valentina

The way that I see this, you didn't "make" him do anything. He chose to do it, and if you hadn't been on the scene, something else probably would have been the impetus to leave that relationship. It might have been another person, or a job that took him far away, or something. It's probably good that you didn't end up with this guy, because it sounds like the relationship drained too much out of you, and your Mister is so good for you. But you didn't force the other guy into anything, he wanted to go there, and things like that happen... often, a lot more than we suspect. ETA: What's the little speech that Nicholas Cage gives in "Moonstruck" when they're walking home from the opera? He says something to the effect that "we're not here to make things perfect. We are here to ruin ourselves and love the wrong people...." I've always remembered the gist of that speech because it's such an honest portrayal of what we're all about. So like indarkmoon said, things like this make us human, and you can't feel too guilty about that.

In the imp, Harlot is rose with a cinnamon stick nearby. When it goes on my body, considering my ability to amp up rose fragrances, it's naturally a very spicy, rosy smell. It dries down as a very strong, spiced rose, but with the rose aroma predominating. I was hoping that the cinnamon would take over, because I love cinnamon, but it's my body and it's rose. 'Nuf said. While it's not for my body, I do make potpourri with rose petals, and this might be an ideal oil for that purpose. It's not an overly sweet rose in this blend, and I think of Harlot as being a really great fall-into-winter rose-based scent for those of you who love roses. It has enough spice and zing to make it very distinct from the more delicate or sweeter spring-into-summer tea rose-based scents.

In the bottle, the Mouse's Long and Sad Tale is predominantly sweet pea and vanilla. After I put it on, the sweet pea amps up, along with the sandalwood. I waited for a while for the amber and the vanilla to kick in, and I'll be darned if they didn't. I was so positive I'd love this scent, and my short and sad tale is that my body can't wear it well. Somehow the sandalwood and sweet pea compete with each other, and it creates a rather bitter sweet pea sort of smell, and while it isn't terrible, it's not something that I'd want to wear. And the sandalwood and sweet pea, bullies that they are, don't burn off in the interest of allowing the other components to move foward. Damn! It really is a lovely little scent in the bottle, very feminine and innocent, and I think it would be perfectly lovely on someone who enjoyed sweet, foody scents with an exotic undertone.

Dormouse, in the imp, is a crisp, sparkling scent. There is absolutely nothing "muddy" about it, as far as my nose is concerned! Once it's on my body, it begins as tea with a bit of green behind it. Upon drydown, and for about 2 hours thereafter, it reminds me of a crisp tea blend that includes both black, green and herbal tea smells. It's still very crisp, very clean, pleasantly sharp and distinct. The longer it wears on my body, the more the tea aromas dissapate, and after about 3 hours, what lingers is predominatly peony with a green, herbal background. How interesting -- on my body, the tea components overpower the peony, but once they burn off, the peony is still there! And while it's a sweet, floral scent, it's not overwhelming or cloying and the herbs help give it a bit of a bite. To me, this begins as the ultimate clean scent that eventually morphs into a clean floral scent that's very feminine and soft.

The other day I received catalogs/advertising mailings from Victoria's Secret, High Country Gardens and Advance Auto Parts. They were not addressed to "Resident," they were addressed to me. I rather liked the diversity. It made me picture a woman in her VSC "Pink" brand shorts and a bra top, waxing and detailing her car next to her xeriscaped garden. (Did you think I was going into a discussion of bikini waxing and "bush trimming" and such? For shame! Although the way I normally carry on, I can hardly blame you.) But you know, that really could be me, except I'd wear a sports bra and not some fussy VSC number that would be easily mussed by car wax. I would also be more inclined to be seen in oversized cargo shorts. Yesterday I went to the men's department and got a pair of cargo shorts made out of camo material. They were on sale. As indarkmoon would say, man oh manpants, what a deal! And in the car detailing category, Zymol car wax is really good; it's my favorite. You pay more but it's worth it. It makes the vehicles shine like nobody's business. Detailing cars is rather fun; I'm not obsessive like some men can be about such things, but there is something rather soothing about fussing around with your car on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon. I even drink a beer when I'm doing it, although I eschew listening to baseball or football games; I usually have my car CD player going with my music of choice on. And xeriscaped gardens are low water-use gardens, and I'm all about that. Yeah, the colors may not be as brilliant and the blooms not as showy, but I'm all about preserving the ground and surface water supply. I love resilient plants and flowers, I do not understand why people on the prairie insist on planting annuals that are meant to grown in subtropical areas. Purple coneflowers and sedums and hardy sage and native grasses and herbs rock my world. I like to plant Mexican sunflowers, and by this time of year, the Monarch butterflies are worth it. Having Monarchs fluttering through my garden in late August is so worth not having extreme color in June and July. So, last thing tonight... does that Lab turnaround time on orders simply rock your world? I was thinking it would be a while before my next order arrived, and looking at the CnS status, it may be sooner than I imagined! I love the Lab. So much so, that I have three outstanding orders. I always tell people that if I sell something on my sales thread, I return it to the Lab. Actually, I usually order twice as much. Three outstanding orders is proof of that fact, which is a thinly-disguised excuse for my compulsive behavior. 'Cause when I'm wearing the lingerie and watering the garden as I take a break from waxing the car, I always smell good.

