Continuing on with
I put these little fun gift bags together.More Will Be Forthcoming......
So my sweet friends who are like family to me, arrived yesterday, the Birthday Day...bearing Thai Food, Birthday Cake and Ice Cream...We had...Cocoanut Chicken Soup---
Oh My Lord, is that stuff healing.., I'd say just give it to me intravenously but then I'd miss the incredibly addicting flavor and the soothingness of this fabulous rich yummy unbelievably delicious tasting soup...!
Then....there were some other things...Among them....Chicken Pad Thai and Shrimp Pad Thai....More lucious flavors....
Wonderfully satisfying flavors these Pad Thai's were...I ate the Chicken Pad Thai because I don't eat shrimp very often...I prefer Chicken, quite honestly, anyway...Then, we had some Barbecued Chicken, Thai Style...
And also some Vegetable Beef Fried Rice....extremely yummy!
And then....there were some Mixed Vegetables which were super delicious...(I couldn't find a good picture of this dish...) But, here are a few shots of the table with all the dishes that The Parks Family brought...
This was the Barbecued Chicken, still in 'the box'. There were 5 boxes of this chicken...enough really, for 15 people...we were just 7 people.
This was the Chicken Pad Thai from this fabulous Restaurant...Ichan...Oh my dears....Lovely lovely lovely, beyond words...
Aren't those Happy Birthday plates colorful and adorable, too? So very pretty...the wonderful Seemah Wilder brought them and she also brought the fantastically rich and gorgeous Birthday Cake at the top of this post! Deep Dark Chocolate! What else, right? Here is another shot of the Birthday Plates and some of the food, too, with the very late afternoon sun coming in from the window...
And here, below, are some of 'the usual suspects'....Betty, her son Garrett Parks, and then Dianne Travis and Betty's other son Andy Parks and his wife, Katy Melody, and the lovely dear Seemah Wilder, too....
Dianne and Garrett....He is pouring out all the Chicken Cocoanut Soup from the cartons so that it would all be in one Big Bowl.....that ambrosia of a soup was wolfed down as if none of us had eaten in a week!
And here are Seemah and Dianne arranging more food. You can see my front Patio in the background, with the street beyond that...
And Betty and her daughter in law Katy married to Andy, and then, younger son, Andy himself. They look like they were sort of directing the proceedings here...
And as a special treat Garrett had gotten a lovely Thai Dessert, too.
Mango and Sweet Rice....We each had a tiny bit of this so we wouldn't spoil our appitite for the Birthday Cake Dessert. But this Mango & Sweet Rice was just lovely and delicate and light and the perfect finish to this scrumptious Thai meal. Then, we decided to take a little break before the Birthday Cake so that Betty could go see my blog and especially so she could see my Birthday Post!
And here below is Betty, talking on the phone to Wendy, (Our New Zealand dear one....yes, that Wendy...) who had called from New Zealand to wish me Happy Birthday just as Betty and I were going to go onto my blog so Betty could 'comment'....That was so very sweet of Wendy to do that and a complete surprise for me....And, I even got to say 'Hi' to her littlest one....
And before we had our dessert---(my sinful Birthday Cake)---we went out onto the deck facing the city, and I took this photo of our lovely group...well, at least the Parks Family part of the group...
Andy, Betty, Katy and Garrett. All those trees in the background are covering the houses that are further down on my street where the street curves and before you can see the city view looking East....
This is the view much much later at night...well, really early morning...It's more the view of the lights on the deck which I love because it looks so very festive. Perfect for my Birthday Celebration on this coming Saturday...!
And last but not least...one more photograph of the lovely cake with those two little burning candles on top....the number 7 and the number 5...So there is no doubt which birthday this is! 
Beautiful day, and Beautiful cake...I'm so very grateful to these dear sweet loving people who enrich my life with their true goodness and their true friendship, too...
