Flora and Fame

"All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever." 1 Peter 24-25

"There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom." Anais Nan

Here's what is fun. Spending money.

Here's what' s more fun: Spending other people's money.

Now I have the slightest understanding of what got Bernie Madoff's rocks off...

And a clearer picture of why people continue to vote Democrat.

Being the dutiful employee, I met my boss this morning in the gritty petal covered streets of New York City's century old Flower District. Not a bad place to start a crisp sunny morning. Walking more than a city block though a verdant and fragrant floral oasis, I caught my first glimpse and scent of fall colors. Not just Chrysanthemums, Black Eyed Susan's, and Golden Rod but an abundance of Amaryllis', Gerber's, Peonies, Lillie's, Irises, Hydrangeas, Sunflowers, and Grapevine, all colorfully crowded the bustling sidewalk of West 28th competing with the men unloading pallets of waxy green leafed plants from South America and the southern like.

Absolutely taken with the breathtaking scenery it was hard to believe they had already been 'picked over' by the early bird florists and restaurateurs there well before sunrise.

Rushing to get ahead of the second wave...we frantically began our mission:

To buy in plenty for clients.

For the first time with every swipe of the credit card, I felt at ease.

Ceramic pots, dripping jade, reaching palms, blown glass ornamentals, sweet succulents, bundled roses, budding orchids, lucky money plants all rung up, bagged up, and shipped to the proud new owners...

And then on to luxury bedding...cotton, cashmere, silk, bamboo, linen... You get the picture.

My decadent day received a topped off cherry evening end as my best "serious Mariska-like face" filled the small silver screen in an SVU jury box.

Between the two, I'm at a loss as to which brought the most joy...

You know. I think he was right when he sang.."You belong among the Wildflowers." TP

Is any of it worth it, if it all fades?

It's All Lovely

"You judge by human standards; I pass judgment on no one." John 8:15"

Because the streets are alive with the sound of Boom Bap, can I hear it once again! Boom Bap tell your neighbor tell a friend every flower got a right to be bloomin'!

Stay Human... Cause all the freaky people make the beauty in the world!" MF

The pressures of a daily blog weigh heavily at 1 AM.

As if the smell of winter has not already paralyzed my motivation.

Writer's Block continues to plague my mind..

Not even the Middle Eastern stationary store owner, nor the afro donning black New Yorker tired from all her sex last night, nor the cougar aged woman with tens of piercings stitched with a ribbon up her legs, or the 4 foot 50 year old dressed as a leprechaun with an Irish bowler on the subway, nor the blonde's from Amsterdam puffing on the Hookah on 2nd, or the Puerto Rican Indian who helped me mail my resume to All My Children, As the World Turns, and One Life to Live could serve as a muse.

Drinks with my hot mess Canadian Jew friend was oh so close.

Maybe tomorrow I will get so intoxicated that the William S. Burroughs stuffed inside of me will bleed out.

Accusations aside...What if we really did only see in black and white?

What If?

"The length of our days is seventy years— or eighty, if we have the strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away." Psalm 90:10

Do you think Portugal's Court has regrets??

Resigned to not having one I wallow in...I reflect.

"One's real life is often the life that one does not lead” Oscar Wilde

“Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable.” Sydney Smith

“We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons." Jim Rohn

“If only. Those must be the two saddest words in the world.” Mercedes Lackey

"Many of us crucify ourselves between two thieves - regret for the past and fear of the future.” Fulton Ousler

“I would much rather have regrets about not doing what people said, than regretting not doing what my heart led me to and wondering what life had been like if I'd just been myself.”

Brittany Renée

"I would rather regret the things that I have done than the things that I have not." Lucille Ball

"This is the book I never read, These are the words I never said, This is the path I'll never tread. These are the dreams I'll dream instead... "Annie Lenox

WHY?

Moon Shine Sunday

"On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine— the best of meats and the finest of wines." Isaiah 25:6

WHISKEY REBELLION in New York City!!!! Get a rope....