Is this the grandma who do something like take used motor oil to burn her garbage, or something of the sort? I know you told a story like that a while back, and I have such a wonderfully vivid image of an older woman doing something like that; you don't know whether to call it utterly intrepid or goofy or a bit of both. Anyway, I am sorry to hear of the loss; times like this are never easy, no matter how much it was expected. I hope your trip back east is a safe one and the family-related trauma is held to a minimum. And good, excellent, superb-o luck tomorrow in the interview! I am pulling for you, I hope it goes beautifully, and I'm sure you will do a lovely job. We'll miss you! Take care of yourselves and wave if you fly over Nebraska!

In the imp, Belle Epoque is sharp and complex, although I'm mainly pulling opium and citrus from the blend. Once on my body, it starts out as opium and floral (lily of the valley), but dries down to a very muted opium with some vague powdery undertones that must come from the lily of the valley and sandalwood. Since my body amps opium rather significantly, that is what I continue to smell as time goes on -- a powdered opium. Because of that, the blend isn't especially "crisp" and gets muddled on my body chemistry. However, I would imagine that on the right person, this scent might be wonderful, especially if all of the sharpness and complexity of Belle Epoque would stay in place. I really do enjoy the wonderfully contradictory elements of this blend, if only it would hold on my body!

I've seen the Silverado Sage bushes in a couple of garden catalogs that I get from plant nurserys in the southwestern U.S. I'm too far north to plant that sort of thing and have it survive the winters, but I love everything in that sage-like family, and wish I could grow more of it. And pomegranates! How cool! Again, in Hardiness Zone 5, that's not happening! Great photos... I love to see gardens in other parts of the country.

I am going to stay halfway on-point, considering that this is a blog on a fragrance fandom community. Not that our entries should always be about fragrances, but lately the BPAL experience is what piques my musings, or more accurately, my hallucinations. I put on some Snake Oil yesterday because the Lab frimped it to me with my Harvest Moon order. (THANK YOU, Lab! ) I layered it over O, because a year ago, I didn't like Snake Oil when I tested it. Things change, and now I think it's pretty yummy. As did a coworker, who literally could not keep his train of thought going because the way I smelled was that distracting. I found someone who wanted swap their imp of Snake Oil, so I can give it to him and he can test run it on his wife. If it works, he will be taking runs at his wife, but we won't go there. She may or may not be happy with me. I think I'll also give him some O, just in case that was what was driving him nuts -- but I don't think so, because I've worn O a lot, alone and layered. The infinite power of Snake Oil, previously unknown to me, was powerfully demonstrated to me yesterday, and now I am a believer. And if you get an imp of something that you really adore, be careful of the first time that you wear it. When I got my imp of Dorian, I loved it so much that I put it on right away. However, Dorian now has associations with the situation I went into right after I applied it for the first time. I get a very poignant feeling whenever I open the bottle and sniff it. Smut is like a headbutt, O is a tease, Bengal is a dare, Underpants is a naughty giggle, Khajurajo is a shudder, Anathema is a leer, and Siren is a shimmy. But Dorian just makes me feel really unarmored and vulnerable. You can imagine, I don't wear it to work very often. But holy hell, I may have to get a bottle of Snake Oil if it's going to get such rave reviews when I wear it. This has been my week -- getting eyes-rolling-up-in-the-head reviews about Siren and Snake Oil. Whodaeverthunkit? I have a bottle of The Mouse's Long and Sad Tale coming in the mail because I had GypsyRoseRed pick it up for me at Will Call. (BTW, GypsyRoseRed is a diva and a lovely person for volunteering to do Will Call runs!) I hope I like the Mouse, but I fear for its success on my person, simply because recently everything that isn't supposed to work on me has been great -- so something that should be perfect for me may not work. Confusing! But if I love it, I'm going to be really, really careful to wear it out for the first time in a very neutral context. This much I know is true!

