[SUMMARY: Connecting the dots to give you the whole picture.]
They say money can't buy happiness. It's a pretty little thought, good for Aesop and bedtime stories, but a steady stream of deliveries from Internet retailers gets me pretty goddamned giddy.
For instance, when I fully realised you can purchase discontinued perfumes at any number of online venues, I immediately went to look for Scaasi, my signature scent from 1990 through 1993.
No go.
I tried periodically, and finally a week ago, there it was.
EVERYWHERE.
So I married a discount code to a sale price on a website with free shipping and pennies later...
Still as big and bold and stupidly beautiful as I remember it.^
And I read a little something a little somewhere about a niche perfumer offering a sample set and voilà!
Don't tell me I didn't just buy myself some happy.‡
[SUMMARY: Feel-good psychology is lost on the capitalist.]
Then, because this is still a knitblog,§ there's the singular joy of the yarn club.
My new-found fibre lust for lace knitting¶ was slaked by the arrival of about 1000 yards of Black Bunny merino/silk laceweight in totally -licious# purples.††
It doesn't hurt that the purple goodness came in this‡‡:
Carol was kind enough to let me stay in the Black Bunny club even though I'm just *barely* bright enough to work PayPal to finance it. That in itself makes me happy.
[SUMMARY: The gods look out for the feeble.]
Best for last, there's the even-better of receiving unsolicited items that didn't even require a credit card number in the mailbox.
Brought to you by Skull a Day, the Magic of Kim, the number four...
...and Animal.§§
Kim... seriously, better than Nintendo in the mail.
[SUMMARY: Good things come to those who stop whining for five minutes to appreciate them.]
Know what else makes me happy?
[SUMMARY: Proof of life.@]
*************
Améthyst - Olivier Durbano (Bijoux de Pierres Poèmes)
Marin says: My very first impression was, "Oh, no... Chanel." I was sure we were heading straight into That Aldehyde, but the alcohol burned off and it was a lovely ride.
Much like its companion scent, Black Tourmaline, there is a soft richness to this that probably shouldn't appeal to me. It's very nearly vanilla, very nearly aldehyde, very nearly headshop.
Maybe this an olfactory tour of negative space, harmony, background and all those things that make good art great.
Deep, huh?
I smell cedar and pepper, I got a whiff of bitter orange, something powdery -- which always makes me think of iris¶¶ -- and a touch of those vanilla/amber/sandalwood headshop things I usually hate.
The tiniest hint of smoke?
I really like this, but it may be too pedestrian to consider buying a bottle.## Something about it just says blah, blah, masculine cologne, blah.
Upon revisiting, I'm getting more of the soft, tempered cedar, which I lovelovelove. And I have no idea what kind of crack I was smoking to get The Aldehyde.†††
Luckyscent‡‡‡ says: The second in Olivier Durbano’s Perfume Poems, Améthyst takes its name and mood from amethyst, the prized purple gemstone of lore.% The gem itself is a symbol of heavenly understanding, and of moving with ease in the religious, spiritual, and material planes. In antiquity, the gem was thought to serve as a talisman against poison, drunkenness and bad luck. Durbano’s interpretation of amethyst into perfume form has made for a deeply peaceful, mysterious scent that debuts with a surprising pepper and fruit mix before it slowly swirls into palisander wood and the silky powder notes of orris. A soft amber, sandalwood, musk and vanilla are the base upon which this purifying scent is built upon, playing upon your senses with their sweet and musky natures and sending you to a place of contemplation and reverie. The majesty, the spirituality and the intensity of the color purple all rolled into one beautifully mysterious and forever haunting fragrance.
NOTES: bergamot,$ pepper, grape, raspberry, incense,$ palisander wood, jasmine, orris, vegetable amber, sandalwood,$ musk, vanilla$
Hans says: Mmmm... very citrusy. Like orange juice. You can tell them I said it smells like Yazoo spicy barbecue sauce.§§§
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): If even one of you got my tortured jape, all the set-up will have been worth it. I am just that dork.
^FOOTNOTE (careted): And even if it's awful, it will always remind me of Mom -- who bought me my first bottle of Scaasi -- and that will always blind me to the possibility of awfulness.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): And the chance to dabble in what I fool myself is Nathan Branch-esque perfume photography doesn't break my heart neither. On the other hand, the Scent Systems Jasmine is to ass AS cat piss is to honeyed rose petals. This did NOT make me happy, but I will chalk it up to the greater good and... happy again. Lalala.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): *cough*
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Despite having frogged and re-knit the first two repeats of the body of the Purple Prose scarf roughly eleventy-seven times.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): It used to say "Marin-licious." I simply couldn't keep a straight face.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Purples even a digital camera can love.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Which furthered my happiness because Cat for Scale tried wildly to catch and bat and bite the ghosts.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (beat the drum, don't eat the drum): AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!! WOMAAAAAAAAN!!!
@FOOTNOTE (atted): And proof that, though the damned cat won't sit still for a decent portrait, he can't resist hanging around when the camera comes out.
§§FOOTNOTE (the swirling elegance of irises): Largely because all the real perfume critics say iris is powdery. I don't think I'd know if an iris bit me in the ass. Rest assured if an iris ever does bite me in the ass, I'll share the pictures with you.
##FOOTNOTE (pounded like cross-wise logic): Yes, upon re-reading that sentence, I realise just how dorky and sort of elitist it sounds. I never promised you logic or reason. Or a rose garden. Though I think I did just promise photographic evidence of ass-biting irises.
†††FOOTNOTE (obvious is my cross to bear): Aldehyde crack, apparently.
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (cryptic triptych): I usually try to quote the actual perfumier (or the soulless conglomerate that markets the stuff), but when I went to the Olivier Durbano website, I found a cryptic splash page -- a login, an animation about beauty and truth or some such drivel, and no content to be reached without the login and password... no way to even sign up to get a login and password. I'm thinking I have to buy a bottle of something Olivier Durbano to learn the secret handshake so I can share with y'all. That's the sacrifice I'm willing to make to help further your education.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): And my very favourite stone of all time, for those of you scoring at home. Only 49 shopping days left 'til Christmas.
$FOOTNOTE (on the money): Ha! Got one! And if palisander wood could be mistaken for cedar, maybe even two!
§§§FOOTNOTE (smokey joe): This isn't like the elephant comment. We had BBQ for lunch and I had a blob of Yazoo spicy on my left wrist right next to the scent zone. BBQ trumps cedar/citrus and Hans thinks he's funny.
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