The European tour continues, sort of

 

Jordan's shipboard view

It’s not actually Europe. Jordan embarked at Brest, France on a ship from the Ponant cruise line bound for Iceland. The neat part about the cruise is that instead of going out to sea and around Ireland, the ship is going up the channel between England and Ireland, so she will get to see England and Scotland on the starboard side and Ireland on the port, including the city of Dublin. I am pretty sure they won’t disembark, but she’ll get a glimpse. And since she wasn’t along when her older brother and sister and I went to Scotland, I am glad she’ll get this glimpse of the land of my ancestors.

Of course, she has a glass of wine in her hand in most pictures, but she also has apparently ordered hake again, this in a lovely presentation on a bed of vegetables. Since she likes it so well, I checked Central Market, but when you search for hake all kinds of weird things come up, like baking powder and a plant-based protein chocolate shake. I love shopping at Central Market, but their website frustrates me.

Hake with vegetables

Meanwhile back at home, I’m busy planning menus of things that Central Market does carry, as opposed to hake. Today Christian fixed a pot roast with carrots, onion, potatoes, and onion soup. Delicious, and a good thing to have when Jordan’s out of town because she would say it’s heavy. I’m going to make a shopping list for coronation chicken salad and old-fashioned pea salad for Saturday—I presume there will be coronation reruns Saturday night.

So tonight I’ll decide what to cook for three other nights, so that we have supper the first night Jordan’s home. She definitely won’t want to run to the grocery store that first day back. Menu planning is one of the great pleasures of my life and the reason I cancelled the Home Fresh order that Jamie so sweetly gave me. Jordan forwarded an email, apparently unrelated to Jamie’s gift, that said she had somehow been awarded eighteen free meals. We jointly agreed not to claim them.

Meanwhile, it was a beautiful day in Fort Worth—sunny and about eighty degrees. Subie and Phil came for happy hour, and we sat on the patio. Sophie overcame her bad manners of the last time they were here and was sweet and docile, except for a couple of barking periods. Subie and I agreed she likes for us to be outside. Christian came home in time to join us and recounted his trip to San Miguel, where Subie and Phil visited a number of years ago.

We also touched on politics, so here’s my two cents for the day: If you live in Fort Worth District 9, please vote for Elizabeth Beck. She’s been pro-active for neighborhoods and an active council member. I know nothing about her opponent, Pam Boggess, save for a slur kind of post on Facebook which I will not repeat. But Beck deserves re-election. No sense changing horses in mid-stream for no good reason. Maddie Parker appears to have endorse both candidates, which cancels out her endorsement.

My other political note for the day is that I am delighted that Colin Allred is going to take on Ted Cruz in the next senatorial elections. Allred has been a rising star in the Democratic caucus in the House and takes a risk by challenging the incumbent, but Beto O’Rourke came so close to beating Cruz last time that it seems possible to unseat the senator. I am cheering for Allred.

Otherwise, a workday. I am revising my Helen Corbitt manuscript, pulling 3,000 words out of 28,000 for an article. Today I went through seven chapters, choosing article material and fixing in my mind the theme of the article—how Corbitt and the Zodiac Room at Neiman’s changed Texans’ palate. I even think there may be a second article buried in that material, but I will have to find a food magazine that is an appropriate outlet. Fun to have a project.

So that’s my day. How was yours?

My good news and a weather-challenged dog

 

Sophie watching for happy hour company. 

Friday, my editor at Rowman and Littlefield wrote me about catalog copy for my forthcoming book, The Most Land, The Best Cattle: The Waggoners of Texas, due out in September. I had been a little uncertain about it because I had not heard a word from the new editor. The entire operation got behind when they closed for six months at the beginning of pandemic, and though I had been assured all was back on schedule, I was nervous. We exchanged emails for over an hour, tweaking this detail and that, until we were finally pleased with what we had done. I wrote her that it was fun to work it out with her, and she replied with “Ditto.” I felt I had established a good relationship with her.

That sent me on a search or the Rowman and Littlefield Two Dot catalog for Spring—and there they were! Two reprints of my historical novels written and published in the 1990s—Libbie, a fictional biography of Elizabeth Bacon Custer, wife of George Armstrong of Little Big Horn fame—or infamy. I toyed for years with writing a sequel, detailing the thirty-some years Libbie was a widow. She spent every one of those years cementing her husband’s role as a martyr/hero. It was only after her death that the truth about Custer began to be revealed. But I never could make a compelling story out of it.