Straight up... corn? Ahem... I have to wonder if Goodhue was having a few erectile dysfunction issues when he designed this place. I was in looking something up on state website and noticed they have a virtual tour of this building, which includes some eye-crossing, vertigo and migraine-inducing turning camera shots. For some reason, they chose to show a few of the darker first-floor hallways, which would have meaning only because they're the ones that I use to get to and fro my office. I traipse by those Governor's portraits every day. But... if you look at the Courtyard shot, the camera will pan around to a place where there's a lilac shrub that's a bit overgrown across a window. That's my office window! Whee! Had we known this was going on, my coworkers would have all stood in the window and waved, or mooned the camera, or carried on in some deeply inappropriate way. I would have hung up a large sign that said: Viva BPAL!" Well, anyway... the entire little tour just cracks me up: http://its.ne.gov/vt/

Well, you an almost-architect! Much closer than I am! The Walt Lockey web site had a link to some pages he put together on the work of the architect who designed the building where I work. http://www.waltlockley.com/lalibrary/lalibrary.htm The interior of the L.A. Library is very similar to the Law Library in the State Capitol, so much so that it was difficult to tell at first what building was being pictured. He talks a lot about the rotundas in each building -- in this building, the rotunda is where the lobbyists stand around when the Legislature is in session. There's one lobbyist who is an extremely large man (truly a "fat cat" lobbyist), and a friend and I enjoy looking for the "orb within the orb" when we look around at the lobbying contingent. And so here I sit, in what Lockey called "the dead center of Nebraska" in a building "that won't shut up" (how true on so many levels!), wearing Snake Oil and O! Hee hee!!

Ah, that is the Harpo I've come to know and love! He was such a crazy little imp and things like that happened to him a lot. I am also very jealous of snarky for being an architect. I love architecture, I just couldn't do it myself. Let's just say the spatial-mathematics skills aren't quite what one needs to be an architect? However, I do understand it well enough to truly appreciate it. That web site looks like a riot -- I'm going to check it out when I get to work, and that's what I'm procrastinating doing right now...

In the bottle, Harvest Moon is complex, layered and beautiful. I smell chrysanthemum, fruit, herbs and woods. I think I even catch a whiff of my beloved Russian sage. On my body, it initially amps chryasanthemum/fruit, then briefly amps bamboo and herbs, then goes very apple-berry-pomegranate. It generally stays in that strong fruity note for the duration that it's on my body. I didn't find that it lasted a tremedously long time, probably because my body found the fruits so yummy that it ate them!

I remembered that I had an imp of Siren that I hadn't tested, so yesterday, when I had a migraine, I decided to try it once I started to feel better. I almost ran downstairs right away to get some vinegar to wash it off when I remembered that the description said something about jasmine being one of the ingredients. Jasmine is the bane of my perfume-wearing existence. I thought, oh great, the migraine will bloom again. Because truly, on my body jasmine smells like flower vase water that has been sitting around waaaaay too long. I've always wanted to love jasmine, since it seems so girly-girl and mysterious and it's so pretty on some people. So I sniffed the swiped area and waited for the gag-a-maggot smell and the throb behind my eyes to reoccur. It smelled nice. My head didn't hurt. I waited a bit and sniffed it again. I could swear I smelled patchouli. I went to computer to look up Siren and yeah, there's jasmine in it and no patchouli. Weird. I was convinced that after an hour or so, I'd still be heading for the soap and then the vinegar to neutralize the stench. But I didn't -- it stayed the same and didn't morph. I was meeting a friend for coffee in the evening and I put on more. I'm wearing it today. It's nice! It's exotic-sexy-sultry and I can smell jasmine in it, but it smells good. What???? It must be the ginger offsetting the jasmine, that's all I can figure out. There's also vanilla and apricot in Siren, and I do get a fair amount of apricot, but I like it even better than the apricot in Depraved. What the hell? Just amazin.' There's a song by Jamie Cullum called "Get Your Way" and some of the lyrics go like this: I opened the door and you walked in, (Sniff) The scent of wild jasmine. The room, seemed to freeze in time, My regular table will be just fine. Radiant and elegant, you might be But your concentration is so go-lightly Both of your eyes reflecting the moon, You really think you own the room. I used to think, yeah, if I could wear jasmine, I could be that way, but it's not meant to be. So now I can wear Siren and try to be like the woman in the song, although I'll probably fall off my heel or trip over the leg of a chair, or something dorky like Carrie in "Sex And The City" used to do. Actually, I liked her character better when she was like that, so maybe I should accept that my klutziness can be a bit charming at times. At least I will smell a bit like jasmine.