And to all of you: I just want to thank everyone out there in Cyberspace for joining me at my "Virtual" 75th Birthday Blog Party...all your kind thoughtful words and your great good wishes made this BIG Birthday the happiest most stupendous and wonderful day and evening it could possibly be...You are all so very generous and loving and supportive...I feel very very lucky to know each and every one of you and I thank you all for helping me truly celebrate this incredibly special day in my life...
More will be forthcoming....
****I have put up this TickerFactory goody to remind everyone that the lovely Wendy is coming here to Los Angles all the way fromNew Zealand so she and her husband can go to The Emmy's!****
And one more thing....
I saw this on Ariels Blog...This is just about the cutest little video I've ever seen....ENJOY!!
So happy you could stop by today.
My Staff
The Rather Formal Blair
And
The Rather Clumsy Melinda
With The More Than Able
Very Handsome Walt, Courtesy of Craziequeen
And
The Always Accomodating Clara,
Also Courtesy Of Our Own CQ
Will Be Seeing To Your Every Need.
And I Do Mean "Every".
There Is Lots Of Good Food,
And Anything You Would Like To Drink, Too.
Please Make Yourselves Comfortable
And
Feel Free To Wander In The Garden
Or Anywhere Else Your Heart Desires.
Fireworks Will Be Forthcoming.
And Later...
Birthday Cake
Only
It
Will
Be
Yes, That's Right
Chocolate!
So
WELCOME
And
Enjoy!
****Posting six hours early for all my overseas friends...I will be here for the first three or four hours or so, (Starting at 12:01am, June 27th, L.A. time)...then I will take a "sleep break" and then I'll be back...eat, drink and enjoy each others company. The staff will fulfill your every wish and need....We are here to have oodles and oodles of fun, my dears...for now, see you all, later...Oh, and do talk to each other while I am off in Zzzzzzzzzzzland, or wherever....****
This photograph is the most recent photo of me I have...from my Birthday Party in 2004...it's just a snapshot and it is an 'untouched up' one...and, I have a bra on as I did in that last picture in the shiny material from yeterday's post! (lol) I had to laugh when I read that two people---Lucy and Jamie Dawn thought I had no bra on in that picture---no, I have no bra on now! I actually had never noticed that THAT is how it looks...and I laughed because one of my claims to fame is being the first woman to appear Topless in a play 'on stage' at the Mark Taper Forum at The Music Center, here in Los Angeles....1970!Somewhere I have some photographs of me and my fellow actress, Helen Page Camp, who also had to take off her bra...(after I took off mine, btw)...in the same play...They have been put away for 'safe-keeping' and I'm afraid I do not remember where the hell I put them...it is probably just as well....I have mentioned this somewhere in a previous post...so for now all I will say is...more about that will not be forthcoming at this time...
This was taken at the famed Cocoanut Grove in The Amassador Hotel. Food stained though it is, this was my 16th Birthday, 1947. What a thrill to be here in this now no longer functioning place...it had so much history. The Hotel of course had so much history, too...not the least of which was it being the place where Bobby Kennedy was shot the night of June 4th, 1968...a horrendous night, to say the least. Much later...in the early 1980's I joined the Amassador Hotel's Health and Tennis club and was probably in the best shape of my life during those years...swimming two and three miles a day. This wonderful place was a true haven...an Oasis if you will, in the middle of the city. But back to 1947...They would take these photo's and then bring them to you just before you were ready to depart the club and they would be in this wonderful 'cover'.
Many years later...in the mid 1960's...I saw Barbra Striesand there in that wonderful room...She was so very young at the time...the voice was amazing to say the least, but I remember saying to Scott Marlowe one of the people who I went with...'wait till she has "lived" and experienced a lot in her life...she will be even more phenomenol'...I wasn't wrong about that, was I? (lol)
Since I seem to be posting Birthday Party Pictures, here is a photo of me, and two incredibly talented men...the superb actor, Dick Davalos and the truly amazing and funny Dom DeLuise...this was my 65th Birthday at my dear sweet friend Betty G.'s house....and what a bash that was! It is almost impossible to fathom that it was ten years ago...! I have no idea what I was laughing at, but I sure was laughing hard!
