Nanny X Returns (12 page)

When the game was over, we all drove Howard back to the David T. Jones Primate Sanctuary in Nanny X's minivan. The giant fish sculpture was on top.

My parents called to check on us during dinner, which was late because Jake's baseball game lasted forever. Stinky and Boris had come over, and we were eating hamburgers—the lentil kind, which weren't so bad with ketchup—and sweet-potato fries. For dessert we had soft molasses cookies, my grandmother's recipe.

“How's Grandma?” I asked my mother when it was my turn to talk.

“Home and hurting but hobbling around,” my mother said. “Did you do anything special today?”

I chose my words carefully. “We caught a criminal who threatened the president of the United States with a statue of a wolf fish,” I said. “That about sums it up.”

“Alison,” said my mother. “Let's not start.”

“We went fishing and saw some art and the Washington Monument,” I told her.

“I'm so glad Nanny X is teaching you about the finer things,” my mother said.

I was glad, too. Of course, everybody has a different idea about the finger things.

To some people they are paintings.

To some people they are sculptures of fish.

To Stinky they are a clean planet, to Howard they are a bunch of bananas, and to Jake they are the sound of a baseball when you crack it with a bat.

And to me? To me, the finer things are running around Washington, D.C., chasing criminals with a nanny who wears mirrored sunglasses, a motorcycle jacket and pink bunny slippers that just happen to turn into roller skates.

By Alison and Jake Pringle

Look at a piece of art from a distance. Decide whether you think it's modern, ye olde, impressionistic or realistic. Give it a name. When you get closer, see how much of the name you got right.

If you guess the whole title right, it's ten points.

If you guess the idea of the title (like if you say
Galaxy
and the painting is really
Solar System
or you say Bronze Statue No. 5 but it's really No. 14) you get five points.

If you guess part of the title (like if you
Bronze Statue #3
but it's really
Bronze Statue #12
, or if you say
Girl with Trees
but it's really
Girl in Wind
), you get five points.

You are only allowed to guess
Untitled
twice per gallery visit.

With your knees wide and over your feet, turn your toes in and squat low. Now dig hard with your edges (that's the sides of your wheels) and squeeze your thighs. That's a plow stop. The idea is to stop
before
you plow into somebody. Unless you happen to be in roller derby—which I am, Tuesday nights at eight.