Yesterday at noon, Hans whisked his girlfriend Angie away from work for a surprise trip.
Yesterday at 6:30, they took off for Prague.
BFD, you may think, particularly if you've gleaned any sense of Hans's travel habits over the last few years.†
This time, thought, he's taking his girlfriend on a trip and bringing home a fiancée.‡
He spent the last month planning, agonising over diamonds and settings, wondering how much his bonus would actually be, asking advice. He found an American photographer in Prague§ and hired him to take pictures of the proposal on the Charles Bridge.¶
At 4:30 yesterday, my boss and one of the other leads asked me if I'd heard from Hans.#
"No. I don't really expect to..." I trailed off as I saw the consternation mixed with disbelief in their eyes.
"I'll text him right now."
And we sat around, Craig Ferguson-style awkward pause in the air.
"Well..." I said, jingling my keys to indicate I really was on my way out the door.
"You'll tell us tomorrow morning."
About 6:15, Hans texted:
"She was shocked, it was awesome."
Keep in mind, that was just because he picked her up to go to the airport.
When I got in this morning, Avis% asked, "Did you hear from Hans?"
"He says she was shocked and it was awesome."
"Where are they now? What time is it in Prague? Has he asked her yet?"
I Googled to find out it was 5:45 in Prague.
"Right about now. He should be asking her any second now."
"Oh, I hope the weather is nice. Did you see what the weather was?"
"Just the time. Here, let me Google... it's raining. It's 39 degrees and it's raining."
"Oh, no! I hope it doesn't ruin their pictures!"
"Well, overcast skies are better for photography anyway..."††
From around the corner, Carla@ chimed in from her desk, "Look at you, looking on the bright side!"
People keep dropping in to find out what we know, speculate on what happened, wonder if Hans has Internet access so he can send us pictures RIGHT NOW.
Gail‡‡ came down a few minutes ago and we were chatting about it.
"I can't believe how excited I am about something that really has nothing to do with me," I said.
"I know!"
"It's like reality TV or something."§§
"It's like we're living in reality."
We both contemplated the sobering idea for a moment, then went on to daydream about wonderful, romantic, surprise proposals in exotic foreign lands.
Hey, maybe I can be Hans's best man...¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Like how he went to Thailand when we were in crunch time for the Legacy sale... or how he went to Cancun when we were in crunch time for the Albrecht sale... or how he went to Austin when we were in crunch time for the Sequel sale... not that I'm bitter.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Yep! He's trading Angie in on a new model! Haha! Just kidding!
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Google.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): When he was about 20, he was stumbling around Prague in a drunken stupour with some of his college buddies - absinthe may have been involved - and he says that even in his drunken, juvenile state, he stopped on the St. Charles bridge and decided it was the most romantic place in the world and he wanted to come back to it when he wanted to propose to someone. I can hear you "Awwwwwww" from here.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): This is a distinctly female trait. I'm, like, 70% guy, having been trained through many of my formative years by some of the guyest of the guys. It always takes me a little aback when someone asks something like, "Has Hans, who is not your boyfriend, relative or parole officer, taken time out of his very personal journey to one of the most important moments of his life to give you minute-by-minute updates, much like the newscrawl on CNN?"
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Avis is my boss, head of the Lease Records part of the Land Administration department, which consists of two branches - Lease Records and Division Orders - and is overseen by Sandy. You're welcome.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): I learned this in a real photography class. I wasn't just shooting platitudes to the masses to make the masses feel better.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Carla is the another Lead in Lease Records and oversees the Gulf/Shreveport (basically Texas and Louisiana) region. I oversee the Rockies (Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Utah... but mostly North Dakota). Again, you're welcome.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Who fielded the girly questions from Hans (who knows I'm 70% guy and maybe not the best person to ask for how Ange would feel about something). She says he'd come in and say, "If you were packing for a surprise trip, how much time would you need?" "Hans," she'd say, "why don't you just ask the question you want to ask: how much time will Angie need to pack? I'm not packing. I'm not going anywhere. Two hours, but you better be packed and on call to pick up pantyhose or mascara or whatever last-minute thing she thinks she needs."
§§FOOTNOTE (my girly little head is just all a-swirl!): I've heard it's like that on reality TiVi. *ahem*
¶¶FOOTNOTE (reality knocks twice): *ZING!* That was the sound of reality going right out the window.
Showing posts with label Hans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hans. Show all posts
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Islands in the Stream of Consciousness
It could be one of *those* blogposts.†
A few things‡ have happened since last I (really) posted.
*ahem*
I could get seriously philosophical here, because, as I was lining up my excuse ducks,§ I realised how telling they really are.
My first excuse duck?¶
Werk.#
I suspect I genuinely have more work than I used to, now that I'm a Paid Hack for the Corporate Machine, but I can say for a fact that my time is parcelled out very differently. I have vacation time. And sick time. And hours.
Practically, it's not that much different from when I was contract. Philosophically, I feel a much greater sense of obligation.
Plus, the stress is enormously greater, what with expense reporting and million-dollar deadlines and million-dollar deadlines and Hans and United Way campaigns and the impending Oompa Loompa Revolution and stuff.
Duck!††
Blogui.‡‡
Steve. §§
And Nathan.¶¶
Wii.##
I lost my camera.†††
But I now have a lot of stories.
So I'll be around.‡‡‡
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): One may wonder that there's a blogpost at all. One may have strongly hinted on Twitter about one's suspiciously absent blogposts. You know who you are.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): One. Two. 2010.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): You know, so you can shoot them down.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): It's a good, all-purpose duck, which is a real phrase about real ducks in duck shows and one of Steve's best-loved terms. More on Steve later. But in case you wanted to know, some ducks are raised for down, some for meat and a good, all-purpose duck has qualities that make it good for both. You're welcome.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Which differs from "work" in the face you make when you say it.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): That's the second duck, but who's counting.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Occasional bouts of techui, under which I shamefully ignored Twitter and occasionally email for abnormally wide swaths of time.
§§FOOTNOTE (time swirls when you're having fun): Because we've been doing lots of fun stuff, and fun stuff takes *time*.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (is that a Wii controler? EEK!): Who bribed me to Vegas with martinis and sushi, then moved to New Zealand, leaving me bereft. I was totally reft before that.
##FOOTNOTE (bomp bomp): Wii is totally kicking my ass. Not in the way you're thinking. I'm totally intimidated by it and, even though My Friends at Nintendo have sent me games and a disco light and a cool game involving yarn and felt, I still play more on the nephews' Wii than on my own. Because my Wii scares me.
†††FOOTNOTE (very, very cross): Seriously. All my Vegas photos - including the Liberace Museum, which is now closed - plus the Christmas Eve Ugly Sweater Party and an assortment of other worthy subjects. I think the car ate it. The car ate Kate's CDs; we tore the car apart looking for them, but the car just spit them out two years later when I was looking for the cell phone I'm convinced it ate.
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (stitched together like Frankenstein's monster): I'd do more now, only I received what I see as barely-veiled threats should I not post something soon.
A few things‡ have happened since last I (really) posted.
*ahem*
I could get seriously philosophical here, because, as I was lining up my excuse ducks,§ I realised how telling they really are.
My first excuse duck?¶
Werk.#
I suspect I genuinely have more work than I used to, now that I'm a Paid Hack for the Corporate Machine, but I can say for a fact that my time is parcelled out very differently. I have vacation time. And sick time. And hours.
Practically, it's not that much different from when I was contract. Philosophically, I feel a much greater sense of obligation.
Plus, the stress is enormously greater, what with expense reporting and million-dollar deadlines and million-dollar deadlines and Hans and United Way campaigns and the impending Oompa Loompa Revolution and stuff.
Duck!††
Blogui.‡‡
Steve. §§
And Nathan.¶¶
Wii.##
I lost my camera.†††
But I now have a lot of stories.
