Okay, gang!

I finally got all the flowers, potting soil, etc., and today I’m going to be able to get all the flower boxes filled and out on the porches.

Sadly, due to Trump’s tariffs on petunias and impatiens, the price of flowers was really high this season. So I couldn’t buy as many as I usually do.

I am of course JUST KIDDING.

But I couldn’t buy as many as I usually do, only because I usually buy flowers over the Memorial Day holiday, when they are always on sale.

But this holiday season, as perhaps you recall, the Agency had me working like a crazy person. Plus, it was cold and rainy.

Anyway, better late than never and at least I have enough to put a few flowers on each porch. And the weather today is still beautiful, so I’m excited.

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On an interesting note–

I have a husband & wife client(s) that I usually see at least twice a week.

Over the past 2 days, for very different reasons, each of them has wound up in the hospital and both are heading to rehab for the rest of the month.

Yes. That means at least 7 shifts, gone. And right before I’m taking a week off to go to NYC.

But you know what??? I mean, I’m sorry that they are both having to go through rehab (again — 2nd time for each in the past 6 months), but I am so excited to finally have some unexpected free time to get the house clean and ready for summer, plant the flowers, work on the novel and the play. AND get back over to the shooting range. It’s been a month since I’ve been able to get back over there.

I am a little bit in shock to suddenly have all this time, but I am really, really happy. Everything will finally get done around here. And I can start keeping up with my neighbors!!

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Here something that’s disturbing…

It seems that THIS place–

— has switched who they buy their fortune cookies from!! They are now just the regular kind of fortunes you can get in any Asian restaurant across the country.

Gone are the uncanny fortunes at the end of a meal!! No irony whatsoever.

Gone are the reasons to save the little fortunes, take photos of them and post them to the blog!!

It’s a good thing that the staff their is really friendly and that the food there is great, otherwise there would be no point in going there anymore…

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Okay!!!

I really don’t have much else I can post about right now. There is some major stuff happening, but it’ll be awhile before I can blog about it.

Meanwhile, I want to get started on the flowers.

So here’s this!! From my personal desktop stash!!

And 6 more days before Switzerland!!! (Buy tickets here, if there are any left in the tour!!)

And now I gotta scoot!

Enjoy your Thursday, wherever you are in the world.

Thanks for visiting.

I love you guys. See ya!

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Our Daily Feature continues!

Gifts Keith Richards gave me when I was a wee bonny girl!!

Wherein I regale you with “songs Keith loved, that he would talk about in an interview in some magazine, and then I’d go out and try to find the record and then buy it with my babysitting money, and then I’d listen to it alone in my intense little room, playing it on the portable record player that my dad bought me, and the song would change my life. “

Today’s selection!! 

Although Keith has had nothing too flattering to say about the times he worked with Chuck Berry in later years, Chuck Berry was still a huge influence on Keith’s sound when he was young.

And even though it doesn’t sound like Chuck Berry was a very nice person, I loved a lot of those early songs he wrote — especially this one!! — and I know them all by heart. And it was Keith Richards that first introduced me to his music.

Chuck Berry, “Maybelline”, 1955. Enjoy, gang.

“Maybellene”

Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
Oh Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
You done started doin’ the things you used to do

As I was motorvatin’ over the hill
I saw Maybellene in a Coupe de Ville
A Cadillac a-rollin’ on the open road
Nothin’ will outrun my V8 Ford
The Cadillac doin’ about ninety-five
She’s bumper to bumper, rollin’ side by side

Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
Oh Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
You done started back doin’ the things you used to do

The Cadillac pulled up to a hundred and four
The Ford got hot and wouldn’t do no more
It then got cloudy and started to rain
I tooted my horn for the passin’ lane
The rainwater blowin’ all under my hood
I know that I was doin’ my motor good

Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
Oh Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
You done started back doin’ the things you used to do

[Solo guitar]

Oh Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
Oh Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
You done started back doin’ the things you used to do

The motor cooled down, the heat went down
And that’s when I heard that highway sound
The Cadillac a-sittin’ like a ton of lead
A hundred and ten half a mile ahead
The Cadillac lookin’ like it’s sittin’ still
And I caught Mabellene at the top of the hill

Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
Oh Maybellene, why can’t you be true?
You done started back doin’ the things you used to do

c – 1955 – Chuck Berry