August 25 is KISS AND MAKE UP DAY. In the Cary Grant spirit of occupying myself as best I can, I thought I’d present an assemblage of good old-fashioned “kiss and make up” goodies (the idea being, if you don’t love my premise, you can kiss my assortment). Let’s start with Cary’s take on make-up, which (as you can see) I’m not making up:
Well, apparently Cary never did make up with that gal, because here he is two years later, singing another love song to another gal:
It seems that Cary would rather play the field than kiss and make up. Let us therefore pick a dilly of a ditty less playboy-like in character:
So much for the guys. I give the last word to the gals (they usually have it anyway):
Kiss and make up — but too much makeup has ruined many a kiss. –Mae West
Kiss & make up. Maybe making out for a few minutes would help us figure things out. –Katie Anderson
In trying to get our own way, we should remember that kisses are sweeter than whine. –Ann Nonymous
Serj is a little after (not BEFORE) my time, musically speaking….but I appreciate a lyric that most of my non-geezer readers may be familiar with, and that even I can dig.
Paul, I think you may be giving me more credit than I’m due, because (not knowing if Ann Nonymous is guy or gal), I may not be lying….though the quote sounds more likely to have been said by a gal. Nonetheless, I would like to be thought of as at least a half-admirable man, so I’ll concede a 50-50 chance that Ann is a man. 🙂
Some actors and actresses (and I don’t mean this pejoratively) basically play themselves in their films, while others are so believable and natural in varied roles and genres, they completely inhabit whatever given character they portray. An example of the latter, going back to Hollywood’s Golden Age, is Henry Fonda (if you think he played only serious parts, you haven’t seen the classic 1941 comedy, THE LADY EVE, in which he co-starred with Barbara Stanwyck — another of the most versatile players of that era).
Mae West was of the first category, very much the Diamond Lil character she created. Today being her birthday (8/17/1893), it’s her day to sparkle:
It has been said that “Mae West literally constituted a one-woman genre.” Basically playing herself, she was one of the country’s biggest box office draws in the 1930s, despite being almost 40 years old when offered her first movie contract (by Paramount) in 1932. Previously, she’d appeared in a number of rather risqué plays, including Diamond Lil and her first starring role on Broadway (appropriately titled Sex), which she wrote, produced and directed. As with all the plays she wrote and performed in, there was much controversy and publicity, and it was only a matter of time before Hollywood came calling.
Her first film (see opening quote) was NIGHT AFTER NIGHT, making such an impression that co-star George Raft reportedly said, “She stole everything but the cameras.” Her next film, SHE DONE HIM WRONG (1933), featured Cary Grant in one of his first major roles, and was nominated for a Best Picture Academy Award. It was such a big moneymaker that it saved Paramount from bankruptcy in the midst of the Great Depression.
West went on to make six more movies in the 1930s, but in 1934, the Production Code began to be strictly enforced, and censors doubled down on her double-entendres. By today’s standards, such censorship seems ludicrous, but those were moralistic times, and after her last ‘naughty’ picture for Paramount in 1937, they thought it best to terminate her contract if they knew what’s good for them. She did manage to make one more hit movie, co-starring with W. C. Fields in My Little Chickadee for Universal Pictures in 1940.
Unbawdied and unbowed, when asked about puritanical attempts to impede her career, West wisecracked, “I believe in censorship. I made a fortune out of it.” Not for nothing was one of her nicknames “The Statue of Libido.” She died in 1980 at the age of 87.
Happy Birthday to one of my favorites – and risque she was. In the elevator, a man said to her (as she was nearest the console), “Ballroom, please.” Her reply? “Oh, I didn’t know I was crowding you.”
I’m sure your mother was a great deal more appropriate, but I’ll bet she was just as memorable. Raise a birthday toast to her for me.
FUN post!
xx,
mgh
(Madelyn Griffith-Haynie – ADDandSoMuchMORE dot com)
ADD/EFD Coach Training Field founder; ADD Coaching co-founder
“It takes a village to educate a world!”