So I'll be around.‡‡‡
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): One may wonder that there's a blogpost at all. One may have strongly hinted on Twitter about one's suspiciously absent blogposts. You know who you are.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): One. Two. 2010.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): You know, so you can shoot them down.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): It's a good, all-purpose duck, which is a real phrase about real ducks in duck shows and one of Steve's best-loved terms. More on Steve later. But in case you wanted to know, some ducks are raised for down, some for meat and a good, all-purpose duck has qualities that make it good for both. You're welcome.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Which differs from "work" in the face you make when you say it.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): That's the second duck, but who's counting.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Occasional bouts of techui, under which I shamefully ignored Twitter and occasionally email for abnormally wide swaths of time.
§§FOOTNOTE (time swirls when you're having fun): Because we've been doing lots of fun stuff, and fun stuff takes *time*.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (is that a Wii controler? EEK!): Who bribed me to Vegas with martinis and sushi, then moved to New Zealand, leaving me bereft. I was totally reft before that.
##FOOTNOTE (bomp bomp): Wii is totally kicking my ass. Not in the way you're thinking. I'm totally intimidated by it and, even though My Friends at Nintendo have sent me games and a disco light and a cool game involving yarn and felt, I still play more on the nephews' Wii than on my own. Because my Wii scares me.
†††FOOTNOTE (very, very cross): Seriously. All my Vegas photos - including the Liberace Museum, which is now closed - plus the Christmas Eve Ugly Sweater Party and an assortment of other worthy subjects. I think the car ate it. The car ate Kate's CDs; we tore the car apart looking for them, but the car just spit them out two years later when I was looking for the cell phone I'm convinced it ate.
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (stitched together like Frankenstein's monster): I'd do more now, only I received what I see as barely-veiled threats should I not post something soon.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Werk of the Day
I had a dream last night that Hans and I jokingly set up Cat for Scale as an oil property - oh, not in any real way. This wasn't some elaborate practical joke. We just got to giggling about oil property sales and how some people must pick properties they want to buy or sell† and... voila!‡ Cat for Sale!
During our weekly conference call with the marketer on our current divestiture, Hans made an aside about the Nine Lives 4-1 well and the marketer overheard us and asked the API number.§ We thought he knew we were joking, so we made up an API number, randomly adding digits until he stopped us.
Then the ersatz well showed up on the sales brochure that went out to potential buyers.
Then we had to explain to the Senior VP and General Counsel that it was a joke.
Then the Senior VP and General Counsel explained to us how you never want to remove items from the sales brochure, only add them.¶
Meanwhile, the API number we fabricated turned out to be in the hottest oil field in the western hemisphere and high-powered multinational oil conglomerates were in a bidding war on my cat.
My freakin' cat.
I need to go work at McDonalds now.#
Or maybe I need a vacation.††
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Like some girls pick football teams in the pool - the uniforms are pretty, I used to know a guy from Tennessee, that Tom Brady is just so dreamy... not that guys couldn't possibly do this to, but I've never heard one admit to it.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Which is French for "couple of dumb-asses."
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): A social security number for wells - all unique, never used twice, the first two digits indicate the state, the next three are the county and the remaining are a unique identifier, occasionally incorporating coding for horizontal or offshore or other types of wells.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): This is true. If we're not sure about something, we leave it out so later we can go, "Surprise! We found you 1200 more acres and a tank farm!"
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Though I fear two months at McDonalds would bring dreams of the cat with a side of fries.
††FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Bright light city gonna set my soul, gonna set my soul on fire...
During our weekly conference call with the marketer on our current divestiture, Hans made an aside about the Nine Lives 4-1 well and the marketer overheard us and asked the API number.§ We thought he knew we were joking, so we made up an API number, randomly adding digits until he stopped us.
Then the ersatz well showed up on the sales brochure that went out to potential buyers.
Then we had to explain to the Senior VP and General Counsel that it was a joke.
Then the Senior VP and General Counsel explained to us how you never want to remove items from the sales brochure, only add them.¶
Meanwhile, the API number we fabricated turned out to be in the hottest oil field in the western hemisphere and high-powered multinational oil conglomerates were in a bidding war on my cat.
My freakin' cat.
I need to go work at McDonalds now.#
Or maybe I need a vacation.††
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Like some girls pick football teams in the pool - the uniforms are pretty, I used to know a guy from Tennessee, that Tom Brady is just so dreamy... not that guys couldn't possibly do this to, but I've never heard one admit to it.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Which is French for "couple of dumb-asses."
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): A social security number for wells - all unique, never used twice, the first two digits indicate the state, the next three are the county and the remaining are a unique identifier, occasionally incorporating coding for horizontal or offshore or other types of wells.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): This is true. If we're not sure about something, we leave it out so later we can go, "Surprise! We found you 1200 more acres and a tank farm!"
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Though I fear two months at McDonalds would bring dreams of the cat with a side of fries.
††FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Bright light city gonna set my soul, gonna set my soul on fire...
Friday, July 2, 2010
We Interrupt Our Blog Schedule†...
I'm puttering‡ through a handful of blogposts, including:
[our Hans]
went to see
[brace yourself]
the latest STUPID SPARKLY VAMPIRE MOVIE
[in IMAX††]
on opening night.‡‡
Take a moment.§§
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): BWAHAHAHA! Because I'm sure you're setting your watch by my blog these days. Schedule... BWA!
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Because puttering is the order of the day here at Chez Barfly.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): All will be explained in due time. Perhaps now would be a good time for another "BWAHAHAHA!"
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Gods, I love my friends. How else would someone be browsing a wool festival and go, "Sparkly. Purple, grey. Foggy, atmospheric, sparkly... stupid sparkly... vampire. Marin"?
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): If you don't think executives should have tiaras, you're not familiar with the insecurity of executiveship. If I can confess right here, nothing in my life (not boys, not college, not spandex, not yearbook pictures) has made me more insecure than being an executive.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Possibly in 3D.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Bought the tickets *in advance*.
§§FOOTNOTE (turn it around): Because we love Hans, and in all fairness, he's the best of best boyfriends; his girlfriend is out of touch with her Twilight contingency, so Hans wanted her to see the movie. AND he decided that she spent a lot of time doing what he wanted to do, so maybe he should do something she wants. If more men were like Hans, there would be no sit-coms.
NOTE: It made me feel better, and may make you feel better, that Hans did not like stupid sparkly vampires.
ALSO NOTE: He told me. He didn't tell his girlfriend. In the land where sit-coms don't mean anything.
- Pole dancing
- The many wonderful things my year-long now-not-so-secret pal§ has sent me
- The many wonderful things Nintendo has sent me
- Stupid sparkly handspun¶ and an executive tiara#
[our Hans]
went to see
[brace yourself]
the latest STUPID SPARKLY VAMPIRE MOVIE
[in IMAX††]
on opening night.‡‡
Take a moment.§§
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): BWAHAHAHA! Because I'm sure you're setting your watch by my blog these days. Schedule... BWA!
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Because puttering is the order of the day here at Chez Barfly.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): All will be explained in due time. Perhaps now would be a good time for another "BWAHAHAHA!"
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Gods, I love my friends. How else would someone be browsing a wool festival and go, "Sparkly. Purple, grey. Foggy, atmospheric, sparkly... stupid sparkly... vampire. Marin"?
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): If you don't think executives should have tiaras, you're not familiar with the insecurity of executiveship. If I can confess right here, nothing in my life (not boys, not college, not spandex, not yearbook pictures) has made me more insecure than being an executive.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Possibly in 3D.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Bought the tickets *in advance*.
§§FOOTNOTE (turn it around): Because we love Hans, and in all fairness, he's the best of best boyfriends; his girlfriend is out of touch with her Twilight contingency, so Hans wanted her to see the movie. AND he decided that she spent a lot of time doing what he wanted to do, so maybe he should do something she wants. If more men were like Hans, there would be no sit-coms.
NOTE: It made me feel better, and may make you feel better, that Hans did not like stupid sparkly vampires.
ALSO NOTE: He told me. He didn't tell his girlfriend. In the land where sit-coms don't mean anything.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Excuse #10
The "Why I Have Neglected My Blog" series:
I don't know exactly what it is, but I suspect it was Hans's doing.