Less is probably known about Jessie Benton Frémont, the daughter of longtime Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton, a spokesman for western expansion, and the wife of John Charles Frémont, explorer, mining entrepreneur, the failed military leader who tried to upstage President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, and failed governor of the Arizona Territory. Frémont is mostly remembered for the Bear Flag Revolt in California. Theirs’ was a passionate love story but also the story of a man whose reach exceeded his grasp.

I found both these women fascinating, loved studying them, though I realized what I was writing about were strong women married to men with less resilience than their wives possessed. These two novels will be out in June and are in the current Rowman and Littlefield/Globe Pequot catalog. Other reprints will follow in 2022.

No bookstore signings, unless the pandemic goes away a lot quicker than most of us believe, but you can be sure that I will bombard you with links and the like when the books are back in print.

Last night, when it was damp but not too cold, Sophie was earnestly trying to tell me something. She didn’t bark, but she made a lot of guttural sounds with great feeling, all the while staring intently at me. She had food, water, a treat, and the outside door was open—I couldn’t imagine what else she wanted, but I desperately wished I spoke dog. Jordan asked if I wanted to take our wine outside, and I said no, it was too chilly—the temperature was then dropping fairly rapidly as it can here in Texas. Jordan nodded at Sophie and suggested, “It may help with that.”

Well, magic solution. She ran out, then ran back to check that I was coming, and then settled down on the patio to watch the gate for company. How to tell her no company was coming. She just really wanted happy hour on the patio.

Tonight she tried the same thing again, but I told her with certainty that it was too cold. We weren’t going out. Then neighbors Mary and Joe came bringing firewood they thought would fit in our fire pit. Sophie ran out the door ecstatically, so happy to see company, however brief their stay. We are hoping the firewood will keep us warm on Tuesday night when we gather for ladies’ night on the patio. Sophie is included as one of the ladies.

There is good news tonight, what with the vaccine and the SCOTUS dismissal of Ken Paxton’s frivolous lawsuit—I wish the media would call it Paxton’s lawsuit and not Texas’. Most of us in Texas want no part of it. But anyway, the good news is tempered by the difficulty of delivering the vaccine and by the fact that there was a big rally in support of trump tonight, though I am pleased it barely made a blip on the network news. It’s easy to wonder if this upheaval will ever end, but be of good faith, my friends. It will. We will get to a new and different normal.

A perfectly rosy day

 

   

 That’s the kind of day I’ve had—a perfectly rosy day. This morning, the sun shone so brightly that I thought I might have to wear sunglasses inside. And though I thought the prediction was for low seventies, the temperature soon climbed near eighty. Balmy and gorgeous with a slight breeze.

The main event today was a visit from my longtime friend, Linda. We’ve probably known each other over forty years, with the friendship increasing as we grew older. We’ve seen each other through bad times and good, and we can laugh together about ex-husbands (mine) and deceased husbands (hers). We have old friends in common and feel close to each other’s kids.

Linda lives in Granbury. If you shopped the square a few years ago and went into an upscale gift store called Almost Heaven, that was Linda’s store. After too many years, she got out of retail and, like me, is now retired. Having grown up in Granbury and lived there most but not all of her adult life, she hates Texas summers and bought herself a tiny condo in Taos. And though I encouraged her to write—she’s good at it—she found her passion in painting, probably because of one teacher in Taos. So anyway, between distance to Granbury and her long absences in Taos, we don’t get together nearly as much as we’d like. Pandemic complicates things. We were masked at first and socially distanced this afternoon. One thing Linda said resonated with me. She talked about how lucky we are that each of us has our passion—her painting and my writing. Our passions keep us young.

I fixed tuna salad—ubiquitous at my cottage—and Jordan served the three of us lovely salad plates with tuna, cottage cheese, a pickle, hearts of palm, and a scone to top it off. She laughed that she still has her waiting skills—she can hand carry several dishes at once. We loved it and have already decided on the menu for our next get-together—salmon croquettes (I’ll fix those) and salad with blue cheese dressing (Jordan’s specialty).

