Tag Archives: doris day

It was just one of those things

4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Think, , , ,

The candle…THE candle.

It was just one of those things

Just one of those crazy flings

One of those bells that now and then rings

Just one of those things

I never- ever-ever pay a lot for a candle-in-a-jar, but Target had a fall selection of Yankee Candles (the best candles in the world) near my birthday (early October) on sale for $18, down from $24.99 and when I expressed great pleasure in the “Autumn Festival” scent, Dave insisted on getting me one.  You know – for my birthday.

I have burned it, and burned it and burned it.  When I am home (and sometimes when I not, shhhhhh, it isn’t on purpose!), I burn it.  It has burned all day long and all night long (like, ALL night long, much to Dave’s dismay).  I have burned that thing for hundreds of hours by now.  300+ I’d say.

It was just one of those nights

Just one of those fabulous flights

A trip to the moon on gossamer wings

Just one of those things

Was it meant to last this long?  Was it meant to make my early mornings so sweet and my evenings so romantic?  Was it supposed to burn for untold lengths of time where the memory of it lingered in the air as I’d descend the stairs come morning?  And as I watch the flicker this afternoon, smaller, much closer to its end, I wonder how on earth I shall ever replace this beloved candle?

If we’d thought a bit about the end of it

When we started painting the town

We’d have been aware that our love affair

Was too hot not to cool down

I have been preparing myself for the end, dreading it, yet helpless to stop it.  I have been sniffing candles madly at stores, looking for my winter comfort.  But so far, none can surpass my Autumn Festival – both fruity and spicy; tangy and zesty,  yet mellow, rich.  It has been the scent of my home as the days have grown shorter and the nights longer; as the chill has forced its way into early morning and long hours of dark azure skies. 

So good-bye, dear, and amen

Here’s hoping we meet now and then

It was great fun

But it was just one of those things

It seems hard to believe another candle could ever match this one.  This one.  But I am fond of a deep red cinnamon scent, earthy and multi-layered…where o where is it?!

SONG LYRICS  “It Was Just One of Those Things” by Cole Porter, performed by gazillions of artists, though I am fond of the Diana Krall version!).

NOTE:  I used to get very teary when my mom threw out the Christmas trees at season’s end, too.  They’d just made me so happy….

The Garden Winner

4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 5 Songs I am Singing, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , ,

It is COLD out today!  It is also overcast and funny-looking and  I fear the rumors of a spittering and sputtering of snowflakes arriving this weekend may, indeed, be true. 

I just went out and walked among the gardens, which are slowly but surely finishing up their work year.  There are gazillions of tomatoes left and just yesterday, bright yellow zucchini flowers were still trumpeting their intent to produce.  But today, all bets seem off and I think the zucchini has resigned itself to closing up shop. 

But they are the winners!  The zucchini wins for the garden of 2008.  I have never had zucchini last into mid-October (I am calling it mid-October even if we are still in the first third – they deserve that).  Usually they are wondrous for a month or so and then get some sort of zucchini-acne-powdery-weird disease and die off, which is why an attentive gardener will do successive plantings and why I am usually kicking myself for not doing so.  But these sweet 5 plants, roundabout the yard, tucked in here and there as if I weren’t expecting much, have consistently outdone themselves, and oh how I have loved turning my nose up at their grocery store cousins!  For I have harvested the best.

  

So, tonight: what shall I do?  Shall I throw floating row covers over the green beans and cucumbers and tomatoes and zuchs – knowing full well that in a few days we could be back into the higher temperatures again (the beautiful, little-known secret of the Rocky Mountain Region)?  Or “should I,” as Doris Day sings in Pillow Talk concerning Rock Hudson, “surrender?” 

The garden – is it over or is it not?…TBD…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  Enjoy the gorgeous dazzling-orange-red Maple leaves strewn about the yard, even though they are from the neighbor’s tree!

pictured: the garden shutting down; see the blackbirds eating the decrepit sunflower’s seeds?