I don't know exactly what it is, but I suspect it was Hans's doing.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Double Crap!
The comments are often interesting. Sometimes, they're downright hilarious. Today, they were humbling, as Kari reminded me of a little oversight† on my part.
I was so busy talking about myself and saying things to make Kim hate me‡ that I completely forgot to tell y'all that Hans got a job too.§ Same place. We'll probably still have adjoining offices.¶
*whew*
There.
Back on the high road.#
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): *cough*
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Dear Kim, I've said it before:
"Look at me," said the star, "I'm shining so brightly." Then it went supernova. The moral of this story is obvious. - Tanith Lee, The Silver Metal Lover
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): And he doesn't even have to be one of my minions.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): There is some chance I will have to move to the other side of our floor, given my two extant minions office there and it's where the empty offices where the two TBD minions will likely live.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Where a saint-in-training belongs.
I was so busy talking about myself and saying things to make Kim hate me‡ that I completely forgot to tell y'all that Hans got a job too.§ Same place. We'll probably still have adjoining offices.¶
*whew*
There.
Back on the high road.#
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): *cough*
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Dear Kim, I've said it before:
"Look at me," said the star, "I'm shining so brightly." Then it went supernova. The moral of this story is obvious. - Tanith Lee, The Silver Metal Lover
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): And he doesn't even have to be one of my minions.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): There is some chance I will have to move to the other side of our floor, given my two extant minions office there and it's where the empty offices where the two TBD minions will likely live.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Where a saint-in-training belongs.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Injury, Meet Insult
"I want to use a whole assortment† of four-letter words right now, doc," I said to the optometrist when he told me I NEED BIFOCALS.
I've worn glasses for years for three things:
[SUMMARY: Keep your eye¶ on the important things.]
Apparently, I got old overnight. One day, I gauged where to hold my book by how comfortable my arms were, not where I could see. Because, you see, I could see. Everything. Just fine. Far or near.
Then, *bam!* one Tuesday,# I couldn't see the computer screen. And that night, I had to hold the book an inch from my nose.
So. Bifocals.
I reeled around the mirrored displays, blindly†† picking up one frame after the other, waving them in front of my face in a desultory manner, humming "Glory Days" and craving dinner at 4:30 for some reason.
[SUMMARY: No focus‡‡ at all.]
Old, feeble brains can't multi-task.§§ It seems I was... less than thorough in my search.
To those of you youngsters out there with all this wonder ahead of you, let me give you a little tip.
Don't forget to check the whole frame before you order.¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Like a big, brightly-coloured Costco assortment.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): You know how it is with free agency and salary caps. Sometimes you don't know a soul at the beginning of the season.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): When I remembered them. It was always a proud day when I could say, "Oh, we can sit anywhere. I remembered my glasses."
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): I worry that I have a form of Alzheimer's which has as its primary symptom uncontrollable punning.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Um... if I remember correctly.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Oh, no...
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Punzheimer's!
§§FOOTNOTE (*so* confused): And just remembering the words to Glory Days is multi-tasking in and of itself.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (*headbonk* *headbonk*): For those of you scoring at home, the random, ugly triangles are orange, purple and white. All I wanted was copper frames. I thought they'd go with my hair. I showed Hans and he didn't even try to make like it was OK. "Your hair almost completely covers the bad part," he said, helpfully.
I've worn glasses for years for three things:
- Driving at night.
- To see the names on the jerseys.‡
- Movies.§
[SUMMARY: Keep your eye¶ on the important things.]
Apparently, I got old overnight. One day, I gauged where to hold my book by how comfortable my arms were, not where I could see. Because, you see, I could see. Everything. Just fine. Far or near.
Then, *bam!* one Tuesday,# I couldn't see the computer screen. And that night, I had to hold the book an inch from my nose.
So. Bifocals.
I reeled around the mirrored displays, blindly†† picking up one frame after the other, waving them in front of my face in a desultory manner, humming "Glory Days" and craving dinner at 4:30 for some reason.
[SUMMARY: No focus‡‡ at all.]
Old, feeble brains can't multi-task.§§ It seems I was... less than thorough in my search.
To those of you youngsters out there with all this wonder ahead of you, let me give you a little tip.
Don't forget to check the whole frame before you order.¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Like a big, brightly-coloured Costco assortment.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): You know how it is with free agency and salary caps. Sometimes you don't know a soul at the beginning of the season.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): When I remembered them. It was always a proud day when I could say, "Oh, we can sit anywhere. I remembered my glasses."
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): I worry that I have a form of Alzheimer's which has as its primary symptom uncontrollable punning.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Um... if I remember correctly.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Oh, no...
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Punzheimer's!
§§FOOTNOTE (*so* confused): And just remembering the words to Glory Days is multi-tasking in and of itself.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (*headbonk* *headbonk*): For those of you scoring at home, the random, ugly triangles are orange, purple and white. All I wanted was copper frames. I thought they'd go with my hair. I showed Hans and he didn't even try to make like it was OK. "Your hair almost completely covers the bad part," he said, helpfully.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Contest! Win a Fabulous Prize!
And this isn't like the time I tried to foist my ill-fitting socks on an unsuspecting public.
No, this is a REAL prize. Hand-picked† by yours truly via the good graces of AllModern.com.
Jamie at All Modern contacted me and asked if I'd like to check out their merchandise and maybe pick out a couple of little items to give away here at the Rickety Blog.
Jamie says they love that I'm "Honest, up front and blunt."‡
[SUMMARY: And I quote.]
Is it bad that makes me chuckle just a little evilly?
Anyway, I dutifully went to peruse the websites and spent a fair chunk of free time mentally re-decorating my home.^ There's SO much I liked,% so I'm just going to share that one thing that captured my imagination more than any other:
The whole Vitra store speaks to the sleek, modern side of me.§ And the Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec Collection is like the next logical evolution of Frank Lloyd Wright.
Plus, y'know, it's like LEGOs for grown-ups.¶
You can take thos widgets above and hook them together to make screens like this:
Or maybe like this...
Or maybe in a sleek, skeletal Christmas tree, which can then be covered in tiny knitted sweaters and traveling lights with a blinking, musical angel on top.#
Class through kitsch is one of my favourite emotions.††
[SUMMARY: The self-aware cop to kitsch first.]
So now maybe you're wondering what I have for you, oh my imaginary friends.‡‡
One lucky winner, residing in the US or Canada,§§ will receive these oddly useful things.
The first, a luxury pet dish with a warming function.¶¶ Simply put hot water in the reservoir in the bottom and your Fluffy or Fido can enjoy a home-warmed meal.
Plus, y'know, cute animal print.##
And the other part of our prize package is this sleek, unobtrusive magazine rack. You can put it on the floor, on a side table... and don't even *try* to tell me you don't have a couple dozen knitting/quilting/cooking††† magazines strewn about your living room that could use a little wrangling.
Plus, y'know... shiny.
So here are the rules:
[SUMMARY: There are always rules.]
1) Comment on this post for entry -- BE SURE TO ENTER YOUR EMAIL. If I can't find you, it's going to be hard to shower you with gifts.
2) One entry per person, except in the case where you drive my readership through the roof by mentioning this on your blog or sending other people to me.‡‡‡
SO...
3) You can earn an extra entry by posting a link to this post and putting a link to that link in the comments on this post.§§§
OR...
4) You can earn an extra entry for each person who comments and says you sent them.
A winner will be drawn randomly@ on Wednesday, November 11.¶¶¶
What are you waiting for? Don't you want your kitty to have warm kibble?###
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Srsly. That wee tiny OCD flap in my brain agonised for ages over the perfect, oddly useful goods. I figure everybody can use a nice magazine rack and most of y'all have a pet or two -- or know somebody who does and might appreciate a luxury pet dish. As I mention later in these footnotes, Christmas is right around the corner.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Perhaps they caught my delicate snort at the Neiman Marcus Christmas book bargain offerings.