That’s a great quote, Madelyn — I hadn’t heard it before…. And thank you for the “memorable” thoughts concerning my mother: much deserved by her and appreciated by me.
Have you heard the one about her climbing a staircase lined with young men in one of her films? She never lifted her eyes above their belts and, at one point she paused and said, “Oh, a new one!” Outrageous always.
You are most welcome, btw, for my comment about your mother. After all, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
xx,
mgh
That would’ve been one hell of a movie, Don. Throw in Dorothy Parker (even though she never acted), and we wouldn’t have been able to ‘keep up’ with the double-entendres.
I can appreciate why you might think Groucho wrote his own stuff. However, having read several books on the Marx Brothers, the fact is that Groucho didn’t write the scripts for their movies; the Marx’s were so zany and hard to hold to script that their ad libs/antics usually took precedence over what was written for them (even though very good writers, such as George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind, worked on their films).
I re-thank you for another public service (or disservice, depending upon one’s point of view) on my behalf. Remind me to give you a raise if you keep this up. 😦
LOL – I find what you do most engaging. I simply can’t help myself. Even as a child I couldn’t help sharing with my friends whatever treasure I had found in my Cracker Jack’s Box.
I remember Cracker Jacks well — I think they’ve been around even longer than I have, if that’s possible (not that I liked them all that much). I vaguely recall a time or two, as a boy, buying a box just for the “treasure” and throwing away the Cracker Jacks. Too bad I don’t still have the treasures — I could take them on Antiques Roadshow and find out if they’re worth thousands today. One never knows, do one?
I wonder if she was the inspiration for the, “Did you get your ears lowered?” comment. I use it regularly at school and get lots of blank stares in response – from High School folk. 🙂 Once in awhile I get, “Hey! My grandparents say that!” (which gives me pause, as you would think)
“Fulsome praise for the filthy-minded” – excellent – ha, ha! 🙂 (the mister is hesitant in replying; he’s having a hard time with a rejoinder, methinks)
Carmen, contrary to unpopular belief, I don’t sit in front of my computer for hours at a time (except when I fall asleep) waiting for comments to pop up that I can shoot down….though I will admit that in the hours after I post, I wish I didn’t have to get up from my chair to go to the john every 15 minutes (just kidding, of course — and now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go see a man about a horse). 😦
Speaking of which, here’s one of her quotes: “I’ve no time for broads who want to rule the world alone — without men, who’d do up the zipper on the back of your dress?” 🙂
I’m a Mae West fan and have been known to binge on her movies. In one she does a naughty dance that was so naughty they filmed her from the waist up! Seriously, she was a pioneer in promoting women as sexy AND intelligent. She put gays and transvestites in her plays. She didn’t do it just to shock, she did it because she believed in respect for people no matter what their sexuality or gender orientation, and especially for women.
Although I own a number of biographies/autobiographies of Hollywood Golden Age movie stars, I’ve never read one by or about Mae West, so I didn’t know some of what you describe. Thanks for the info.
Indeed! Mae was both a woman of her time (1920s-early 1930s) and too much woman for highly puritanical times (from 1934 on, when rigid censorship curtailed, and subsequently ended, her freedom to make the movies she wanted to make).
Thank you. Personality-wise, my mother was as much the opposite of Mae as East is from West, but as they say, variety is the spice of life. Life would be very dull if everyone were the same!
This post isn’t about what you may think it’s about (like maybe mountain climbing, drugs or seduction). No, friends — just as you can’t judge a book by its cover, you shouldn’t judge the title of a post by its lover.
And what am I a lover of? Faithful readers know that from time to time, I indulge my love for 1920s-1940s popular music/jazz with a post honoring a songwriting giant of that era (forgotten though he or she may be today). Dec. 10 is the birthday of one such songwriter, and this is such a post (sorry about the letdown).