At that same party, here is another photograph. Way over to the extreme left is the brilliant Painter Morris Broderson who I have writtten about and plan to again, soon....We are standing outside on Betty's back patio...Betty has her back to the camera. 
Next to her on her left is her older son, Garrett, then me, and a side-view of Kenny Welch, and just sort of behind him to the side is the brilliantly talented actress/writer Leslie Caveny, and last but not least, Betty's other son, Andy, who is also a very very talented actor. He is on the far right of the picture. I have a Bra on here, too though it sure doesn't look like it. Low slung, you know? Always was and will be...worse now that I am 'getting on'...
This is a milestone photo too, but for different reasons. This was the 'signing of the Marriage License' photo, at Garrett Parks and Karen Culliver's Wedding, at which I was the "Officiant" in my capacity as a Minister in the Universal Life Church---which is no Church at all. 
Because it is Non-Demoninational that makes me the perfect choice if people do not want a religious wedding but they do want to have a ceremony that covers many religious affiliatios...if that is the case, then I'm your Gal! Or in this case, I was and am a close friend of the family, which makes for a very personal ceremony. This was November, 1991. A beautiful wedding in the back garden at Betty's home in Studio City.
And here is another important wedding picture: Audrey & Michael Franks. Michael's parents are very very old friends of mine. In fact, I met Michael's Dad, Danny, in 1954, before he met his dear wife Ruth...and, I was at Michael's briss...
Now how is that for spanning some very important times in a young man's life? Ruth and Danny and three of their six children knew my mother, too...So, within the space of two weeks time I officiated at two weddings that had so much meaning for me as well as for the people getting married. Both were very emotional experiences. This was October, 1991.
And back to a Birthday Photograph. This is a Birthday Lunch at Harrod's, in London, 1993. I am sitting with Charley Berliner and the photograph is being taken by Betty's couson Carol Smith, who had arranged for the Pipers to come by and play Happy Birthday to me! 
Now how fantastically special is that? This was on Saturday, June 26th, the day before my Birthday which as many of you may recall was spent in The Cotswolds....
More on the morrow, my dear ones....
****Reminder: The "Virtual" Birthday Gathering will begin at 12:01am on June 27th and go till around 10:00am on June 28th...And dear Wendy is going to bring her special Virtual Cookies...my favorite, of coyrse...Chocolate Chocolate Chunk!****
This was my mother's father, Grandpa Berman, who of course none of us ever new because he died when my mother was just nine years old. A rather dapper gentleman wasn't he? It was, I believe 1908 when he died and they say he was so huge that they had to build a special coffin for him. It is suspected...well, more than suspected...that he had Diabetes and probably Bright's Disease, too. After his death Mema went on by herself supporting her two young daughters. She had had a baby son who died when he was about a year old. So my mother had had a brother as well as her sister Ruth. Here is Jen The Hen when she was probably about 19 or 20 years old...I'm really not sure about that...But this is a photograph of her that all of us have always loved...She was really very beautiful, wasn't she?
She had on her 'nurses' uniform. She worked in a doctors office during this period. She wasn't a trained nurse but certainly acted in the capacity of nurse-helper-appointment keeper. Things were simpler back then. Most doctors had offices by themselves and did not have 'partners'. And if they had a person in the office helping them, it was usually just one woman and she did everything. This was maybe 1920-1921.Another really pretty picture of Jen The Hen...this was taken maybe a few years later than the above photograph. I think mother and daddy were already married by this time...again, I'm not sure of the timing here...I just know I love this photograph of her.
I don't think she thought of herself as a pretty woman. I know that the only man I ever saw her 'with' was Daddy...and I don't think she ever got over him. They had such a long history...they knew each other from the time they were nine years old...(I think she met him soon after her father died---and that death was a big blow to her...)..They were married for twenty years. And as far as I know, he was the only man she gave her heart to for all those many many years...and when it was over, in certain ways it was never really over for her, even though there was so very much about their relationship that was a struggle and stressful, etc., and in so many ways what was important to each of them was very very different. This next photograph was taken when my parents took a trip to Europe and visited the place where Daddy grew up in Latvia. They took his mother with them so that she could visit a lot of the family that was still there at that time. This was 1928....