^FOOTNOTE (careted): And mentally knocking down the neighbour's walls so I have room for all the couches and chairs I want.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): They have pet stuff and kid stuff (ask me how much I love the chalkboard dots) and modern bedding (ask me how much I love the Missoni collection) and accessories and... well, there was a lot to re-decorate with. Is redecorate hyphenated?
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Which is locked in a lifelong death struggle with the cute animals and things-that-sing-and-light-up-and-are-possibly-covered-in-skulls side of me.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): There would never be a better segueway than this one, so I must take this tangent: remember the Frank Lloyd Wright LEGO sets I was lusting after? The first two are released! Just in time for Christmas! OK, one was released in May, but still.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): You can take the girl out of the trailer park...
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): All due respect to Truvy Jones.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Even IRL friends can play!
§§FOOTNOTE (smug and twisty): Sorry, Ally. If you wanted to play with the cool kids, you shoulda stayed on the continent. See? "Expatriate" doesn't sound so glamourous now, does it?
¶¶FOOTNOTE (two thumbs sideways!): I'm not making this up.
##FOOTNOTE (zebra crossing): Also available in zebra print!
†††FOOTNOTE (three more crosses to bear): ...fishing/watch-collecting/nudie...
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (how did I get off track?): *snort* I suspect if I were that worried about readership, I would've stopped posting pictures of zombie chickens a long time ago. Hey, Jamie at All Modern was nice enough to say nice things about my rickety little corner of the Innernets, so I'd like to give them as much exposure as possible. It doesn't hurt that they have wonderful things like LEGOs for grown-ups and chalkboard dots either.
§§§FOOTNOTE (triple spin zoom meta!): Oh, baby, that's not just meta... that's meta in the mirror.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Hans will probably be involved.
¶¶¶FOOTNOTE (three-gun salute to Mom): To commemorate Mom's second birthday; Dad thought it was the 11th the first year they were married, and Mom was in sniffly, silent martyr mode from the 7th -- her actual birthday -- until the 11th when he threw her a surprise party. As punishment, she made us all celebrate on the 7th and the 11th ever after.
###FOOTNOTE (pound pound pound kitty with entitlement issues): Please don't tell Quill (a/k/a Cat for Scale) about this. If he knows there's potential for hot meals, I'll never hear the end of it.
No, this is a REAL prize. Hand-picked† by yours truly via the good graces of AllModern.com.
Jamie at All Modern contacted me and asked if I'd like to check out their merchandise and maybe pick out a couple of little items to give away here at the Rickety Blog.
Jamie says they love that I'm "Honest, up front and blunt."‡
[SUMMARY: And I quote.]
Is it bad that makes me chuckle just a little evilly?
Anyway, I dutifully went to peruse the websites and spent a fair chunk of free time mentally re-decorating my home.^ There's SO much I liked,% so I'm just going to share that one thing that captured my imagination more than any other:
The whole Vitra store speaks to the sleek, modern side of me.§ And the Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec Collection is like the next logical evolution of Frank Lloyd Wright.
Plus, y'know, it's like LEGOs for grown-ups.¶
You can take thos widgets above and hook them together to make screens like this:
Or maybe like this...
Or maybe in a sleek, skeletal Christmas tree, which can then be covered in tiny knitted sweaters and traveling lights with a blinking, musical angel on top.#
Class through kitsch is one of my favourite emotions.††
[SUMMARY: The self-aware cop to kitsch first.]
So now maybe you're wondering what I have for you, oh my imaginary friends.‡‡
One lucky winner, residing in the US or Canada,§§ will receive these oddly useful things.
The first, a luxury pet dish with a warming function.¶¶ Simply put hot water in the reservoir in the bottom and your Fluffy or Fido can enjoy a home-warmed meal.
Plus, y'know, cute animal print.##
And the other part of our prize package is this sleek, unobtrusive magazine rack. You can put it on the floor, on a side table... and don't even *try* to tell me you don't have a couple dozen knitting/quilting/cooking††† magazines strewn about your living room that could use a little wrangling.
Plus, y'know... shiny.
So here are the rules:
[SUMMARY: There are always rules.]
1) Comment on this post for entry -- BE SURE TO ENTER YOUR EMAIL. If I can't find you, it's going to be hard to shower you with gifts.
2) One entry per person, except in the case where you drive my readership through the roof by mentioning this on your blog or sending other people to me.‡‡‡
SO...
3) You can earn an extra entry by posting a link to this post and putting a link to that link in the comments on this post.§§§
OR...
4) You can earn an extra entry for each person who comments and says you sent them.
A winner will be drawn randomly@ on Wednesday, November 11.¶¶¶
What are you waiting for? Don't you want your kitty to have warm kibble?###
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Srsly. That wee tiny OCD flap in my brain agonised for ages over the perfect, oddly useful goods. I figure everybody can use a nice magazine rack and most of y'all have a pet or two -- or know somebody who does and might appreciate a luxury pet dish. As I mention later in these footnotes, Christmas is right around the corner.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Perhaps they caught my delicate snort at the Neiman Marcus Christmas book bargain offerings.
^FOOTNOTE (careted): And mentally knocking down the neighbour's walls so I have room for all the couches and chairs I want.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): They have pet stuff and kid stuff (ask me how much I love the chalkboard dots) and modern bedding (ask me how much I love the Missoni collection) and accessories and... well, there was a lot to re-decorate with. Is redecorate hyphenated?
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Which is locked in a lifelong death struggle with the cute animals and things-that-sing-and-light-up-and-are-possibly-covered-in-skulls side of me.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): There would never be a better segueway than this one, so I must take this tangent: remember the Frank Lloyd Wright LEGO sets I was lusting after? The first two are released! Just in time for Christmas! OK, one was released in May, but still.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): You can take the girl out of the trailer park...
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): All due respect to Truvy Jones.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Even IRL friends can play!
§§FOOTNOTE (smug and twisty): Sorry, Ally. If you wanted to play with the cool kids, you shoulda stayed on the continent. See? "Expatriate" doesn't sound so glamourous now, does it?
¶¶FOOTNOTE (two thumbs sideways!): I'm not making this up.
##FOOTNOTE (zebra crossing): Also available in zebra print!
†††FOOTNOTE (three more crosses to bear): ...fishing/watch-collecting/nudie...
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (how did I get off track?): *snort* I suspect if I were that worried about readership, I would've stopped posting pictures of zombie chickens a long time ago. Hey, Jamie at All Modern was nice enough to say nice things about my rickety little corner of the Innernets, so I'd like to give them as much exposure as possible. It doesn't hurt that they have wonderful things like LEGOs for grown-ups and chalkboard dots either.
§§§FOOTNOTE (triple spin zoom meta!): Oh, baby, that's not just meta... that's meta in the mirror.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Hans will probably be involved.
¶¶¶FOOTNOTE (three-gun salute to Mom): To commemorate Mom's second birthday; Dad thought it was the 11th the first year they were married, and Mom was in sniffly, silent martyr mode from the 7th -- her actual birthday -- until the 11th when he threw her a surprise party. As punishment, she made us all celebrate on the 7th and the 11th ever after.
###FOOTNOTE (pound pound pound kitty with entitlement issues): Please don't tell Quill (a/k/a Cat for Scale) about this. If he knows there's potential for hot meals, I'll never hear the end of it.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
State of the Onion
My office is roughly 2/3 of a block from the bathroom.
If you'll direct your attention the clever graphic below, I have drawn a rough diagram of my daily habitat.
The green star is me. The purple star outside the box is the bathroom. The red star is the coffee maker, the blue star the printer where my documents mostly show up and the orange dinosaur-looking thing is Hans.†
[SUMMARY: With that, you know way more about my daily life than you want to.]
The series of events:
A vague notion that I have to pee. A vague notion that coffee would be good. The certainty that this print job is going to take several minutes, seeing as it's 180 pages long.
In a fit of efficient brilliance,‡ I hit print, figuring I'd drop my coffee cup in the kitchen, cruise to the bathroom, pick up coffee and collect my printed document on the return trip.