Lyricist Harold Adamson was born on this date in 1906. He studied law at Harvard, but songwriting had a greater appeal and, as luck (and talent) would have it, his first published song became an all-time standard: Time On My Hands, written for the 1930 stage show SMILES, starring Fred and Adele Astaire….and who better to do it justice than Billie Holiday, backed by Teddy Wilson, Lester Young & other jazz greats:
Working with such composers as Jimmy McHugh, Vincent Youmans, Hoagy Carmichael, Duke Ellington, Vernon Duke and Victor Young, Adamson went on to write lyrics to such hits as Manhattan Serenade, Everything I Have Is Yours, It’s A Wonderful World, It’s A Most Unusual Day and many more. Here, from the 1936 film SUZY starring Jean Harlow and a very young Cary Grant, is one of Adamson’s lesser known songs (and the only time Cary Grant ever sang in a movie):
In 1943 (at the height of WW II), Adamson teamed with McHugh to write the songs for Frank Sinatra’s first starring movie, HIGHER ANDHIGHER. Quoting McHugh:
Adamson and I trekked into our office at RKO and found the script glaring coldly at us from the top of the piano. It informed us that there’d be a minor lover’s quarrel in the story, also the need of a big production number. Nothing happened with us that first day, but at 3 a.m. the next morning, Adamson phoned me and said he’d been listening to a musical shortwave program that suddenly had been cut off for a news announcement.
“There’s our title for the production number, Jim,” he said, “The Music Stopped.”
Then I began concentrating on the lovers’ spat and came down with insomnia. As the thousandth sheep jumped over the fence, both tune and title landed: “I Couldn’t Sleep a Wink Last Night.”
But to my mind, the best of the McHugh-Adamson songs from that film is this one:
Note that the above recording is a V-Disc, which is a story in itself. James Petrillo, head of the American Federation of Musicians (AFM), had called a national ban on recording by its members in 1942, meaning no new recordings could be made by commercial record companies using AFM musicians. To get around this ban, songs were recorded a capella, without instrumental accompaniment. However, there was an exception for records, called V-Discs, made for American troops overseas….thus the orchestral accompaniment for this song from the film’s CBS rehearsal session was recorded as a V-Disc. This, and many other V-Discs, survive to this day because, although such discs were supposed to be off-limits in the U.S., this edict was largely ignored by returning GIs.
I close at the bottom of this HIGHER AND HIGHER post with the title song from TOP OF THE TOWN, a film with screenplay co-written by humorist Robert Benchley:
Wonderful! Especially the incomparable Cary Grant. I didn’t realize he ever sang in a film 🙂 He’s not bad! Also love the Axel Stordahl years of Sinatra. My kind of music.
I agree – Cary Grant’s singing of “Did I Remember?” is not only “not bad,” it’s a sheer delight. And it was indeed Alex Stordahl who arranged and conducted the orchestra in the Sinatra V-Disc.
Don Frankel
8:07 am on December 11, 2015 Permalink
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Where did it go? I posted a comment here and poof. Maybe I didn’t hit the right button.
Anyway I was surprised to hear Cary Grant sing and I wondered what army he was in. I mean it looked like he was wearing one of Major Strasser’s uniforms.
Don, as someone who has had his share of comments disappear into cyberspace, I offer my makes-my-blood-boil-to-think-of-it condolences. May the cyberspace gods become blinded by the brilliance of our missing comments and get lost forever in the netherworld of their perfidious malevolence (or worse — if this comment doesn’t get through).
As for Cary Grant, he played a French aviator in the film, and Jean Harlow is an American showgirl in Paris as WW I begins. As I recall, the film isn’t as good as it should’ve been (given that it was co-scripted by Dorothy Parker), but the song “Did I Remember” did get an Academy Award nomination.
I saw a film last night, apropos of the 1920s-40s, starring Deanna Durbin. She sang “Night and Day” and hit the right tone on the nuances. Some of those old “movie stars” could sing.
I own well over a dozen Deanna Durbin records (both 78s & LPs) and love her voice. I don’t think NIGHT AND DAY is her best song, though I like the “big finish” she gives it in the film (her orchestral accompaniment doesn’t seem right for the song, which doesn’t help). It’s not that she doesn’t sing it well – it’s just that I’ve heard it sung better by others.
