Ramblings And What Not ~

Hello Peoples! The groundhog was wrong! According to the information I received, we were suppose to have an early spring! It’s the end of February and we have over twelve inches of snow on the ground and it’s COLD. Crazy! I did enjoy a few walks to the bakery in February. Since it was warm enough to walk outside, maybe there is a slight indication spring is coming.  🙂  Today I was talking and laughing with a friend and we decided we are going to find that groundhog, that’s right, we’re going to hold him or her accountable! We’re going to give him the what for! *ahem!*

As many of you know, Rick cut his hand several days ago. He had the stitches taken out. The doctor wasn’t happy with his progress, so she put steri-strips on the wound and covered it with an big bandage. He reports, it itches.  🙂

Your favorites at the cottage in February ~

February 25, 2019 ~ Hello Peoples! It’s my blog’s birthday!

February 22, 2019 ~ Classic Movie Friday! The Baroness and the Butler (1938)

February 4, 2019 ~ Of Fire And Lions by Mesu Andrews

February 18, 2019 ~ Ramblings And What Not ~ 🙂

February 23, 2019 ~ Thirteen Chocolates by Agatha Chocolats

There was a considerable amount of traffic on my blog in February! Thanks so much to ALL my readers!  🙂

Favorite Word of the Month ~

kerfuffle  🙂  

Favorite Book In February ~

Deceived by Irene Hannon

A Private Justice Novel

Much love ~

Kathy

 

Hello Peoples! It’s my blog’s birthday!

I got a message from WordPress. My blog is five (5) years old today! YAY! Thanks to all my reader’s, followers, friends, visitors, all of you!!! You’re great!

photo credit ~ unsplash.com

 

Thirteen Chocolates by Agatha Chocolats

A Chandler’s chocolate Box Mystery

My. My. My.  Ulysses Chandler is a famous chocolatier. Oh yes. He’s made his fortune delighting us with decadent treats!  🙂  Chandler has passed away and his mansion in the Smokey Mountains along with his factory need an heir. Well, interestingly enough, there are thirteen heirs, Anna Clementine is one of those individuals. She’s a single mother and works as a waitress. Of course, the heirs are certainly an interesting group of individuals. And! Dangerous! One by one each heir is disappearing and when each one disappears a special chocolate vanishes also. One of the thirteen has nefarious intent.

I feel like it should be dark, a storm brewing and lightening flashing!  🙂  But instead, a blizzard is coming.

It was a good mystery. There was assuredly a hodgepodge of interesting characters. They were certainly a human bunch. There were missing items, a bracelet, earrings, a pipe and a photo. Mmm. Characters were getting bumped off or disappearing. The story got creepy toward the end of the book and there were several great surprises in the story. There were some interesting metaphors and I loved Tess. She had pluck! 4 **** mysterious stars!

Have you read Thirteen Chocolates? Happy Reading!  🙂

Classic Movie Friday!

The Baroness and the Butler (1938)

William Powell   Annabella   Helen Westley   Henry Stevenson   Nigel Bruce

I really liked this film! Johann Porok (William Powell) is the butler in the home of the Prime Minister (Henry Stevenson) of Hungary. The Prime Minister and his family are surprised to discover Porok has been elected to Parliament in a recent election! Porok and the Prime Minister have opposing political views! Good times ensue! Porok wants to continue to be the butler in the Prime Minister’s home. Katrina (Annabella) the Prime Minister’s daughter is shocked and appalled when she discovers their butler is opposing her father in Parliament. Katrina’s father seems to be amused with the entire situation. Her mother (Helen Westley) the Countess is a hoot! This film is great. There’s a brawl in Parliament just to name one amusing incident! Nigel Bruce is always entertaining. And! I can always count on William Powell!

Have you seen The Baroness and the Butler? What are your thoughts?

Ramblings And What Not ~ :)

Hello Peoples! Smile, it’s Monday!