Ahh silky sweet bourbon. It might be the drink of SEC Football, but today (two hours after noon) about fifty "New Yorker's" got certifiably schooled on the differences between Bourbon, Whiskey, Scotch, and SOCO on sleek leather couches in the meatpacking district.

And just for being a fan of Knob Creek, a shiny rooting tooting FULL flask to go...

It's Food and Wine Fest in Manhattan. Guess which class won out.?

--Bull Steers, Belt buckles, BBQ, and BOURBON...bountiful BOURBON.

The number one differentiating factor in the brown straight to your head syrup?

BOURBON is 100% American.

Did you know Scotch is aged in our charred oak barrels left over from the Bourbon aging process? All bourbon is whiskey. All whiskey is not bourbon. And Southern Comfort ain't either.At least 51% must be corn...to be true rocking chair bourbon.

From not your Mama's Manhattan to 80 proof, into a ten year old 130 shot of punch your face.

Today I was button bustin, boot stompin, proud to be from the South and stumbled home

smiling over yonder in the Wild Wild, East Village.

"Well a city slicker came and he said "I'm tough"
I think I wanna taste that powerful stuff
He took one g-g-glug and drank it right down
And I heard him a moaning as he hit the ground
Mighty, mighty pleasin, pappy's corn squeezin'
Whshhhoooh . . . white lightnin'" GJ

Whens the last time you drank in your heritage?

But It Don't Sing and Dance

"Direct my footsteps according to your word; let no sin rule over me." Psalm 119:133

Just to name a few:

Platoon

Wall Street

Talk Radio

Born on the Fourth of July

The Doors

Any Given Sunday

Natural Born Killers

JFK

Nixon

Alexander

And Joining Wall Street 2 already in production..

Not only is Gordon Gecko out of jail with a gorgeous head of silver hair and back in NYC...he's had a jailhouse conversion. And none of those deadly sins appeal to him anymore.

Another 13 hours on set "acting" as if I'm down on capitalism and having Oliver Stone brush my arm, while tripping over PA's lusting after the augmented Italian youth beside me.

No craft services for the last 8 hours and gluttony is sounding pretty good.

If the acting dream doesn't reach fruition. There is always SET CHAPLAIN.

**Agreed on by the best two seat mates a girl could ask for...

How are greed and attachment working for you?

Irena's List

"How long, O men, will you turn my glory into shame ? How long will you love delusions and seek false gods ? Selah" Psalm 4:2

I didn't want to start my morning like this....

I haven't felt this alone or detached from people in a long time. While many of my peers are rejoicing smugly in victory for the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to their leader, I am literally holding my head over the keyboard in tears of anger.We are such a lost nation asleep at the wheel.

Not only is this award grossly premature and does not recognize ANY concrete achievement as he was only in office 2 WEEKS before the nomination but seems to be given in haste about his promises to come. AAAHHHH. This sheds even more light on the fact, that the blind with loud mouths are in love with the ILLUSION of Barak Obama.

“Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future,” Thorbjoern Jagland, chairman of the Nobel Committee said.

GOD. Give me a shot in the arm now and put me out of my misery.

2002-Carter

2007-Gore The inventor of the Internet

2009-Obama

THREE LIBERAL DEMOCRATS.

Awareness of Climate change and Charismatic speaking are far from worthy.....

You want to hear a story about someone deeply worthy of receiving the Nobel Peace Price?

------During World War II Irena Sendlerowa was an activist in the Polish Underground and the Polish anti-Holocaust resistance in Warsaw. She helped save 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto by providing them false documents and sheltering them in group children’s homes outside the Ghetto. Sendlerowa organized a small group of social workers to smuggle the children to safety. As an employee of the Social Welfare Department, she had a special permit to enter the Warsaw Ghetto, to check for signs of typhus, something the Nazis feared would spread beyond the ghetto. Irena Sendlerowa and her team smuggled the children out by variously hiding them in ambulances, taking them through the sewer pipes or other underground passageways, wheeling them out on a trolley in suitcases or boxes…Some were smuggled out in workmen’s toolbags one by one.....Irena smuggled infants out in the bottom of her tool box she carried, and she also carried in the back of her truck a Burlap sack, (for larger kids). She also had a dog in the back that she trained to bark when the Nazi soldiers let her in and out of the ghetto. The soldiers, of course, wanted nothing to do with the dog, and the barking covered the kids and infants crying noises.