Diva! They are GORGEOUS! I love that pedicure; it is so damn summertime sassy. You have lovely, lovely tooties. And the fingernails are very elegant and look especially beautiful with your rings.

That photo of the bowl of nature's body is a gorgeous little still life photo. And it makes me hungry... And I too was admiring your French manicure! It looks great on you, and you have beautiful hands.

Holyguacamole, Siren has broken my long-standing tradition of never, ever being able to wear scents with even a drop of jasmine in them! In the imp, Siren smells sort of snappy and mysterious to me, a scent that is sort of sweet and sort of floral, but also not...my nose can't figure it out. On my skin, I would swear there's patchouli in it. It must be the tug-of-war between the ginger and the jasmine. Normally my skin muddles the heck out of scents with contradictory elements, but this time it works. Yipee! In addition, Siren lasts a long time and it doesn't morph. All the elements hold together at about the same level of ampage. I like this! I like it a lot, and for me to say that about a scent with jasmine in it is beyond the pale. Woot! I love the little BPAL miracles! For anyone who thinks they can't wear jasmine, but who likes Depraved and Vixen, I say you should try Siren... you may be amazed.

Here's an example of the office cyber-patter that goes on about the Coworker From Hell, who is seemingly a Seinfeld character come to life. Let me clarify that she likes to pick a sworn enemy in the professional world and rant and rave about them. The sworn enemy is usually a female that she has deemed completely incompetent and of questionable sanity. (To borrow a line that I think was used on Seinfeld: "Hello pot? It's the kettle. You're black!") First, my original "ARGH BLARGH" email -- I edited out real names: What is she going to do now that 1) Person A, 2) Person B, 3) Person C and 4) Person D are all out of government? When will a new female sworn enemy emerge, so we don't have to hear retread stories about Person A and Person C? One coworker's response: I have 2 semi-crazy women, do I hear 3? 2 going once... Going twice…. Gone! Sold to the lush with a bad case of bed-head! Another coworker's observation: If no viable object for her scorn emerges, I see a possibility that she may simply turn on herself. Let's hope not. The number of aberrant behavior stories that she then would be able to tell would be endless. The only reason that I stay even slightly sane is because my other colleagues are really funny.

