Or perhaps I should ask, “What is it about September?”

Is it a particularly frisky month? Because I know more people who have birthdays in June than in any other month of the year.

Well, I don’t actually “know” all of these people — but still.

A very happy birthday today to Wayne Lewis!! A previous husband and a dear friend!

These photos are kind of how I still think of Wayne — in the kitchen! We were both really good cooks and had dinner parties all the time. He’s in the kitchen in our apartment on West End Avenue here, preparing for a Christmas dinner party, early 90s (photos by moi!):

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And a very happy 78th birthday to Ronnie Wood!!

Officially, the first song he played on with the Rolling Stones was in 1974, “It’s Only Rock & Roll (But I Like It)”. And his first live song with them was on May 1st, 1975, “Brown Sugar.”

But here’s one of my favorite Ronnie Wood songs — with Rod Stewart and The Faces. (I think I posted this song here on his birthday last year…)

It is so hard to believe that I was listening to this stuff back in 1973 (and earlier)… I was still just a girl. But I didn’t feel as young as I was. Anyway, back then, music was my life.

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Okay!

I am moving really slow here today. I think I’m actually depressed. I am just ridiculously overworked these days. And I can’t keep the house clean, and haven’t even planted my summer flowers yet that I put out on my various porches every year. And that alone really depresses me.

I feel like I don’t have time to stop and focus, or enjoy my own life because of all these caregiver jobs that take so much out of me. And this is, allegedly, only part-time!! Because I’m semi-retired!! Whatever the fuck that means. Anyway.

It won’t last forever, but for now, I need the work.

Peitor’s expecting me to send him over the revisions of Acts 1, 2 and 3 of Episode 2 of the TV project by noon, and I still have about 15 more pages to edit, so I better scoot.

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But first!

I think I should have an entire category called “My absolute favorite Nick Cave photo of all time” because I don’t think I can narrow it down to just one photo–

So here’s another “absolute favorite of all time”!

Okay, enjoy your Sunday, wherever you are in the world.

Thanks for visiting.

I love you guys. See ya!

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Meanwhile…

Our new 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!! 

Jimmy Reed, “I Ain’t Got You”, 1960. Enjoy, gang!

“I Ain’t Got You”

I got a Eldorado Cadillac
Wit’s a spare tire on the back
I got the charge account at Goldblatt
But I ain’t got you

I got a tavern and a package store
Don’t matter where I go
You keep the ring in my nose
But I ain’t got you

I got a tavern an’a package store
I hit the numbers, four-forty four
I got a mojo and don’t you know?
I’m all dressed up, no place to go

I got a-women to the right of me
I got a-women to the left of me
I got a-womens all around me
But I ain’t got you

I got a-women on the right of me
I got a-women to the left of me
I got a-women all around me
But I ain’t got you
But I ain’t got you
But I ain’t got you
But I ain’t got you

c – 1960 – Calvin Carter

Just keep a bunch of 7-week-old kittens closed up in your bedroom/office 24/7, and see what it does to the joy factor in your living space!

Although a couple of them are really, really wanting to go out into the hallway now, so I have to be careful when I open the door.

And a couple of the fully grown cats out in the hallway really, really want to know what the heck is going on in here.

But since Mommy (Little Blackie) still ferociously attacks all the other cats in the house (she got out once), I’m not ready to start introducing everyone yet.

But meanwhile, the frolicking in here never stops. (I can’t even get a decent photo anymore because they don’t stay still long enough — unless, for a nano second, they’re sleeping.)

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There’s not much to post about today. I spent yesterday afternoon/evening, working on pages that Peitor had sent over.

Although I did manage to get some yoga done, too. Yay. And it was during that nano second when all the kittens were asleep, so I was actually able to focus on the yoga (and relax) and not on trying to not step on any kittens. So, double yay.

Oh, and the interesting thing that happened yesterday — my favorite 94-year-old Japanese man did NOT want to go out for Japanese food.

This is a first, gang. He always wants to go out for lunch. But he said he just wasn’t up to going anywhere, which alarmed me a little bit. But we still had a great afternoon, chatting, laughing, uncovering the meaning of vodka martinis Life…

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Overall, I’m just kind of a little overwhelmed here. Mostly with stuff pertaining to the TV series project.

Mostly because, every time I find a moment to sit at my desk and get some edits done to Episode 2, Peitor sends over more edits to the edits-in-progress. So I have to stop everything and start over.

I don’t think he has a “pause” button… if he does, it’s broken.

But anyway. I am trying to find a way to balance everything. So far, I’m feeling kind of lucky that at least I’m still waking up in the morning. So we’ll start with that — Square One.

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Okay, here’s this!

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And here’s this!

A fave photo from my desktop stash, as we await the passage of 13 more days before the next Nick Cave tour begins (buy tickets here! I think there are maybe 4 tickets left…)

Blixa and Nick from yesteryear:

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And that’s it for today. I gotta scoot and — yes — call the Honda dealership!

They texted me yesterday to say they had discovered that I need 2 different filters and a windshield wiper blade replaced. I don’t know about you, but I’m thinkin’ that sounds like a 15-minute fix, right???