Sophie is an important part of my patio entertainment. She wanders from person to person, only occasionally venturing beyond the patio to scold an errant squirrel or investigate something. The patio is her territory, and she is most happy there.

After Linda headed home, Sophie and I had a long and lovely nap. I slept so deeply!

Tonight, while we wait for whatever Christian will do with chicken, Jordan is in my tiny kitchen, making the cheeseball that has been a holiday tradition all her life and most of mine. I remember Christmas Eve when I was quite young—we went to friends of my parents for a huge buffet. Two items I remember are marinated shrimp (I’m now allergic and can’t eat those) and cheeseball made with blue cheese, cream cheese, and Old English, which they no longer sell. We use Velveeta—shhh! Add a few other ingredients, chill and serve with crackers. But it’s not easy to mix all those cheeses. I’m glad Jordan is doing it and not me.

I just turned on the news. Full of the horror of Covid19. Two terrible things are threatening our country, our people and our way of life—the virus and the political upheaval caused by trump’s attempt at a coup. In my cottage, I feel apart from all the turmoil sweeping the country. I won’t tempt fate by being smug about being isolated and safe, but I do feel like I’m in a bubble that allows me rosy days.

This and that around the cottage

 

Sophie and neighbor Greg Smith
enjoying the last of patio weather

We are enjoying the last of patio weather. My Canadian daughter and her husband came by the other night because, as she said, she knew cooler weather was coming and she didn’t know how they’d be able to see me once it was too cool for the patio. We have made full use of the relative safety of outdoor entertaining (in tiny bunches) during quarantine. Cooler weather will present a problem. The low table on the patio actually is a fire pit with a wooden, removable top—but with a fire pit, you toast one side and freeze the other. Not conducive to prolonged, casual visits. Christian has seen some outdoor heaters with reflective back panels at Costco and says he’ll come home with one soon. Meantime this evening we are expecting two sets of neighbors.

I keep finding appetizer recipes that intrigue me—like one with anchovies parsley, and mayo—but we have not yet gotten back to chip and dip type dishes. When Jordan does that for friends, she provides individual small spoons—a lot of trouble.

We had an uninvited guest the other night, though we are still puzzled by identity. On Saturday morning, Jordan noticed one of the plants sitting on the deck was nearly destroyed, something had taken out a swatch of the pettas that line the front of the deck, and that same something dug a hole in the deconstructed granite that covers a small strip close to the house where nothing will grow. I suspect either a possum or a coon, but we are puzzled. The yard is fenced, gate closed—if there’s a gap large enough for a coon or possum to get in, that gap is large enough for Sophie to get out (Jordan’s dogs are not inclined to wander and, in truth, Soph is less interested these days—she seems to have decided she should stay put where she has a good thing).

But do possums climb fences? Coons? It’s a four-foot hurricane fence. I presume the critter came in close to the point of its destruction, which would be by the gate, but I always check the gate morning and evening. And to reach that inner gate, they’d need access to the driveway—a six-foot fence and an electric driveway gate. I can imagine a raccoon digging and being destructive, but do possums do that too? We have had possums even traveling along the high wires at the back of the property—hmm, guess that answers my question about them climbing. I work so hard to make folks believe possums are our friends, I’d hate to be disappointed.

Cleaning house is not one of my skills, and now that I need the walker, it is beyond me. We had a lovely woman who came every two weeks ever since I’ve been out here, but we’ve stopped that because of COVID. So Saturday she was to come for only the second professional cleaning since last March—bless Jordan who has been doing what’s needed all along. I was going to pack up my computer and work in the main house while she was here, and yes, I was excited. You know that old joke about cleaning the house so the cleaning lady can come? That’s what we did, though I left dishes in the sink because I knew she’d wash them, clothes on the bed because I knew she put them in the laundry, garbage to be carried out. She called in sick with allergies. I cannot tell you how disappointed I am. I so looked forward to that smell of a house that’s just been thoroughly cleaned.

Last weekend with exquisitely poor timing, I made a pot of chili for Sunday supper. It was in the nineties—hardly chili weather. Today on what promises to be the last really hot day, I have made chicken soup. I need to coordinate with the weather forecasters.  I have the patio door open to enjoy the lovely day, and I don’t look forward to keeping it closed. I’ve been coaching Sophie—always in the fall, she forgets she knows how to go in and out if I leave the door open just a crack. She can paw it open to go out, though when she forgets she flings herself against it in frustration, thereby closing it securely.

