There were short periods at William Penn today so I only had Elaine and Charmaine for about 15 minutes. Perquackey is a good game for those two because it forces them to spell I think Scrabble and Probe will be good too.

I took the pictures of Washington into Gimbel's today. Hope they turn out nice. Also looked for picture albums for Frostie and Ronnie. As I was walking into Gimbel's, I saw this little, old lady sitting by the door, with a green bottle in a paper bag at her feet. She said, "Miss, would you help me. I need something to eat.”

"What?" I asked. I thought I smelled alcohol. Funny, the things you learn. I never knew what that smelled like until I joined Teen Haven. Or reefers.

"Would you please help me?" she repeated. "I need something to eat.”

"Is there a restaurant around here?"

"I don't know!" she snapped.

I looked around and saw a little coffee shop by the Ben Franklin Hotel across the street. "There's a coffee shop over there I'll go with you to get something.”

"Look," she said resentfully. "I wanta go by me.

"By you?"

"By myself. If you wanta give me money, allright. If you don't, just forget it." She stared straight ahead.

I went on in to Gimbel’s feeling guilty. I'm not sure I did the right thing or what I should have done. My Dad used to say “No,” quite emphatically when people came up to us and asked for money. That was in New York. I remember once when I was ten years old, we were coming out of Aunt Joan’s apartment in Greenwich village. This drunk guy passed out right in front of us. We just walked off and left him lying on the sidewalk face down in his trench coat. I always felt bad. When I visited Dad in Argentina my senior year, he took us to eat at a nice hotel one evening. Some poor children went table to table selling flowers. Dad smiled, but he wouldn’t buy.

Tonight Ba Ba was telling us about lying to cover up something he'd done. Ba Ba is one of the preteen boys in the Broad Street preteen boys Bible study. Anyway he said he was playing with a ball and broke a window in his house.

"But I'm smart," he said. "I took all the glass from the inside and put it on the outside. Then when my grandmother accused me, I said I didn't break it or the glass would be on the inside. And I didn't get in trouble for it!"

"But, it's wrong to lie,” I said. “You should have just owned up."

"Are you kidding?" he said. "My father doesn't beat me with a cord or a belt. He uses a stick a cane this thick!"

I can't much blame him for lying!