Very early Sunday morning it started snowing. It snowed and it snowed and it snowed! Rick woke up because he thought someone was knocking on our front door. I didn’t hear anything??? He looked outside the window and saw a police car. Mmmm. He intended to go answer the door, but he fell down the stairs!!! And! He cut his hand, badly! I should say, A fall down the stairs is incredibly noisy and I flew out of bed as Rick was pulling himself to his feet, checking body parts. We had to care for his hand immediately, it was bleeding badly. We hurried to the kitchen and put his hand under the running water. I was feeling the effects of witnessing gushing blood, and as such, I was started to feel shaky and just not so good. I quickly checked the front door, no one was there and the police car was gone. Mmm. I raced up the stairs, grabbed the Neosporin and bandages and hopped down the stairs. He was bleeding and we couldn’t get the bleeding to stop, so I got dressed, trudged through the snow and started the car. When I came back inside the house, Rick had wrapped his hand. After he was adorned in his winter coat, I locked up the house and we got in the car and I drove to the hospital. It was still snowing and the streets weren’t plowed, so we moved slowly, our tires crunching through the snow. Fortunately, we live close to the hospital, so it didn’t take very long to arrive at said location. I dropped Rick off at the emergency room door, bloody wrap and all, and I parked our vehicle.

The doctor said, it is a DEEP cut. Apparently, that’s why it wouldn’t stop bleeding. The medical people cleaned it. The doctor stitched it up and wrapped him in a bright pink bandage wrap thing. *ahem* Once again, we were out in the snow, the tires trudging through the accumulation. When we arrived home, I collapsed for awhile. I don’t do well with blood.

Rick is left-handed and he injured his right hand, so he’s good to do whatever. The stitches come out in a few days.

Have a great day!

Much love ~

Kathy

Classic Movie Friday!

Algiers (1938)

Charles Boyer   Hedy Lamarr   Sigrid Gurie

Pepe La Moko (Charles Boyer) is a criminal, hiding in Algiers, in a complex location known as Casbah. He arrived in Algiers from France where he had stolen a fortune in jewels. The French police have arrived in Algiers and are determined to capture and arrest Pepe La Moko but the Casbah is a difficult place to navigate and to locate an individual. However, one crafty Inspector (Joseph Calleia) waited and watched for the opportune moment.

Pepe knows he is already a prisoner in the Casbah and his belief, that he is a prisoner, increase when he meets Gaby (Hedy Lamarr). Gaby reminds him of Paris, where he is a wanted man and can never return. Their relationship causes his lady friend, Ines (Sigrid Gurie) to experience feelings of hurt and jealousy. Not a happy ending.

The quality of this film has a lot to be desired but it was an intriguing story. We thought it was probably filmed on a bioscope hand crank camera!  🙂   Obviously I am no expert.

Enjoy!

Ramblings And What Not ~ I’m Back!

Hello Peoples! Happy Valentine’s Day.  🙂  I’ve been on hiatus for one month. It was an interesting January ~ a January to remember! Brrrr! It was so cold the last two weeks of January. The coldest was -45 degree Fahrenheit temperatures! Rick and I sat by the fire. He played computer games and watched movies on his laptop and I read books. I read twelve books in January! I usually read more books in January than any other month. So, we were toasty warm during our Artic tundra temperatures. The first week of February brought cold temperatures and some snowfall. I look forward to spring!

I purchased a paperback book at a used book sale awhile back and I did read it. I think I’m allergic to my book! It’s the craziest thing. Whenever I tried to read it, I had this irritating allergic reaction. I have decided this reaction makes sense. *ahem* Well, it is a used book. Who knows where it has been??? It may have been in a box in a garage somewhere for months and months. It could have been in a dusty closet for years. It was published in 1971, so it may have been stored under a bed since 1971! Wherever it was and whatever it was exposed to, I am allergic to it! So! I was at the bakery, determined not to have an allergic reaction as I read the book, so, I held the book at my arm’s length and read it at arm’s length. It worked! There was no reaction and I can read at that distance!  🙂  All’s well that end’s well!  haha.

Your favorites at the cottage in January ~

Death In the Stocks by Georgette Heyer ~ January 3, 2019

Classic Movie Friday ~ The Secret of Convict Lake (1951) ~ January 4, 2019

A Memory of Violets by Hazel Gaynor ~ January 4, 2019

My Favorite Book in January ~

Becoming Mrs. Lewis by Patti Callahan

The most captivating book I read in January ~

The Only Woman in the Room by Marie Benedict

Favorite Word of the month ~

chuffed

A BIG thanks to Ness Kingsley for a fun word!