Guess we all have some adaptation to cooler weather on our horizons. I’d keep it Spring and Fall all day long, with daylight savings time, if I could.

Flies, mosquitoes, and fun on the patio

So glad to have these two on the patio

Last night, Jamie, my third child and second son, came from Frisco bring Maddie, my oldest grandchild. At twenty-one, she is a rising senior at Colorado University in Boulder. To say that I was delighted to see them is an understatement. Maddie, on crutches after a recent hip surgery, came over to me and asked, “Am I allowed to hug you? I’ve been quarantining.” Who could say no to a question like that? Hugs all around were most welcome.

Even though it was blistering hot, the patio was comfortable—fan and bug zapper going, shaded all day long so it never really heats up. We sat out there quite a while, catching up and laughing a lot. Remember that thing on Facebook where a dress was shown and some saw it as gold, while others saw it as blue. Jamie had never heard of it, so Maddie pulled it up and a lively discussion followed with some yelling “Blue” and others contending “Gold.” Jamie decided it was a conspiracy on our part to make him look silly.

The flies and mosquitoes finally drove us inside. Mosquitoes don’t much bother me, but apparently Jamie is a target. But we have a horrible fly problem this summer, and as Jordan says there’s not that much dog poop in the yard. Christian ordered some fly traps that are very effective—bottles that attract the flies. But they stink to high heaven, so you have to move them if you want to sit outside. I did order some wine tops to cover our glasses—I was tired of throwing out wine because a fly drowned in it.

We ordered chicken enchiladas from Enchiladas Olé and ended up with a banquet—beans, rice, the best queso I’ve had maybe ever, and Jordan’s freshly made brownies for dessert. Jamie and Maddie stayed until almost ten, and it was a thoroughly fun evening.

Yesterday was a big day for two of my grandsons. Sawyer, sixteen and in Austin, got his braces off. Sorry I couldn’t grab the picture from Facebook, but last night we had a big controversy over whether he looks like his mom or his dad. As a toddler, he was the image of his mom, but as he’s grown and lost that pre-puberty weight, he looks more and more like his dad—to me. Jamie held out for his sister, saying Sawyer looks like Megan.

Cousins! She used to change his diaper
When did he grow taller than her?

Jacob got his first debit card and went through the procedure of calling into validate it, with his mom monitoring every moment. He is off today for a week in Colorado with neighbors who have two daughters his age. They’ll be in a house with a swimming pool and then one with a fishing river in the back yard. Jacob was at loose ends—what high school kid isn’t these days?—so it’s good for him to get away.

Me? I’m still working on my lectures about creating a chef. Wrote a brief—really brief—history of American cuisine in the twentieth century yesterday and today worked on a supplemental reading list. Enjoying this project a lot.

Tonight I’m dining alone. Jordan and Christian are eating leftovers, but I decided to do myself a lamb chop that was in the freezer and use that zucchini languishing in the vegetable drawer for a casserole. It’s cooking right now, and the cottage smells of butter and melted parmesan—so good.

Looking forward to an evening with the book I’m reading—Deadlines, the first novella in Susan Wittig Albert’s Enterprise trilogy. Mystery fans may know Susan as the author of the longstanding China Bayles series. The trilogies—this is the second—put some of the secondary characters from China’s books front and center. Entertaining reading.

Patio and book day

Jordan and Christian worked on the yard this afternoon. It’s that time of year when the pecan tress drops those “worms” all over. You can blow them off in the morning and by mid-afternoon, the patio is covered again. Sophie, with her woolly coat, brings dozens of them into the house—this morning I could follow a trail where she went from French doors, down the hall, and into the bedroom to get into my still-unmade bed, where she dropped more “worms.”

Jordan was so proud that she cleaned the patio while I napped, but by the time I got up, it was littered again. She spray-painted our two metal flamingoes. The paint had been the subject of great controversy. Jacob painted the small one a year or so ago, with a Pepto-Bismol spray paint that was way too pink. I insisted we go to the hardware for a better shade, but that was all they had. So our big flamingo is now an unnatural pink.

I am reminded of my friend, Carol, a purist about many things who once complained, “Why are all my friends’ gardens sprouting this tacky Mexican tin art?” Guilty!

