 Why does Mrs. Graham leave such specific instructions for Mr. Graham?
During the day, by actual count, I heard the phrase "I'm just spitballing" eight times, and another Madison Avenue favorite, "The whole ball of wax," twelve times. I went into our little kitchen to make a drink and reread the directions Molly had left, telling me how to get along by myself until she got back from her mother's in Oyster Bay, a matter of ten days. I noticed one that I had missed, pinned to the door of the dumbwaiter: "Garbage picked up at 6:30 AM so the idea is to Put it Here the Night Before. Since our building is usually very well behaved, I was astonished to hear what sounded like an incipient free-for-all, and among the angry voices I recognized that of my neighbor, Nat, a very quiet guy who works on a newspaper and has never, to my knowledge, given wild parties, particularly in the late afternoon. At the delicatessen on the corner, the man gave me three bottles in what must have been a wet bag, because as he handed them to me over the top of the cold-meat display, the bottom gave and they fell onto the tile floor. This gave them exactly no room to move either forward or backward, for the car had its back to a hydrant and the taxi to a lamp. Although rather narrow, this is a two-way street, and in no time at all, traffic was stacked up from both directions as far as the avenues.
 Mrs. Graham strives to avoid more chaos than what Mr. Graham already attracts
 Mr. Graham cannot hear, but he is able to read  Mrs. Graham has the power to control Mr. Graham, but only in close proximity  Mrs. Graham strives to avoid more chaos than what Mr. Graham already attracts  Mr. Graham is physically unable to do things for himself