Here’s hoping it won’t take another 3 fucking hours. I like the guys at the Honda dealership but, like, not THAT much.

But we shall see. (My car is leased, so anything that needs fixing, I gotta fix. That way, when I trade it in for a new lease, the value remains really high. And the payments on the next lease go really low…)

Meanwhile, enjoy your Thursday, wherever you are in the world.

Thanks for visiting.

I love you guys. See ya!

**********

Our new 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!!

Robert Johnson, “I Believe I’ll Dust My Broom”, 1937. Enjoy, gang!!

“I Believe I’ll Dust My Broom”

I’m gointa get up in the mornin
I believe I’ll dust my broom
I’m gointa get up in the mornin
I believe I’ll dust my broom
Girlfriend the black man you’ve been lovin
Girlfriend can get my room

I’m gonna write a letter
Telephone every town I know
I’m gonna write a letter
Telephone every town I know
If I can’t find her in West Helena
She must be in East Monroe I know

I don’t want no woman
Wants every downtown man she meets
I don’t want no woman
Wants every downtown man she meets
She’s a no good dooney
They shouldn’t allow her on the street

I believe, I believe I’ll go back home
I believe, I believe I’ll go back home
You can mistreat me here babe,
But you can’t when I’m back home

And I’m gettin up in the mornin
I believe I’ll dust my broom
I’m gettin up in the mornin
I believe I’ll dust my broom
Girlfriend the black man you been lovin
Girlfriend can get my room

I’m gonna call up Chiney
See is my good girl over there
I’m gonna call up China
See is my good girl over there
I can’t find her on Phillipine’s island
She must be in Ethiopia somewhere

c – 1937 – Robert Leroy Johnson

Yes, just when I thought today was going to be an easy one.

To town and back. One client. A really sweet lady who is (generally) easy to take care of. Get home in the early afternoon, get some more work done at my desk on Ep. 2 for the TV series project. Do some yoga. Have a quiet dinner in the kitchen, sitting in front of one of my all-time favorite shows (I only watch the old ones, with John Nettle in them):

Then off to bed, to study French, then Chinese, then read a little more from James Tabor’s great new (re-issued) book:

Then…

Alas.

Coming home from my evening client last night, one of those things you never enjoy seeing — a dashboard warning light pops up on the beloved Honda Civic Sport while tootling along on the freeway.

So, today is all about driving to my client’s house in town.

Dashing over to the mall to pop in at Rural King then at Aldi’s, to do some quick grocery shopping, since I will suddenly be over there. Then over to the Honda dealership, to get the oil changed, the tires checked and rotated. And SIT in the (albeit, really nice) Honda waiting room….forever.

Then drive home in rush hour traffic.

Maybe get a TINY bit of work done on the TV script — after dinner.

(I’m not going to mention any of this to Peitor because he’s already freaked out by my intensely overloaded schedule this week.) (He’s over in his part of the world, working like a crazy person on Ep. 2 because so much stuff is happening right now regarding our TV Pilot script.) (Whereas, I’m just a crazy person.)

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Okay!

I just want to mention a little bit about that client last evening, that I had posted about yesterday.

It went very well — partly because his daughter popped in to see him right when I got there and her visit left him in really good spirits. Plus, it was a gorgeous afternoon, so I was able to take him out into the garden for a while before dinner, and he loved being in the sun and looking at all the flowers.

I was working very hard to keep him in good spirits after dinner. Trying to avoid anything that could trigger him. I tried to keep the “conversations” going, in whatever direction they veered off to, since I generally have no clue what he’s talking about at any given moment.

And when my replacement came, and I was getting ready to go home, I went over to say goodbye to him, and in a really quiet voice (so quiet that I had to lean in really close to hear him), he said; “Why are you trying to save me?”

Wow.

Of course, I have no clue if he even knew he had said it. But, wow.

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Okay. So here are a couple of Nick Cave photos from my own really huge, non-Instagram stash!!

And this is a photo from 5 or 6 years ago, when Kara had bought me this really cute photo holder, specifically to put this photo in, because it’s probably my favorite Nick Cave photo from yesteryear:

I have to say, Kara always buys me the best gifts!!

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All righty.

I gotta scoot and get this insane day underway.

Have a terrific Tuesday, wherever you are in the world.

Thanks for visiting.

I love you guys. See ya!

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Okay!

I think I’m starting a new daily feature:

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

I am, of course, referring to 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. Here’s one!!

Merle Haggard’s “Sing Me Back Home”. 1967. Enjoy, gang.

“Sing Me Back Home”

The warden led a prisoner down the hallway to his doom
I stood up to say good-bye like all the rest
And I heard him tell the warden just before he reached my cell
“Let my guitar playing friend do my request.” (Let him…)

Sing me back home with a song I used to hear
Make my old memories come alive
Take me away and turn back the years
Sing Me Back Home before I die

I recall last Sunday morning a choir from off the street
Came in to sing a few old gospel songs
And I heard him tell the singers “There’s a song my mama sang
Could I hear it once before you move along?”

Sing me back home with a song I used to hear
Make my old memories come alive
Take me away and turn back the years
Sing Me Back Home before I die

Sing Me Back Home before I die

c- 1967 Merle Haggard