Irena Sendlerowa was arrested in October 1943 and taken to Gestapo headquarters where she was beaten. Her legs and feet were broken and she was then driven away to be executed. But a rucksack of dollars paid by Zegota secured her release. Underground colleagues bribed a guard to free her at the last minute and list her as “executed.” She was knocked unconscious and left by the roadside. She had to use crutches as a result of her injuries for the rest of her life… She continued her work from hiding.

When the war ended, Irena Sendlerowa retrieved the bottles in which she’d hidden her index of names and began searching for the real parents. Irena Sendlerowa noted the names of the children on cigarette papers, twice for security, and sealed them in two glass bottles, which she buried in a colleague’s garden.After the war the bottles were dug up and the lists handed to Jewish representatives. Attempts were made to reunite the children with their families but most of them had perished in concentration camps....Mrs Sendlerowa was up for the Nobel Peace Prize for rescuing “the most defenseless victims of the Nazi ideology - the Jewish children”, saying in an interview,“I was brought up to believe that a person must be rescued when drowning, regardless of religion and nationality.”-------

***Courtesy of avideditor.worldpress.com, planetearthpeaceparty.com, and aushwitz.dk

In 2007, she was passed over for a video.

And died in 2008 from pnuemonia in Warsaw, Poland.

WILL YOU PLEASE OPEN YOUR EYES???

Grounded

Elijah went before the people and said, "How long will you waver between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him." But the people said nothing." 1 Kings 18:21

Would it be too conspiracy theorist like to think that all the solo dancers with horn rimmed glasses on each block dancing to their own groove were planted just to make me smile on this work less day or are they rehearsing for yet another IPOD commercial?

AND

Is it a clear sign that something has gone awry when four SWAT with AK-47's around their neck are poised on the 2,3 platform while hardworking MTA workers poke their head in every trashcan and run their hands over every drain?

AND

Should I have worried more for the FedEx Kinko's employees who couldn't calm the paranoid schizophrenic blue eye shadowed woman in a cloak accusing all of them for throwing away her identity even after they humored her and checked under all the counters?

These are a sample of questions on my mind on just another Manhattan morning.

Days off are overrated. So I'm held up at B Cup Cafe hammering out yet another resume to kiss and pray over before I send it off in an eye-catching red envelope to the Colbert Report with Neil Young's comfort providing a gentle push.

Its high time for some moral commentary that doesn't immediately get put into a left spin or a coiffed right wing box.

I understand I am getting older and following in the path that so many hippies turned yuppie turned baby boomer skipped, strutted, and strolled down. But I wish there were more woman telling 12 year old girls their worth is more than giving head with different colored lipsticks to other prepubescent boys. I resent that Christianity is equated with small minded people who aren't well read. I believe we should be hearing from equals who believe that Capitalism and prosperity are attributes to this country. Greed is the evil and soils success. I think the tide needs to turn from Religion and Hypocrisy being synonymous to Faith and Freedom going hand in hand.

I believe in marriage. I believe drugs should be legal. I believe in the right for a woman to choose. I believe in personal responsibility. I believe in funding the Arts in public schools. I believe Universal Healthcare will be a step towards a socialist government. I believe that knowledge can change behavior generation to generation. I believe America is the greatest country in the world and those who do not agree, should not stay. I believe people are people.

Most of all, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and one drop of His blood saves us all.

I want to hear these sentiments from a blond, free spirit, Christian commentator who is firm in her beliefs, is not swayed by popular opinion, does not back down despite the unwarranted ridicule, and thinks self deprecating humor is the best medicine for a country that has lost her sense of humor.

This would be fresh ....and I know just the gal to do it.

Colbert, call me.

Are your beliefs on solid rock or sinking sand?