Mother is standing in the row behind all those older ladies who are seated...she is almost in the center in a dark dress with what looks like a flower on her dress. Daddy's mother is seated on the far right of the photograph and Daddy is in the back row the second man from the right. I do not know who any of these other people are except I am sure they are relatives...and so here was the little poor boy who left Latvia at six years old, now grown up and a man, who lived out The American Dream, and had come back to visit 'the old country'. The little boy that 'made good' in America. Later...before the Nazi's got too horrible, Daddy sent for all of his relatives so they could come to this country.
It is interesting to note that I never understood why our life style changed so drastically after my parents split up. It took me till I was almost fifty years old to realize the truth of why our life changed so much. It was because he took our life-style with him. You see, it was never for us...it was only for him. A very very painful realization. So I had to finally come to terms with three very important words. 'He didn't care'.
Skipping around in time as I like to do...here is yet another photograph when I was around three years old, taken at the same time as that very sweet picture of me with Gordon. Here I am alone, well...not completely alone....
There is this little dog that I am holding onto with one of my hands anyway---for dear life. Look at how I am clutching that hard little creature. I honestly have no memory of this toy dog except for these photograph. Gee, I am really cute!
So then I say....how did that little girl become this mature woman?
And a 'touched up' picture, at that! This was taken by Seemah Wilder's husband Bill Idelson...and the lines I saw on my cheek...oy...Well, this was for 'publicity' once again, so I couldn't leave all those lines there...Well, since I am going to be F***ing 75 years old in a few days....here is another shot, taken at the same time but completely un-touched....
Well...what the hell....let it all hang out...sort of...right? There are a lot more of those chicken tracky things on my face now than there was in these photo's...Oy. The 'touched up' photo is the one I use if need be for publicity....it is what appears in the S.T.A.G.E. Ad Journal where my Bio is....I think it is time for a new one.
I always liked these next pictures...again, this was supposed to be for publicity for my first one-woman Art Show at Ankrum Gallery, 1968-69...I was really really thin here and I love that my hair is blowing in the wind.
I don't like that I have a cigerette in my hand...the always ever 'present' cigarette....It would be just a little over a year from these photo's that I gave them up completely and forever. It is now 35 1/2 years that I have not smoked. I wish I could tell you that has made a difference in my lungs. I can't. I can say, I would have been dead if I hadn't given them up when I did.
This is a reproduction of a painting that was on the announcement of this show that I had in San Francisco, November, 1973. The colors are all much brighter and vibrant, but....it's better than nothing.
It was a fantastic Opening. So very many people came up to San Francisco from Los Angeles. We all stayed in the same hotel and I had a big dinner for all the people who had made 'the trip'. I found some other photo's of the opening just tonight...I haven't downloaded them yet so I'll have to post them at another time....but, here is just one.
That important man, again.....
More will be revealed on the morrow....
And just before I go....here is this appropriate thingy:
Your Birthdate: June 27
You are a spiritual soul - a person who tries to find meaning in everything.
You spend a good amount of time meditating, trying to figure out life.
Helping others is also important to you. You enjoy social activities with that goal.
You are very generous and giving. Yet you expect very little in return.
Your strength: Getting along with anyone and everyone
Your weakness: Needing a good amount of downtime to recharge
Your power color: Cobalt blue
Your power symbol: Dove
Your power month: September
****And so...another little reminder of the coming "Virtual" Birthday Party...Get out your Glad Rags...and your Bling...(Craziequeen is dustimg hers off as we spreak! ) Remember, the fun begins at 12:01am, June 27th, and will continue till about 10:00am, on June 28th...I'm getting very excited....!
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