It’s good to be back.  🙂

Much love ~

Kathy

Classic Movie Friday!

I Take This Woman (1931)

Carole Lombard   Gary Cooper

Kay Dowling (Carole Lombard) seems to enjoy creating scandals. She’s a wealthy New York socialite and her father (Charles Trowbridge) is tired of dealing with the scandals she creates. So, he sends her to the ranch in Wyoming until the current scandal blows over. When she arrives in Wyoming, she meets a tall, lean cowboy, Tom McNair (Gary Cooper). In the beginning, I don’t think they really like one another??? She gets this idea in her head that she’s going to make Tom fall in love with her. She is successful, however, she soon realizes she’s also in love with him. So, she remains in Wyoming and Tom and Kay are wed. He takes her to his ranch in the wilds of Wyoming and she has a difficult first year of marriage. She decides to return to New York and divorce Tom. During this tale of ~ the rancher and the wealthy gal ~ Kay’s father has his knickers in a twist and disinherits her. You might be able to guess the rest of the story. Tom travels to New York. She realizes she does love him and the couple return to Wyoming.

I liked it. It was a good film.  🙂  Of course, I can pretty much guarantee if Gary Cooper or Carole Lombard are in the film, I’m going to enjoy the movie.

Stay warm!  🙂  

 

No Escape Claws by Sofie Ryan

~ A Second Chance Cat Mystery ~

“It’s fall in North Harbor, Maine, where Sarah Grayson owns a charming secondhand shop and sells lovingly, refurbished items of all kinds. The shop is always bustling — and not just because a quirky team of senior-citizen detectives works out of it and manages to get in even more trouble than Sarah’s rough-and-tumble rescue cat, Elvis.”

“A cold case heats up when young Mallory Pearson appears at the shop. Mallory’s father is in prison for negligence after her stepmother’s mysterious death, but Mallory believes he is innocent and asks the in-house detectives to take on the case. With Sarah and Elvis lending a paw, the detectives decide to try to give Mallory’s father a second chance of his own.” ~Berkley Prime Crime

This was a good mystery. The only problem ~ it seemed to drag at times and as such, it didn’t keep my attention. The story had some good characters. I liked Mallory. She was loyal to her dad and believed in his innocence throughout the mystery. The interesting senior citizens who investigate the case are certainly entertaining and I found myself chuckling on several occasions as I read the book. Sarah and her brother were an entertaining pair.  🙂  And! The coffin was a nice touch!

The author’s description of Alfred Peterson, the licensed private investigator, made me smile.

“Alfred Peterson was a little bald man with wire framed glasses and pants that were generally hiked up to his armpits.”

The mystery was good and certainly kept me guessing. I had two suspects and one of my suspects was the guilty party. 4 **** stars! I plan to read the books in this series, again in the future.

A BIG thanks to Berkley Prime Crime!

Announcing the winner of the drawing ~

MacKenzie! You won! CONGRATULATIONS! You can find MacKenzie at ~

http://www.mackmarie.com

Happy Reading!  🙂  

 

 

Of Fire And Lions by Mesu Andrews

Publication Date: March 5, 2019

Publisher: Waterbrook & Multnomah

Complimentary copy from Waterbrook through NetGalley.

Well. I am not an expert on Daniel, but it appears to me, this author did her research and did a commendable job presenting the Biblical story. It took me a long time to read this book ~days! So, I recommend that if you choose to read it and I do recommend it, you allow yourself time.

The story is set in 6th century Babylon, so the culture is different. It might take a couple of chapters to become accustom to the names of the characters in the story, although there is a character list in the beginning of the book. I do believe this is a clear story about the faithfulness of Yahweh to his people and Daniel’s strong faith in his God. Daniel’s faith gave him the courage he needed to face any experience while in captivity. I especially liked the author’s telling of Daniel in the lion’s den. Daniel’s faith inspired me to face difficulties with courage! The story is well-written, however at times I thought the chapters ended abruptly. 4.5 **** amazing stars!

I received a complimentary copy of this book from Waterbrook & Multnomah through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.