In reality, I hit print, went to the copy machine, couldn't figure out what I was doing there, realised I didn't have my coffee cup and went back to my office for that.
[SUMMARY: It dont't get any better than this.]
I started out again, this time skipping the copy room and heading for the kitchen, where I dispensed coffee to cup, whitened it up and headed back to my office. When I hit the copy machine, I remembered I had to pee.§
I set the coffee down on the copy counter and went to the bathroom. On the way back, I was intently reminding myself not to forget my stuff at the printer and bypassed the coffee completely.
[SUMMARY: Still not getting better.]
I got back to my desk, started to sit down and bounced like a rubber ball as I remembered my coffee. I went back for the coffee, and circled the copy room for a moment trying to remember what it was I was not supposed to forget in the copy room.¶ There weren't any papers lying around to give me a clue, so I went back to my office.
When I turned back to my computer, there was an email I needed to answer. About ten minutes later, Hans walked into my office with a handful of papers.
"These look like yours," he said.
"Oh, yeah. I printed stuff! Thank you!"
I set the stuff on the desk and continued with my email.
[SUMMARY: Multi-tasking may not be for everybody.]
About five minutes later, I turned without looking and bumped the coffee, spilling it over the freshly printed stuff. I sopped up the brown puddle with the paper towels I keep in my desk just for these moments,# sighed and took a sip of coffee. Which was cold.
Thus the sometimes-vicious cycle of life in the wilds of the office†† begins again. More prints, more coffee and someday I will spill again.
*************
Wazamba - Parfume d'Empire
Marin says: "What are you sniffing these days?" asked Nathan.%
"Not much, really. I'm experiencing perfume ennui," I replied.
"I hate it when that happens," he commiserated.
The next day, Wazamba landed on my desk.
Out of courtesy‡‡ to my generous friend, I pounced, ravaging it like a starving beast ravages a plump gazelle.§§
Mmmmm... fresh-cut pine backed by a dollop of sweet-but-not-too, round, smoky, resiny incense. It mellows noticably but subtly to a gentler pine, not as citrusy-sharp, with the incense bubbling up just a little, but broadening rather than overcoming.
The smoke becomes more pronounced, but this is one of the best smokes I've sniffed -- not too campfire, not too acrid, just smooth and dry and a bit sweet, like the smell of an old church after mass.
Somewhere in here, I was thinking of applewood smoke on a BBQ. Turns out, the perfumer actually lists apple in the notes.
Now, we can chat about all the notes and bits, but there's something complete about this fragrance that wants the forest to be noted ahead of the trees. The word I keep coming back to is "enveloping." I find it cosy and comforting, and just a bit sexy, because smoke and incense usually have a little vavoom in their makeup. The sillage is poofy rather than trailing, more resembling a fog or a cloud than the stream of a peacock's tail carrying behind it.
The fragrance is incredibly long lasting. If I didn't shower, who knows how long it would have stayed? Eighteen hours after a light application, my wrists smelled like baking¶¶ and incense.
It is to be noted that Aaron (the filing clerk) walked into my office and went all dreamy and forgot what he was going to say. "Wow. It smells *really* good in here." Shanny liked it and confirmed that it goes nicely with R&B, Robert Cray-style.
So I've shaken my perfume ennui in favour of Wazamba monomania.##
It's a step in the right direction.
Parfum d'Empire says†††: An aromatic pine$ grove created around incense,$ sacred to all great civilizations. Incense, myrrh, sandalwood, cypress and apple$ fashion the enigmatic formula of this captivaing perfume. A voyage within...
Hans says: A spice. Like a cinnamon. It smells like the colour brown. Rich mahogany. Yeah, I get a spicy scent.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Hans doesn't merit a star because, once again, Hans is leaving on a deadline. We had a deadline yesterday, we have another October 9 and now we have one October 30, the day Hans is leaving for Madison.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Short lived.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): You'd think this wouldn't be a memory item, wouldn't you?
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): My obsessive nature doesn't only apply to hobbies and things people tell me I can't have; it spreads and permeates every little corner of my being. In this case, erroneously. That copy room haunted me all day.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Yes, I keep paper towels in my desk. For good reason.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): I watched a little Discovery Channel this weekend.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): In one of our rare moments lately -- werk is really eating into my pleasant social time.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Y'know... gentle, courteous attention much like what a six-year-old gives a big, beribboned package on Christmas morning.
§§FOOTNOTE (dervish): Huh. Maybe I watched more Discovery Channel than I thought.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (knock knock): I was really surprised to find it didn't have any vanilla in the notes.
##FOOTNOTE (pound the sistrum!): Wazamba Monomania would be a good name for a band. Particularly, as Grain de Musc so kindly provided, since a Wazamba is a sort of African sistrum.
†††FOOTNOTE (holy holy holy cats): Via the packaging. Their website is all in French and I couldn't figure out which button to hit to get to the next on the list of perfumes and I don't know French for "search" and I was looking at the parade of bottles at the bottom of the page going all Nancy Drew with the "it's a golden colour" and again with the "the label is dark brown" and I never saw a Wazamba bottle float by, which is a shame because I thought it would be funny to post the French, doubly funny if I posted the shipping particulars instead of the perfume PR.
Did I mention "obsessive"?
If you'll direct your attention the clever graphic below, I have drawn a rough diagram of my daily habitat.
The green star is me. The purple star outside the box is the bathroom. The red star is the coffee maker, the blue star the printer where my documents mostly show up and the orange dinosaur-looking thing is Hans.†
[SUMMARY: With that, you know way more about my daily life than you want to.]
The series of events:
A vague notion that I have to pee. A vague notion that coffee would be good. The certainty that this print job is going to take several minutes, seeing as it's 180 pages long.
In a fit of efficient brilliance,‡ I hit print, figuring I'd drop my coffee cup in the kitchen, cruise to the bathroom, pick up coffee and collect my printed document on the return trip.
In reality, I hit print, went to the copy machine, couldn't figure out what I was doing there, realised I didn't have my coffee cup and went back to my office for that.
[SUMMARY: It dont't get any better than this.]
I started out again, this time skipping the copy room and heading for the kitchen, where I dispensed coffee to cup, whitened it up and headed back to my office. When I hit the copy machine, I remembered I had to pee.§
I set the coffee down on the copy counter and went to the bathroom. On the way back, I was intently reminding myself not to forget my stuff at the printer and bypassed the coffee completely.
[SUMMARY: Still not getting better.]
I got back to my desk, started to sit down and bounced like a rubber ball as I remembered my coffee. I went back for the coffee, and circled the copy room for a moment trying to remember what it was I was not supposed to forget in the copy room.¶ There weren't any papers lying around to give me a clue, so I went back to my office.
When I turned back to my computer, there was an email I needed to answer. About ten minutes later, Hans walked into my office with a handful of papers.
"These look like yours," he said.
"Oh, yeah. I printed stuff! Thank you!"
I set the stuff on the desk and continued with my email.
[SUMMARY: Multi-tasking may not be for everybody.]
About five minutes later, I turned without looking and bumped the coffee, spilling it over the freshly printed stuff. I sopped up the brown puddle with the paper towels I keep in my desk just for these moments,# sighed and took a sip of coffee. Which was cold.
Thus the sometimes-vicious cycle of life in the wilds of the office†† begins again. More prints, more coffee and someday I will spill again.
*************
Wazamba - Parfume d'Empire
Marin says: "What are you sniffing these days?" asked Nathan.%
"Not much, really. I'm experiencing perfume ennui," I replied.
"I hate it when that happens," he commiserated.
The next day, Wazamba landed on my desk.
Out of courtesy‡‡ to my generous friend, I pounced, ravaging it like a starving beast ravages a plump gazelle.§§
Mmmmm... fresh-cut pine backed by a dollop of sweet-but-not-too, round, smoky, resiny incense. It mellows noticably but subtly to a gentler pine, not as citrusy-sharp, with the incense bubbling up just a little, but broadening rather than overcoming.
The smoke becomes more pronounced, but this is one of the best smokes I've sniffed -- not too campfire, not too acrid, just smooth and dry and a bit sweet, like the smell of an old church after mass.
