her sliding glass door…”
Hadley interrupted. “And there was a man holding a gun on her!”
“We couldn’t do anything,” Robbie said.
“911 would never get there in time,” Hadley added.
“So we hurried to the door, and we were lucky. The man’s back was to us,” Mary Rose said.
“We slammed open the sliding glass door,” Robbie said, demonstrating with her right hand and arm, “we pelted him with the cinnamon rolls, turning them into deadly weapons, then Hadley grabbed a lamp and beaned him with it. I picked up a book and beat him over the head as hard as I could.”
Mary Rose was sitting straight up on the edge of her chair. “I wound up and gave him my deadly groin kick,” she said proudly.
“It dislocated his knee,” Robbie explained.
Marge nodded knowingly.
“Then all at once,” Robbie went on, “through the air came this little ninja in a black body suit, her bun of grey hair was on the floor, she was in the air kicking this dude, his gun was on the floor and so was he…unconscious.”
“Patty smiled at him, laying there, talked into her big watch ad in just seconds, two big men in black suits came in, picked the man up, put his gun in a plastic bag and exited.”
Marge grinned. “Go on,” she said.
“Well,” Robbie went on, “Patty looked around, grinned at us and said, “there are some cinnamon rolls left, we might as well have coffee.”
“That’s when we learned she was not Patty Whack,” Hadley said, grinning, “Her name was Calamity Doodles and she was a spy, in Omaha to find a hidden microchip in a gangster’s mansion out west.”
“Her father was a circus clown. and her mother had the wild west chow,” Mary Rose explained. “That’s how she got the name, Calamity Doodles.”
“We found the microchip and met the BOOB Boys,” Mary Rose said sweetly, her voice filled with nostalgia.
“Robert, Rubin, Lenard and Clyde,” Hadley said with a sad smile. “The BOOB Boys – the Burned Out Old Bastards.”
They all laughed softly,
“And it was Evangeline who taught us the four great religious truths,” Robbie said.
“I definitely want to hear that,” Marge said.
They all leaned forward for a story that dated back a decade. Only Clyde had survived and joined them in The Last BOOB Girl Book.
Evangeline, Calamity, and the Boys adventure on in Book II: Lies, Spies and Cinnamon Rolls.
Remember this? Four Great Religious Truths
Book II: Lies, Spies and Cinnamon Rolls
Evangeline Goldberg leaned forward, her huge breasts dropping nearly to her lap. She wore an apron with “Tuesday” on it, even though it was Friday. He feet were clad in what they always sported – crotchet slippers with pom poms.
“Here they are,” Evangeline said solemnly, “the Four Great Religious Truths:
Palestinians do not recognize Jewish rights to the Holy Land
Jews do not recognize Jesus as their Messiah
Protestants do not recognize the Pope as their religious leader
And Baptists do not recognize each other at Hooters!”
And that dear readers, is the theology of the entire BOOB Girls series.
Wiley’s Corn Beef Casserole for a Cozy Winter Meal
12 oz. noodles, cooked
2 cans cream of chicken soup
2 cans of corn beef (or you can bake your own - which would probably be better)
3/4 lb American cheese.
Mix all together. Top with buttered crumbs.
Bake 350 for 1 hour.
(From Mirm Treadway and friend)
A note from Joy
The hope of this emotional last week came in the form of a skinny black girl dressed in red and yellow. Those are the colors of our apartment, and she would fit right in. Amanda Gorman, the first Your Poet Lauriat, held the country in the palm of her tiny hand and led us into a week of black excellence.
In Book XII Robbie reflects on a black student being denied an A and the horrors of lynching. But last week we saw:
The Obamas, the graceful former first couple
Kamala Harris, first woman Vice President
Amanda Gorman, youth Poet Lauriat
Eugene Goodman, police officer who saved Mike Pence and family
General Lloyd Austin, new Secretary of Defense
Even if I were not married to an excellent black man who is intelligent, gentle, interesting and respected by all who know him, I would still be proud. I would be proud because back in the early 50’s, when the only black student in my high school was told by a teacher, “No Negro deserves and A,” I felt the blunt of the unfairness. I remember her last name was Rice, I remember she was Valedictorian a couple of classes ahead of me, I remember she was tall and beautiful. I have no idea what became of her or what she achieved, but I thank her because she taught me about systemic racism, prejudice, and black excellence. Sometimes you learn more in high school than what is in the books.
We can be better.
In the last blog I asked about keeping friends when we are so politically divided. What to do when you contact a friend and find out they may have gone so far as to even be radicalized? Of all the answers, I picked my friend Pam’s. She said it simply and she said what a lot of you said.
Well written and needed to be said. I have to admit I have found changing people’s minds impossible, but I feel I have a responsibility to point out poor choices, bad actions, and misinformation or have others believe my silence means I agree. I can also refuse to associate with and ban hateful people from my life. You can’t claim to love this country and hate what it stands for and you can’t claim to love God and hate his creation.
It's not too late to give me your ideas. What do YOU do when a friend is on a totally different plane? Women are all about friendship and balancing our own integrity with our love of one another. It’s a tough question and it’s time we found a way to share our feelings and ideas and work together.
The reflecting pool on the mall in Washington symbolizes community loss and grief. How do we heal and hug each other through our differences? I want your ideas you wise old broads!
LIBRARY SPECIAL! All twelve books plus audio book $150-CLICK HERE!BOOB GIRLS XII: THE LAST BOOB GIRL BOOK Is now on Kindle! CLICK HERE!
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