I want to thank Dawndie for her observation that at the end of "Ocean's 11," it sounds like Andy Garcia is yelling "ARGHBLARGS!" The reason being, I have this really, really annoying co-worker. I won't bore you with endless descriptions of her behavior, except to say that she drives everyone nuts. Those of us who have offices close to her frequently send each other emails to vent about her behavior. I have taken to giving all the blowing-off-steam emails the title of "ARGH BLARG!" so my coworkers know instantly that the subject matter is "her." It truly is what I'd like to yell at her when she comes in and starts reading the paper to me. And OK, here's a micro-vent: this woman is the consummate idea-stealer and funny quip swiper. Yesterday I made a comment about something that she felt was rather clever, so she promptly trotted off to tell other people in the office about her idea, then came back, got on the phone, and started calling people to tell them about her wonderful idea. And she does this within earshot of me -- once it goes into her head, it becomes her idea. Let's just say, if it's important, I won't even say it within earshot of her. And my evilness is really minimal in this category, because every now and then I could plant an either bizarre or completely incorrect story in her brain, and watch her carry it around to half the world. She would say it with all the certainty of the sun rising in the east and setting in the west. But I do believe in karma, or the golden rule, or guardian angels shaking their finger angrily at you, so I don't try it. Plus, lest you think I'm too pure, if I told her something stupid just to watch her carry it off, she'd probably tell everyone it was my idea once it was exposed as being stupid and/or false. So my karma would jump up and bite me in the ass rather quickly. But I have evil coworkers. Last fall I impaled the underside of my forearm on a dried-up shrub. I didn't realize I'd driven a shard of the shrub into my arm until about a week later, when the doctor extracted it. Being rather amused, and knowing a few of my friends at the office just love a good gross-out, I brought the shard in so they could see it. Crude jokes about me going to no end to have a woody in me ensued. Word spread and people who hadn't even known about the boo-boo on my arm came in to see what became known as "the branch." Not to be outdone, a few days later "she" started carrying on that the had somehow scratched her eye, that she was in agony, that she could barely keep it open, how it was watering so hard that she could'n't see, and infection was probably setting in. (It didn't look any worse than the non-injured eye -- her eyes are normally bloodshot.) I can't tell you the number of times she stuck her face in mine, pulling down her lower eyelid and yelling about her pain. Having utterly HAD IT with her competitive and attention-seeking bullshit, a couple of my coworkers tried to convince her that she should go purchase an eye patch. They told her it was critical that she keep her eye closed and protected. And SHE DID IT. The two people who talked her into it still high-five each other when they think about it. Of course, the next day, she showed up to work sans the eye patch, claiming a miraculous recovery, due to her superior immune system. There must be a Twilight Alchemy Lab formulation that could work on this person. If there was, I'd do a group order with at least 4 or 5 other people. We'd all need our own bottle. Beth could make a cool $150 or so, thanks to the office battle-ax. And hey, how about that Mum Moon formulation? I realized after I'd put in my update order last week that I should have ordered Mme. Moriarity. I read the Mum Moon description and decided, oh well, there's a good excuse to order the Lunacy upate and a bottle o' the misfortune teller. So, I'm back to having more than one outstanding order. My disjointed little universe once again has its requisite suspense and deferred gratification factors!

A few years ago, a lobbyist called me up and asked me how I could stand to work with "her." He also said she was like a character on Seinfeld and that she was entirely over the top, all the time. And yes, she is the smacker who sprays food. One of my friends told me he observed her smacking her lips the other day, and she wasn't even eating. This week she has been obsessing that she needs to get a pedicure before she goes on vacation. Everyone has been harassing me to suggest to her that she needs to get a French pedicure, because she'll be on vacation and I won't have to see it.

I know a guy who inherited his father's collection of license plates. His dad collected for many years, and had A LOT of plates from every state and countries around the world. My friend has a display in his office of his favorite plate from each state (some are very vintage) and several favorites from other countries. They are way cool.

Amen to your comment about Lieberman. He sounds like a bitter, whiny old poopy-pants today. ETA: Has anyone seen ShriekingViolet's new avatar? It's great! That's too bad that Rusty's candidate lost -- whenever I worked on a campaign for a losing candidate, I always referred to it as working on yet another "noble losing effort." And heck, being involved very directly in the democratic process is always a good, almost exhilarating thing. Finally, believe it or not, since I'm such a fussy thing about feet, but I think the idea of a little flower painted on the big toenail is cute and festive. It's eye-catching in a sassy sort of way, and I enjoy that.

STFU is one of the blends that merits serious consideration, if only because the comment "she needs to STFU" frequently shows up in venting emails sent by my coworkers. Besides, I just love the notion of a STFU blend. It's so appropriate to the place where I work!

In the imp, Ode to Melancholy is mainly lavender to my nose, but there's a sharpness there also. On my body, the lavender gives way to florals! Woo-wee, it is floral -- my body went into the process of burning off the wisteria and rose, which made them amp like crazy for an hour or so. Then, everything calmed down and I was left with lavender, sandalwood and the barest trace of musk. Then it is very thin, very airy, very wispy. While my body chemistry isn't able to hold the complexity of this blend, I think that it's a beautiful blend that would work very well for someone who can wear lavender and florals.