Somewhere in here, I was thinking of applewood smoke on a BBQ. Turns out, the perfumer actually lists apple in the notes.
Now, we can chat about all the notes and bits, but there's something complete about this fragrance that wants the forest to be noted ahead of the trees. The word I keep coming back to is "enveloping." I find it cosy and comforting, and just a bit sexy, because smoke and incense usually have a little vavoom in their makeup. The sillage is poofy rather than trailing, more resembling a fog or a cloud than the stream of a peacock's tail carrying behind it.
The fragrance is incredibly long lasting. If I didn't shower, who knows how long it would have stayed? Eighteen hours after a light application, my wrists smelled like baking¶¶ and incense.
It is to be noted that Aaron (the filing clerk) walked into my office and went all dreamy and forgot what he was going to say. "Wow. It smells *really* good in here." Shanny liked it and confirmed that it goes nicely with R&B, Robert Cray-style.
So I've shaken my perfume ennui in favour of Wazamba monomania.##
It's a step in the right direction.
Parfum d'Empire says†††: An aromatic pine$ grove created around incense,$ sacred to all great civilizations. Incense, myrrh, sandalwood, cypress and apple$ fashion the enigmatic formula of this captivaing perfume. A voyage within...
Hans says: A spice. Like a cinnamon. It smells like the colour brown. Rich mahogany. Yeah, I get a spicy scent.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Hans doesn't merit a star because, once again, Hans is leaving on a deadline. We had a deadline yesterday, we have another October 9 and now we have one October 30, the day Hans is leaving for Madison.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Short lived.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): You'd think this wouldn't be a memory item, wouldn't you?
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): My obsessive nature doesn't only apply to hobbies and things people tell me I can't have; it spreads and permeates every little corner of my being. In this case, erroneously. That copy room haunted me all day.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Yes, I keep paper towels in my desk. For good reason.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): I watched a little Discovery Channel this weekend.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): In one of our rare moments lately -- werk is really eating into my pleasant social time.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Y'know... gentle, courteous attention much like what a six-year-old gives a big, beribboned package on Christmas morning.
§§FOOTNOTE (dervish): Huh. Maybe I watched more Discovery Channel than I thought.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (knock knock): I was really surprised to find it didn't have any vanilla in the notes.
##FOOTNOTE (pound the sistrum!): Wazamba Monomania would be a good name for a band. Particularly, as Grain de Musc so kindly provided, since a Wazamba is a sort of African sistrum.
†††FOOTNOTE (holy holy holy cats): Via the packaging. Their website is all in French and I couldn't figure out which button to hit to get to the next on the list of perfumes and I don't know French for "search" and I was looking at the parade of bottles at the bottom of the page going all Nancy Drew with the "it's a golden colour" and again with the "the label is dark brown" and I never saw a Wazamba bottle float by, which is a shame because I thought it would be funny to post the French, doubly funny if I posted the shipping particulars instead of the perfume PR.
Did I mention "obsessive"?
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
A Half-Hearted, Time-Saving Lick of the Pig
I know, but...
[SUMMARY: Defensive much?]
These days, I don't write blogs.† I barely read blogs.‡ In this economy,§ one must do everything in one's power to stay in the good graces of those willing to pay one.
Translation: Deadlines loom. Free time is short. Can't screw around.%
[SUMMARY: Excuses, excuses.]
I do have a couple of juicy tidbits I want to share, just to let you know I'm still out here somewhere and well, because they're funny or interesting.
Sarah, you're going to want to cover your eyes when we get to "interesting."
[SUMMARY: In the eye of the beholder, my friends, in the eye of the beholder.]
So on the funny front, a follow-up to the Lady Gaga fashion debacle of July 2009:
DON'T LOOK, SARAH! GO FIND A NICE CUPCAKE OR A PUPPY OR A FLUFFY CLOUD OR SOMETHING TO OCCUPY YOUR EYES!
And something I find interesting, courtesy of Kathy-now-Kathryn¶:
Meet Heteropoda davidbowie.
Yep. You read that right. David Bowie gets his own spider. Be it Martian or Glass, it seems somehow glam-appropriate... if a little scary.
[SUMMARY: All day long, my head will be shrieking, "...but where are the spiders?"]
And, since I put it together last week, I can throw this in and complete my tour of the Six Scents line... just in time for the release of Six Scents, part II#, due in October.††
*************
No. 6: Teen Spirit - Preen & Mark Buxton (Part 6 in the series)
Marin says: Bergamot.$ Definitely bergamot. Or maybe lemon of the verbena variety. It's thin and high and sour-citrusy... and as I found out later, may be the most interesting portion of the trip for me.
When the citrus starts fading, a touch of rose$ peeks through. It's very watery, both in that "barely there" sense and in that it smells like rain.$ Once the bergamot is completely gone and the sharper parts of the rose round out, it becomes a round, powdery floral, no particular rose in sight.
I think the "teen spirit" moniker is apt; this reminds me very much of something one gets at Walgreen's when one is a 16 year old girl. Love's Baby Soft. Something attributable to Brittney Spears.@ It goes distinctly soapy (must be musk$) late in the game.
Meh.
Meh meh meh.
Six Scents says: "The idea we had with Preen, was to capture an English summer garden after the rain - light, natural, floral, fresh, but not sweet. Its sprakling top note, made of calabrain bergamot an a unique seashore accord‡‡ is wrapped with magnolia and Turkish rose. The tingling spicy scent of red pepper sustained by hazelnut leaf and rhubarb give the fragrance its natural depth.§§ Finally, a touch of violet wood for the long-lastingness and pleasurable feeling." - Mark Buxton, Perfumer
Ingredients: Hazelnut Leaf, Rhubarb, Bergamot, Seashore accord, Red Pepper, Berry Rose, Magnolia, Violet wood, Sandalwood, Musk.
Hans says: Ooooh, I like that. It smells like grapefruit rind. What do you call that? Zest. Grapefruit zest.¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): You may have noticed.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Mostly of the "funny cats" variety.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Oh, how I hate it when people use that phrase...
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Much.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Who has the most interesting Twitter list. I did eventually have to remove Courtney Love from my follow list because she's patently bugshit insane and completely misses the seminal point of Twitter, which is its brevity, by posting roughly 20,000 words a day, 140 words at a time.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Electric Boogaloo.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): I can hear you cringing from here, Nathan.
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): I'm not as proud of myself as I usually am. Picking out orange and rose seems a scant talent.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Before her particular bugshit slut phase -- back in the Disney "I'm still a virgin" pink poofy feather ponytail days.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I'm officially a perfume snob. I completely dismissed this whole scent as soon as I saw the cutesy marketing ploy "seashore accord." Good thing I didn't really like the scent to begin with or I'd be torn by hypocrisy and existential angst.
§§FOOTNOTE (shaking my head, waggling my finger): If I had detected any of anything in this whole sentence, I may have been able to find something other than "meh" to say about it. Everything in this sentence sounds delightful.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (heads up!): Hans only got the first whiff. I should've made him hang out for the powdery part.
[SUMMARY: Defensive much?]
These days, I don't write blogs.† I barely read blogs.‡ In this economy,§ one must do everything in one's power to stay in the good graces of those willing to pay one.
Translation: Deadlines loom. Free time is short. Can't screw around.%
[SUMMARY: Excuses, excuses.]
I do have a couple of juicy tidbits I want to share, just to let you know I'm still out here somewhere and well, because they're funny or interesting.
Sarah, you're going to want to cover your eyes when we get to "interesting."
[SUMMARY: In the eye of the beholder, my friends, in the eye of the beholder.]
So on the funny front, a follow-up to the Lady Gaga fashion debacle of July 2009:
DON'T LOOK, SARAH! GO FIND A NICE CUPCAKE OR A PUPPY OR A FLUFFY CLOUD OR SOMETHING TO OCCUPY YOUR EYES!
And something I find interesting, courtesy of Kathy-now-Kathryn¶:
Meet Heteropoda davidbowie.