We sat on the patio tonight for a pre-dinner glass of wine. Lovely, peaceful, and green—but those worms dropped all around us. Luckily, none landed in the wine.

Sometimes I feel Sunday is a good day to dedicate to a book, and that’s what I did today, reading most of Ruth Reichl’s Save Me the Plums, the title taken from that marvelously intimate poem by William Carlos Williams. This is Reichl’s memoir of her tenure as editor-in-chief of Gourmet magazine. I wouldn’t call it charming, but I would call it mesmerizing. She is honest and frank about her own insecurities as she ventured into the corporate world, one where she was never completely at home. She admits to anxiety attacks, feelings of inadequacy, guilt about her mothering skills—all this makes her so human.

The memoir is in a way an exposé about corporate America, the kind of revelation that makes me grateful for my small-time, no-pressure, no-big-success writing and publishing career. But it is also a book about food, and Reichl is a skilled food writer, one who can talk unselfconsciously about carousels or explosions of flavor in her mouth, bread that makes you think of a forest on a sunny day, flavors that reverberate. I think I’m a fairly adventuresome eater, but she relishes things I would never try, like squid guts and cod sperm.

A few recipes are scattered throughout the text. In spite of the exotic food she eats and her extensive knowledge, the recipes for such things as jeweled chocolate cake or spicy noodles are easily accessible for the average home cook, a thing she kept in mind during her years at Gourmet.

As in most of her books, the shadow of Reichl’s mother hangs over this one. A troubled woman who suffered from grandiose desires and frequent depression. As Reichl enters the Four Seasons restaurant, she remembers how her mother loved going there for a martini and wished they could afford to go for dinner. It made me realize I under-appreciated the one time in my life that I dined in that hallowed spot.

But there was also Reichl’s father—a quiet, gentle man, a book designer with a marvelous understanding of typography and the importance of the interior of a book (or magazine) but also a clear recognition that cover art was not his forté.

Reichl’s style is casual, chatty, friendly. Reading her memoir is like reading a novel, only you know the end—and it’s not good. I haven’t quite gotten there yet, but the handwriting is on the wall.

Me? I wish in another life, I could have a career like Reichl’s, only without the corporate pressure. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

The details of daily living

Have you noticed how the details of daily living get in the way of the things you really want to do? I don’t mean cooking and cleaning the kitchen and laundry and making the bed. I mean reorganizing your closet—or your files, both of which have been heavy on my mind lately. And yet I’m aware that doing them will take from my writing time, the business I devote my days to.

The gas company is complicating life. They are replacing our meter and digging huge holes on our property. We sit on caliche, so I know it’s hard digging for them. Friday, I couldn’t go grocery shopping with Jordan—our weekly outing—because they had our driveway and the neighbor’s blocked, and she couldn’t drive up here to get me. Today a friend was coming for lunch but called from the street with the same problem. “I’ll go bring you lunch,” she said, but I told her to come on up the driveway on foot, and I’d make tuna salad. No sooner had I opened the tuna than they moved their equipment and told her they’d keep the drive free if we wanted to go out. Too late. We had tuna, avocado, pickles, and tomatoes. And probably a better visit than we would have had in a restaurant. Tomorrow, same story, yet another verse. I hope they’ll free the driveway so I can go out to lunch.

Late this afternoon, Jordan came in and announced she was here to work on my closet. I dropped everything and joined her—mostly as a spectator, since reaching clothes in the closet is a real stretch for me—no pun intended. We didn’t discard much—three things and a bunch of hangers—but she pulled all the spring and summer tops to one side, and put the pants on a low bar where I can reach them. I folded winter-like pants and put in a drawer where I’d discovered space. For a long time, I couldn’t bend enough to open the drawers on the buffet or whatever that serves as bedroom drawers for me. Today I could—the drawers are long, so I have to do one handle and then the other until I get it open enough to pull the center out evenly.  But now I can bend enough to do that. Every time I do something new, I feel inordinately proud.

I’m almost afraid to comment on what lovely weather we’re having, for fear if I enjoy it too much it will go away (is that an old-fashioned Puritanical superstition or not?). But tonight, after closet organizing, we sat on the patio with wine. So pleasant, it was seven before we came in and I fixed my dinner. Spinach fettucine with butter, lemon, garlic, anchovy and lots of shaved pecorino.