I once wrote a post about that master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock, who died 35 years ago April 29….but it seems to have disappeared, rather like Dame May Whitty in THE LADY VANISHES (1938) or the dead body in IN THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY (1955). As much as I would like to replicate that brilliantly comprehensive post for you, even I would find it almost impossible to recapture the genius of the original. In other words, it would be too much like work and not enough like my slightly-overstated missing first post.
Not to worry. My laziness is your gain, as I instead present some of my favorite Hitchcock quotes, which I haven’t a SHADOW OF A DOUBT will leave you SPELLBOUND, if not in a FRENZY:
Man does not live by murder alone. He needs affection, approval, encouragement and, occasionally, a hearty meal.
Puns are the highest form of literature.
When an actor comes to me and wants to discuss his character, I say “It’s in the script.” If he says, “But what’s my motivation?”, I say, “Your salary.”
All love scenes started on the set are continued in the dressing room.
I’ve never been very keen on women who hang their sex round their neck like baubles. I think it should be discovered. It’s more interesting to discover the sex in a woman than to have it thrown at you, like a Marilyn Monroe or those types. To me they are rather vulgar and obvious.
Cartoonists have the best casting system. If they don’t like an actor, they just tear him up.
Our original title [of NORTH BY NORTHWEST] , you know, was THE MAN IN LINCOLN’S NOSE. Couldn’t use it, though. They also wouldn’t let us shoot people on Mount Rushmore. Can’t deface a National Monument. And it’s a pity, too, because I had a wonderful shot in mind of Cary Grant hiding in Lincoln’s nose and having a sneezing fit.
I’m not against the police; I’m just afraid of them.
Hmmm. Alfred, if you only knew how black men today can relate to that last quote.
Personally, I would have had Cary Grant, when hiding in Lincoln’s nose, suddenly being menaced by a giant stone finger, but that’s a different movie, I guess.
I think Hitchcock would have dug it, Ricardo, but I agree with your guess. I see it as a better fit for one of those Japanese giant monster movies or campy independent films like THE LOCH NOSE HORROR.
He also had a very droll sense of humor, as is evident in several of the quotes (and in his introductions to the episodes on his old TV series ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS and THE ALFRED HITCHCOCK HOUR, which you can sample by going to Google and clicking on one or two of the videos, if you wish).
February 26 is the birthday of JOHNNY CASH (1932), not to mention WILLIAM F. “BUFFALO BILL” CODY (1846). I say “not to mention” Cody because I wish it were instead the birthday of CARY GRANT, so I could have titled this post CASH & CARY. No such luck, but give me credit….for trying.
Now, I’m not a big fan of country music (Cash excepted), and not even a small fan of a man killing 4,282 buffalo in 18 months, as Buffalo Bill purportedly did under contract to provide Kansas Pacific Railroad construction crews with buffalo meat. That’s a helluva way to run a railroad chow line, but in the unsettled west at that time (1867-68), what was the meat alternative — prairie dogs and rattlesnakes? I suppose the RR could’ve hired vegetarian railroad workers, but the nearest vegetable stands and supermarkets were probably hundreds of miles away, so let’s not go there.
Anyway, having come this far, we may as well finish paying our Buffalo Bill respects before turning to Johnny Cash. Buffalo Bill was one of the most colorful characters of the Old West. He was a U.S. Army soldier during the Civil War and an Army scout 1868-72, but is most famous for his “Wild West” show in which many historical western figures appeared, including Sitting Bull and Annie Oakley. The show toured throughout the U.S. and Europe, where it was enormously successful and made him an international legend. At the turn of the 20th century, he was regarded as the most widely recognizable celebrity in the world by some historians. Today, we see that he was ahead of his time in his support for conservation and the rights of women and Native Americans, regarding whom I found this Cody quote: Every Indian outbreak that I have ever known has resulted from broken promises and broken treaties by the government.