Yep. You read that right. David Bowie gets his own spider. Be it Martian or Glass, it seems somehow glam-appropriate... if a little scary.
[SUMMARY: All day long, my head will be shrieking, "...but where are the spiders?"]
And, since I put it together last week, I can throw this in and complete my tour of the Six Scents line... just in time for the release of Six Scents, part II#, due in October.††
*************
No. 6: Teen Spirit - Preen & Mark Buxton (Part 6 in the series)
Marin says: Bergamot.$ Definitely bergamot. Or maybe lemon of the verbena variety. It's thin and high and sour-citrusy... and as I found out later, may be the most interesting portion of the trip for me.
When the citrus starts fading, a touch of rose$ peeks through. It's very watery, both in that "barely there" sense and in that it smells like rain.$ Once the bergamot is completely gone and the sharper parts of the rose round out, it becomes a round, powdery floral, no particular rose in sight.
I think the "teen spirit" moniker is apt; this reminds me very much of something one gets at Walgreen's when one is a 16 year old girl. Love's Baby Soft. Something attributable to Brittney Spears.@ It goes distinctly soapy (must be musk$) late in the game.
Meh.
Meh meh meh.
Six Scents says: "The idea we had with Preen, was to capture an English summer garden after the rain - light, natural, floral, fresh, but not sweet. Its sprakling top note, made of calabrain bergamot an a unique seashore accord‡‡ is wrapped with magnolia and Turkish rose. The tingling spicy scent of red pepper sustained by hazelnut leaf and rhubarb give the fragrance its natural depth.§§ Finally, a touch of violet wood for the long-lastingness and pleasurable feeling." - Mark Buxton, Perfumer
Ingredients: Hazelnut Leaf, Rhubarb, Bergamot, Seashore accord, Red Pepper, Berry Rose, Magnolia, Violet wood, Sandalwood, Musk.
Hans says: Ooooh, I like that. It smells like grapefruit rind. What do you call that? Zest. Grapefruit zest.¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): You may have noticed.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Mostly of the "funny cats" variety.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Oh, how I hate it when people use that phrase...
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Much.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Who has the most interesting Twitter list. I did eventually have to remove Courtney Love from my follow list because she's patently bugshit insane and completely misses the seminal point of Twitter, which is its brevity, by posting roughly 20,000 words a day, 140 words at a time.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Electric Boogaloo.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): I can hear you cringing from here, Nathan.
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): I'm not as proud of myself as I usually am. Picking out orange and rose seems a scant talent.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Before her particular bugshit slut phase -- back in the Disney "I'm still a virgin" pink poofy feather ponytail days.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I'm officially a perfume snob. I completely dismissed this whole scent as soon as I saw the cutesy marketing ploy "seashore accord." Good thing I didn't really like the scent to begin with or I'd be torn by hypocrisy and existential angst.
§§FOOTNOTE (shaking my head, waggling my finger): If I had detected any of anything in this whole sentence, I may have been able to find something other than "meh" to say about it. Everything in this sentence sounds delightful.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (heads up!): Hans only got the first whiff. I should've made him hang out for the powdery part.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Ein Kleine Wachtmusik
We had an auxiliary father-daughter dinner last night. We† needed to be sure my iPod would jack into Dad's stereo and the sound would be good for dining and dancing at the wedding.
The wedding on Saturday.
[SUMMARY: A moment of stunned silence, please.‡]
Even as I type this, I'm aware the full impact of what I am about to impart will be lost. Y'all don't really know my dad.
This is a man who doesn't own a tie.§
This is a man who won't wear clothes with words or wild prints¶ on them.
This is a man who thinks big, fancy anything is worth nothing more than a headshake.
This is a man who has no idea where his cell phone is. Almost ever.
This is a man of even temper, good cheer, relaxed attitude, low maintenance, low overhead, relentless good sense and an inherent Protestant work ethic.
So when he turned into Groomzilla, nobody was more surprised than me.
Last night:
Dad: So I got the kids -- being flowers -- taken care of and then I was going to set up the speakers...
Me: When you started that sentence, I heard, "I got the kids, whom I decided to dress like flowers to perform some sort of elementary-school-musical-program at the wedding."
Dad: I wanted to do that. I got vetoed.
[SUMMARY: More stunned! More silence!]
And it's true. A month ago, he told me he wanted to have all the grandchildren gather and sing "We Wish You a Happy Wedding"# at the ceremony.
While various evil stepsisters have been true to form, telling their mother how tacky and passé all her wedding wants†† are, I have to tip my hat to whichever one of them undoubtedly gave my father that you've-been-smoking-crack look and said, "No. There will be no children's chorale."
[SUMMARY: W.C. Fields wasn't blowing smoke. Dogs and children; don't do it.]
Anyway, there will be a skit, but it will be performed by the bride and groom.
Not kidding.
Songs that didn't make it to the wedding playlist:
Flight of the Valkyries - Wagner‡‡
Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division
Another One Bites the Dust - Queen
Achy Breaky Heart - whoever does Achy Breaky Heart§§
Bolero - Ravel¶¶
She Works Hard for the Money - Donna Summer
The Breakup Song - The Greg Kihn Band
Existential Blues - Tom "T-Bone" Stankus
Danse Macabre - Saint-Saëns
Tom Sawyer - Rush
Gin & Juice - Snoop Dogg, or even the Phish## version
At one time, I considered them all. Cooler heads††† prevailed.
*************
No. 5: Illicit Sex - JEREMY SCOTT [sic] & Philippe Roques (Part 5 in the series)
Marin says: Rose -- deep, woody rose with a definite float of bitter orange and a touch of aldehyde.
For me, this is strongly reminiscent of Chanel No. 5, but with a hair less aldehyde and a bit more rose and a skosh of orange. There's something brilliant about the way it captures that memory of Mom and Dad going out for the evening in a cloud of Chanel, while going just far enough into a contemporary space that I could inhabit happily.
Eventually, it parses down to a clear rose, travelling back into history and faded beauty.
The name, Illicit Sex,‡‡‡ doesn't quite meet up with either the scent itself or the perfumer's notes on fragility and strength in love. Do you suppose they really, really hope sex sells?
Six Scents says: ""Illicit Sex is an essay on love: the encounter of fragility and strength." - Philippe Roques, Perfumer
Ingredients: Bergamot,$ Aldehydic,$ Pepper, Nutmet, Rose,$ Benzoin, Olibanum, Cedarwood,$ Musk.
Hans says: Hmmm. It's pretty light. It smells like... I get some incense.§§§ Like Arabian market.¶¶¶ You smell like an Arabian market, Marin. Good morning.###
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): And by "we," I mean, "my father, who has somehow become convinced that I am a technological dummy who will populate his wedding reception with death metal and pimps-n-hos rap music."
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Not that we didn't know it was coming, just... still a little stunned.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): A fact that led to a wedding battle over whether or not he should have to go out and buy a tie for this one tiny occasion when a bolo tie should work just as well. For those of you scoring at home, he won that one.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Like stripes.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Y'know... to the tune of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas."
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Balloons. She loves balloons and wanted some, until Evil Stepsister told her it was tacky and totally 1980s. I say let the woman have her balloons. Who cares if it's tacky -- the guest list is comprised of her children and grandchildren and Dad's children and grandchildren. If ever there was a situation when one could get tacky without repercussion, this is it.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I have four musical divisions: Taps for the processional (I'm not kidding and it wasn't my idea -- this is all the groom), an hour of classical music for dinner, The Rose for the first dance, two hours of dance music for the reception. Under the heading "classical music," it appears my taste is unsurprisingly gothic, with lots of skeletons and sturm-und-drang. I'm guessing "O Fortuna" isn't a good idea. I have to go get some Handel and Vivaldi or everyone will lose their appetites.
§§FOOTNOTE (do-si-do): Peach wanted me to put in some country music suitable for line dancing. For my country cousins. I told Dad I figured they can dance the Electric Slide with everybody else if they feel a need to line dance. I am NOT BUYING Achy Breaky Heart. Yes, there will be Electric Slide. Possibly Chicken Dance too, because I think those are funny wedding traditions I am willing to follow for my own wicked glee.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (beat that... drum): I saw 10.
