To be frank, our short-term strategy is for Maggie to be arrested so we can get a restraining order. No judge will give us a restraining order, we were told, with some harassment complaints and a keyed car without video evidence. But how do we get her arrested?

It is a departure from the last two rounds we’ve gone with her. In those days (2 or 3 weeks ago? It seems like years now), we were hoping that she would be committed to a psych ward and get real help and actually take medication. So we used language that the City’s mental health people gave us: “I am calling about an emotionally-disturbed person. She is threatening me and my family. She has menaced us.”

Now we are not using that language. We have no interest in her “getting the help she needs.” Maggie needs help, but she has not accepted what has been offered, and I’m not interested in helping anymore. I have some sympathy as I see her move in slow motion in the alley, smoking and wandering and doing aimless tasks with intense concentration. But the sympathy is paired with annoyance (on a good day) and rage (on a bad day).

It’s like Donald Trump—one of the worst things about him being president is that I have to think about him and hear his voice almost every day. It’s the same with Maggie—I have to think about her every day, a few times a day. I have to be interested in her uninteresting life because I am trying to figure out how to get her arrested.

Every morning I check her Twitter accounts. There are two, and the most active one is called PaulsSexKitten (no apostrophe and no spaces in the handle. Pauls Sex (as we call her) Tweets at Paul McCartney all day and all night. She tweets videos that roll lovingly over her own body, spending a lot of time on her very dirty feet. This, we think, is connected to Maggie’s past as a dancer, which she talks about all the time.

Maggie’s past is in constant review on her Twitter and her Instagram, and sadly the kids and I know far more about her than we would like. I’ve even watched a video of her dancing at Jacob’s Pillow, a dance center in the Berkshires. It’s an astounding video in that Maggie’s personality comes through loud and clear. She seems put upon and annoyed that she has to dance. “What, this?” she seems to say as she sulkily drags her body around the stage. “I am so bored doing thisss….”

It is an astonishingly joyless performance and one, sadly, I know well. Her Twitter accounts are now filled with links to her daughter’s TikTok videos, and truly hideous videos for Paul McCartney.

Last week Maggie and Paul McCartney celebrated their birthdays, and Maggie posted a film clip on Pauls Sex that she tagged as his birthday present. The video is shot inside her refrigerator, which seems to hold only three items: two containers of kimchi, and one old and dirty flip flop sandal.

We’ve established that Maggie is mentally ill, so why we were all surprised at the kimchi and flip flop birthday present for Paul McCartney is a real testament to our gullible natures.

But it percolated through everyone’s mind, especially Wyatt. Next time, we’ll explore the Tweets from the Alley.