As for Johnny Cash, I think he is of recent enough vintage that I need not detail his life here, and in any case, his music is his enduring legacy….music such as:
I suppose I should quit while I’m ahead, but Feb. 26 is also the birthday of probably the youngest HUSBAND in history, as recorded on his birth certificate: HUSBAND EDWARD KIMMEL….a name which some say lives in infamy. Husband E. Kimmel was a four-star Admiral and Commander-in-chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet at the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor….following which he was demoted to a two-star Admiral. There is debate to this day as to whether he was made a scapegoat for the failure of the U.S. to be prepared for the disastrous sneak attack, but there is no debating that he was already a Husband when he married (Dorothy). She HAD to know, don’t you think?
arekhill1
11:59 am on February 26, 2015 Permalink
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That’s a lot of buffalo, but considering that it would probably take at least 18 months for one railroad worker to eat a whole buffalo, and that there were probably at least 4,000 guys working on the railroad, it’s statistically possible. I wonder how many buffalo Wild Bill shot at and missed?
He probably didn’t miss too many, Ricardo, because of his strategy. According to Wikipedia, Cody and another hunter, Wm. Comstock, competed in an 8-hour buffalo shooting match to win the contract and exclusive rights to the name “Buffalo Bill.” Cody won by killing 68 bison to Comstock’s 48. Comstock chased after his buffalo for miles, while Cody rode to the front of the herd, identified the leaders and forced the followers to circle close together, making them easy targets. He also used a larger-caliber rifle than Comstock.
I’d imagine catching a lot of buffalo requires more strategy than shooting, really. It’d be almost hopeless if they didn’t, well, out-think the animals.
I didn’t mind listening to Johnny Cash, but I just didn’t like watching him. Who knows why. 😦
I always wondered how stars like Buffalo Bill etc toured Europe with their shows. No airplanes or good transportation etc. And lack of all the modern conveniences and whatever else we take for granted today.
Well, I already had the Cash – I needed the Cary. But don’t feel bad about confusing them – I have no idea who cash warren is, so I’m just as “out of the loop” as you. 🙂
Lol. Well cash warren is Jessica alba’s husband. I was more thinking that maybe cash warrens Bday would miraculously be on Cary’s so you could have a retry?
Stella’s Mommy, I checked, and Cary Grant’s birthday is Jan. 18, Cash Warren’s is Jan.10 — close, but not on the money. Then I thought of Mariah Carey, but her birthday is March 27. But you know what – I’m sure the most important birthday in your life is Stella’s, so who cares about those other characters! 🙂
I love Cash’s songs & his recognizable voice… 🙂 Cary Grant is a January Cappy – like me, a living legend as we call THE genuine movie stars of the “golden age”… and yeah: who cares about their b’days?!… 😉
I also love Cash’s voice, as well as his wife’s, June Carter. I didn’t realize until I looked it up that they were married for 35 years and died just 3 months apart.
Well, Cash and Cody using more of the kind than Cash and Cary. And I have some nice memories of the few times I’ve been in Cody, Wyoming. And sometimes hearing Johnny Cash on the radio.
Been there once myself years ago (passing through, but stopped to see the Buffalo Bill Museum, which is about the only thing I remember about the town). Of course, Cody was named after Buffalo Bill Cody, who was instrumental in founding the town.
I love the Buffalo Bill quote and the puns sprinkled throughout this post. I took a semester course on Canadian history in high school. If I remember correctly, the US government broke over 300 treaties with Native Americans while the Candian government broke 30 treaties with what I I believe they call First Nations.
I don’t know which was more shameful — the way the U.S. Government treated African Americans or the way it treated Native Americans. And now we have a President who shamefully treats migrants who want to be Americans. Why? Because too many Americans vote into power the kind of government which does these shameful things.
As my October 18 HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME fades into post-parting recession, I decided to check today’s birthday notables and found among them one Judith Sheindlin, better known to daytime court potatos as Judge Judy (who could just as easily be charged as Celebrity Judy). By either alias, this is a judge who some might dismiss as a bit(ch) too much of a good thing….but who am I to judge? Hahaha. In any case, I like the title of her book, Don’t Pee on my Leg and Tell Me It’s Raining.
