Figure 1. Crazy Grackle Lady Correlates Positively with Insignificance

So my favorite pants are missing very important butt elements. This has been a source of of major concern for me over the course of the past few weeks, but today, without warning, a singularly bizarre solution presented itself.

I was biking down Alister street as I am wont to do during my weekly Grapefruit Mission, and I passed a small hovel-like shop that I had never noticed before. "Port Island Seamstress" was emblazoned across a single, curtained window in red paint. A sign on the doorknob was flipped to "open." Interesting, I thought, my prayers have been answered... After a hasty pedal to Dorm A to retrieve my poor pants, I was nudging open the door of this peculiar shack.

The inside of this seamstress shop was unlike anything that actually occurs in real life. Shirts, sheets, slacks, pajamas, sofa covers--all of these things and more were literally piled from the floor to the ceiling of a room so small it felt like it was built for hobbits. A white wire cage contained two parakeets in the far corner.

A severely pregnant blond was stitching something lacy by the door, and a frog-like old woman sat hunched by an expensive looking computer, engrossed in a telephone conversation. She was surrounded by stray papers and the ever-present clothing explosion. I thought I could even discern a pinafore.

"She'll be with you in a minute," said the pregnant lady, "Would you like to hold Jeremy? My boyfriend saved him." Jeremy was a baby grackle, perched on the windowsill. He was awkwardly half-fluff, half feather, and too much leg.

I reached out a hand toward Jeremy, but he must have sensed my hesitation, because he fled. "The ceiling fan!!!" shouted the pregnant lady as she heaved herself from her chair.

And thus I found myself practicing Grackle Reconnaissance in a cluttered hobbit hole somewhere on the Gulf Coast. And I even gave them my pants.

In other news, I have to give my final presentation tomorrow. Earlier today I e-mailed my power point file and the outline of what I'm planning to say to my mentor professor, and he stopped by my office half an hour later with one piece of feedback: "Rather than saying that your results are insignificant, Caitlin, I think it might be more technically appropriate to say that they are non-significant."

Thanks, Ed.