Don’t you just love when you find a great bargain? A couple of weeks ago I got that Rosenblum zinfandel at about 1/3 the price it was going for elsewhere and yesterday I found some more bargains — and I wasn’t even looking. Not wine, though, other stuff. Let’s start with the plants! First of all, I finally grabbed the trowel and clippers, pulled on my gardening gloves and removed the dead snapdragons from the little space under the kitchen window. I love to have flowers there because it makes the entrance festive — but not when it’s a bunch of dead stalks. So now, what to replace them with? It’s a bit of a problem because the area is small and right up against the stucco wall so it gets plenty of heat, but it is also north-facing so only gets direct sunshine for a few hours in mid-summer. Flowers need sunshine… Read More »
Phyllis ‘n Roses (not a gun in sight …)
“Here, let me show you a trick,” Phyllis said as she took the flagging rosebuds from my hand. This was only a few weeks after I’d started working for her and we were backstage in her dressing room at the Riviera Hotel in Las Vegas. The room was filled, as usual, with vases of red roses. Phyllis loved roses and everytime she opened an engagement of more than a night or two, she would be flooded with bouquets of flowers — mostly red roses — from her business manager, her publicist, her agent and several friends. (I always sort of wondered who was paying for those roses her business manager sent — was he really footing the bill or did it come out of her own account? But I’m a skeptic.) As you know if you’ve ever received a delivery of flowers, roses in particular, they don’t always open the way they should. This particular evening I… Read More »
IT’S SPRING !
… Well, it’s not quite spring, but it will be soon. My cousins in Framingham, MA, and New York City and my friend in Pennsylvania may doubt that, but my apricot tree is saying “yes!” And here’s proof: The nurseries are stocking spring flowers. Right now! At noon I was sitting on the patio reading the paper and looked at my garden wondering when things were going to start blooming. The apricot tree started two days ago and the pomegranate tree has some miniscule leaves showing, too. But I was thinking of the flower bed and then it hit me: Hey, I could go and BUY some flowers and jump start this whole spring thing! So, jamming a baseball cap on my unkempt hair and donning my sunglasses for disguise, I headed down to Lowe’s. Just walking into the nursery made me smile. My breathing slowed and my pulse dropped to somewhere near… Read More »