Whenever I hear the name Judy, I think of Cary Grant, who famously said Judy, Judy, Judy….or did he? Here is his testimony:
Grant’s mention of Garland leaves us short one Judy, so to round out the triumvirate of my Judy, Judy, Judy dissertation, I can think of no Judy less deserving of being overlooked than the wonderful comedic actress Judy Holliday of BORN YESTERDAY and BELLS ARE RINGING fame. She died much too young, but once encountered, there’s no forgetting what she left behind, as exhibited by this evidence from BELLS ARE RINGING:
The first person I ever heard the “Don’t pee on my leg” etc. quote attributed to was Lyndon Johnson but it’s probably ages older than that. Likely it was invented by an anonymous quipster of the Stone Age and translated forward into most of the languages of men. It makes me aware of the inevitable fate of my most pithy observations–spilling from the mouths of soulless politicians of the future who will get full credit for inventing them. What a world, what a world.
Despair not, Ricardo. All the pithy observations in your copyrighted books TRUTH OR BARE and IT’S GIRL SCOUT COOKIE TIME FOR LESBIANS AND ABORTIONISTS will survive you, or my name isn’t P. T. Barnum. And just to insure that they will be well read and long remembered, I hereby recommend them to my vast readership.
Glad you like the song, which can be appreciated even more in the context of the movie. It’s one of half a dozen or more good songs in BELLS ARE RINGING. If you haven’t seen it, it’s well worth keeping an eye open for.
Well, it could be argued that you can’t get more accurate than exact wording. On the other hand, literal exactness may, for one reason or another (such as changed meanings of words or context over time), not be up to the task of conveying the original flavor or wisdom. In other words, “circumstances alter cases” – but don’t quote me on that.
masercot 1:45 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
Wake up (Wake up)
Grab a brush and put a little makeup
Hide your scars to fade away the shakeup
Serj Tankian
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mistermuse 2:11 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
Serj is a little after (not BEFORE) my time, musically speaking….but I appreciate a lyric that most of my non-geezer readers may be familiar with, and that even I can dig.
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Rosaliene Bacchus 2:13 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
Enjoyed that 🙂 My ex didn’t like me wearing makeup, but eyed-up* all the women with makeup.
*Caribbean expression
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mistermuse 5:01 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
Rosaliene, just be thankful you didn’t marry The Donald! 😦
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Rosaliene Bacchus 2:54 pm on August 26, 2018 Permalink
OMG. God forbid!
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chattykerry 5:45 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
I can’t help thinking that Cary Grant seemed to enjoy kissing boys as much or more than girls…
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mistermuse 8:14 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
Well, let’s just say that Cary was ahead of his time — he didn’t believe in gender bias or sex discrimination. 🙂
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chattykerry 12:42 pm on August 28, 2018 Permalink
He was indeed!
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Richard A Cahill 7:32 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky.
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mistermuse 8:21 pm on August 25, 2018 Permalink |
I had to look that one up, Ricardo, and it turns out that you’re just blowin’ smoke (not that I disapprove). 🙂
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Paul Sunstone 11:51 pm on August 27, 2018 Permalink |
“Ann Nonymous” That cracked me up.
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mistermuse 12:28 am on August 28, 2018 Permalink |
I said I’d give the last word to the gals, so on my post, Ann Nonymous is a gal, whether (s)he likes it or not.
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Paul Sunstone 2:27 am on August 28, 2018 Permalink
I’ve always said, “A man of his word is an admirable man” even if he has to lie to be a man of his word.
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mistermuse 9:11 am on August 28, 2018 Permalink |
Paul, I think you may be giving me more credit than I’m due, because (not knowing if Ann Nonymous is guy or gal), I may not be lying….though the quote sounds more likely to have been said by a gal. Nonetheless, I would like to be thought of as at least a half-admirable man, so I’ll concede a 50-50 chance that Ann is a man. 🙂
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calmkate 5:39 pm on August 28, 2018 Permalink |
lol Cary didn’t even like the girls, it was all just the camera … love this one but the last wins a gold star!
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