MY goal tonight is to proof one more short story—more about that later. But now I must get to it.

Laughter amidst the blessings

Thanksgiving at the Alter/Burton house

Almost a perfect day—sunny, just the right temperature, You’d have thought it was October’s bright blue weather instead of almost the end of November. And Thanksgiving. At our house, it was a perfect holiday.

Kids riding bikes, playing tetherball and dodgeball and football and other things I didn’t recognize.

Football teams-oops, how did Aunt Lisa sneak in there?

Maybe because she doesn't look an older than her nieces and nephews

Boys, temporarily not into mischief

My two oldest granddaughters with aunts Jordan and Lisa

Adults sitting lazily on the patio, some reading, most visiting…and with my French doors open I was part of the conversation yet removed. My sons frying turkey and chickens, while another turkey roasted inside.

Boys at the fryers

For me, deskwork done, peanut butter for lunch in anticipation of a big dinner, a nice nap, and then time spent on the patio.

Christian and Judy on patio

Happens every time—I get out there, which requires some difficulty, and everybody leaves. The kind of day where you just exist, do what you want, and enjoy the pleasant laziness of it. Inside the girls were cooking, setting a beautiful table (clear plastic plates on chargers worked just fine, thank you), and preparing a lavish feast.

At dinner, ten adults at one table and seven children at the family room table. Wonderful and very traditional dinner--Megan made dairy-free gravy for me—I could have eaten a pint. Jordan mashed potatoes with Smart Balance dairy-free butter and yogurt, and I had crisp fresh green beans.

After dinner, our one guest, Chandry who is more family than not, suggested everyone go around the table telling what they were thankful for about me. The moment could have succumbed to sentimentality, but instead great hilarity and long-winded stories followed, with lots of banter and much toasting with wine. A recurring them was how grateful we all were that we remain so close. A moment to treasure.

Hope you all had a good day too. Life s really good, and I am thankful.

Concrete lessons

My new living space has lots of windows and light. Most of the windows are covered with paper until the blinds come in, but the French doors across from my desk and the window to the right are bare. As a result, I’m like a fish in a gold bowl—except there’s usually no one out there to see. Today there was a whole crew of concrete people—preparing to pour the patio, taking up the old sidewalk and getting ready to pour a new one. I was treated to a fascinating study in people’s behavior and a construction process.

These men work hard. They were here when I got up at 8:30—okay, I overslept—and some were still working at 5:30 tonight. They work with picks and sledgehammers, slamming them into the ground, picking up huge chunks of concrete and pitching them into some kind of motorized wagon that disposes of them. I saw them standing around frequently and figured they had to take breaks from that hard labor. They churn up the dirt, then rake it and pounds it flat, painstaking work. By the end of the day they had made an absolute mess of my back yard, which was already a mess. But the forms were in place, and I could see where the patio and curving walkway will be.

I had intended to ask neighbor Greg to mow the grass in back today, but he came back to the cottage before I could do that and said there was so little grass anyway he meant to go after it with the weed eater. The worker mens (a grandchild’s phrase) even tore up my large, flourishing turk’s cap but Greg says you can’t kill them, so I guess it will bloom again.

Today’s work was not as noisy as I’d dreaded but they apparently cut through concrete because occasionally the air was thick with a white powder—that can’t be healthy. It was that way when the physical therapist came, and I knew he intended for me to walk down the ramp. I balked, because I didn’t want to go out in that thick dust.

 We walked in the house. I asked if he was comfortable with me using the walker when home alone, and he said he was. “Are you?” he asked. I figured I have to be, because if I don’t start walking more, I’ll never walk again. And the surgeon recommended a lot more walking. So watch my dust! (Bad pun)

On a completely unrelated note, my Scottish heart beat faster tonight. I found on Facebook a lovely rendition of “Loch Lomand.” I can remember singing it with my dad on one of our piano nights. We had a book of folk songs-I have it still—and would sing the Scottish ones with special fervor. Dad loved “Loch Lomand.” His signature song on the piano was “Red Wing.” I can still sing the chorus to that one. What a fine memory to have.

This is my fourth night in the cottage, and I am still happy as a clam. Tonight my dining pal Betty brought spaghetti from Chadra—so delicious. I am one lucky lady.