##FOOTNOTE (I will pound on this until you get it): Please to pronounce "P-hish."
†††FOOTNOTE (three stepsisters, all in a row): Or at least my Inner Evil Stepsister.
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (sex on the wrong side of the tracks): Illicit sex should be rumpled, sweaty, hurried, shameful, furtive, seedy, possibly up against the stall wall in a club restroom. There should be nothing fragile or strong about it, unless you count the leg muscles it takes to have sex in a bathroom stall. Essay on love, my ass. Though that may be another way to do illicit...
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): Well, look at me!
§§§FOOTNOTE (give that man three rounds of applause!): Hans is getting really good at this. Speaking of Hans, he's very disappointed nobody commented on his prom picture. I told him I figure out there was a shocked silence as everybody in his fan club said, "I didn't know Hans was gay." His girlfriend thinks that's really funny.
¶¶¶FOOTNOTE (camels in the desert): And Hans knows of which he speaks -- he lived in Saudi for many years.
The wedding on Saturday.
[SUMMARY: A moment of stunned silence, please.‡]
Even as I type this, I'm aware the full impact of what I am about to impart will be lost. Y'all don't really know my dad.
This is a man who doesn't own a tie.§
This is a man who won't wear clothes with words or wild prints¶ on them.
This is a man who thinks big, fancy anything is worth nothing more than a headshake.
This is a man who has no idea where his cell phone is. Almost ever.
This is a man of even temper, good cheer, relaxed attitude, low maintenance, low overhead, relentless good sense and an inherent Protestant work ethic.
So when he turned into Groomzilla, nobody was more surprised than me.
Last night:
Dad: So I got the kids -- being flowers -- taken care of and then I was going to set up the speakers...
Me: When you started that sentence, I heard, "I got the kids, whom I decided to dress like flowers to perform some sort of elementary-school-musical-program at the wedding."
Dad: I wanted to do that. I got vetoed.
[SUMMARY: More stunned! More silence!]
And it's true. A month ago, he told me he wanted to have all the grandchildren gather and sing "We Wish You a Happy Wedding"# at the ceremony.
While various evil stepsisters have been true to form, telling their mother how tacky and passé all her wedding wants†† are, I have to tip my hat to whichever one of them undoubtedly gave my father that you've-been-smoking-crack look and said, "No. There will be no children's chorale."
[SUMMARY: W.C. Fields wasn't blowing smoke. Dogs and children; don't do it.]
Anyway, there will be a skit, but it will be performed by the bride and groom.
Not kidding.
Songs that didn't make it to the wedding playlist:
Flight of the Valkyries - Wagner‡‡
Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division
Another One Bites the Dust - Queen
Achy Breaky Heart - whoever does Achy Breaky Heart§§
Bolero - Ravel¶¶
She Works Hard for the Money - Donna Summer
The Breakup Song - The Greg Kihn Band
Existential Blues - Tom "T-Bone" Stankus
Danse Macabre - Saint-Saëns
Tom Sawyer - Rush
Gin & Juice - Snoop Dogg, or even the Phish## version
At one time, I considered them all. Cooler heads††† prevailed.
*************
No. 5: Illicit Sex - JEREMY SCOTT [sic] & Philippe Roques (Part 5 in the series)
Marin says: Rose -- deep, woody rose with a definite float of bitter orange and a touch of aldehyde.
For me, this is strongly reminiscent of Chanel No. 5, but with a hair less aldehyde and a bit more rose and a skosh of orange. There's something brilliant about the way it captures that memory of Mom and Dad going out for the evening in a cloud of Chanel, while going just far enough into a contemporary space that I could inhabit happily.
Eventually, it parses down to a clear rose, travelling back into history and faded beauty.
The name, Illicit Sex,‡‡‡ doesn't quite meet up with either the scent itself or the perfumer's notes on fragility and strength in love. Do you suppose they really, really hope sex sells?
Six Scents says: ""Illicit Sex is an essay on love: the encounter of fragility and strength." - Philippe Roques, Perfumer
Ingredients: Bergamot,$ Aldehydic,$ Pepper, Nutmet, Rose,$ Benzoin, Olibanum, Cedarwood,$ Musk.
Hans says: Hmmm. It's pretty light. It smells like... I get some incense.§§§ Like Arabian market.¶¶¶ You smell like an Arabian market, Marin. Good morning.###
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): And by "we," I mean, "my father, who has somehow become convinced that I am a technological dummy who will populate his wedding reception with death metal and pimps-n-hos rap music."
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Not that we didn't know it was coming, just... still a little stunned.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): A fact that led to a wedding battle over whether or not he should have to go out and buy a tie for this one tiny occasion when a bolo tie should work just as well. For those of you scoring at home, he won that one.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Like stripes.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Y'know... to the tune of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas."
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Balloons. She loves balloons and wanted some, until Evil Stepsister told her it was tacky and totally 1980s. I say let the woman have her balloons. Who cares if it's tacky -- the guest list is comprised of her children and grandchildren and Dad's children and grandchildren. If ever there was a situation when one could get tacky without repercussion, this is it.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I have four musical divisions: Taps for the processional (I'm not kidding and it wasn't my idea -- this is all the groom), an hour of classical music for dinner, The Rose for the first dance, two hours of dance music for the reception. Under the heading "classical music," it appears my taste is unsurprisingly gothic, with lots of skeletons and sturm-und-drang. I'm guessing "O Fortuna" isn't a good idea. I have to go get some Handel and Vivaldi or everyone will lose their appetites.
§§FOOTNOTE (do-si-do): Peach wanted me to put in some country music suitable for line dancing. For my country cousins. I told Dad I figured they can dance the Electric Slide with everybody else if they feel a need to line dance. I am NOT BUYING Achy Breaky Heart. Yes, there will be Electric Slide. Possibly Chicken Dance too, because I think those are funny wedding traditions I am willing to follow for my own wicked glee.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (beat that... drum): I saw 10.
##FOOTNOTE (I will pound on this until you get it): Please to pronounce "P-hish."
†††FOOTNOTE (three stepsisters, all in a row): Or at least my Inner Evil Stepsister.
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (sex on the wrong side of the tracks): Illicit sex should be rumpled, sweaty, hurried, shameful, furtive, seedy, possibly up against the stall wall in a club restroom. There should be nothing fragile or strong about it, unless you count the leg muscles it takes to have sex in a bathroom stall. Essay on love, my ass. Though that may be another way to do illicit...
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): Well, look at me!
§§§FOOTNOTE (give that man three rounds of applause!): Hans is getting really good at this. Speaking of Hans, he's very disappointed nobody commented on his prom picture. I told him I figure out there was a shocked silence as everybody in his fan club said, "I didn't know Hans was gay." His girlfriend thinks that's really funny.
¶¶¶FOOTNOTE (camels in the desert): And Hans knows of which he speaks -- he lived in Saudi for many years.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Tuesday, Tuesday... la laa la l-la laaaaaa
I played hooky yesterday. It was marvelous.
For some reason, sitting around knitting and reading and communing with the North 40 is just so much better when I realise Hans is in the office working.
*************
You know what those 13 little stars mean... we're going to lick the pig!
*************
This is not my story to tell, but I feel I must relate it anyway.† Many of you don't know Mary Beth and most of you weren't there when she was telling it. I feel I would be remiss if I didn't spread the word.
Wherever you live, there's a good chance the question of urban chicken coops has come up recently. I thought it was that way in Denver because of recent changes to city ordinances, but it turns out it's just part of this big push toward organic self-sufficiency.
Anyway, Mary Beth is going to raise chickens. Which takes a lot of paperwork and governmental meddling.
First, she had to be issued the application from Community Planning and Development and Neighborhood Inspection Services. The completed application was then filed with Animal Control.
Somewhere in here, she bult a chicken coop which apparently rivals the Ritz Carlton and Mary Beth wants to move into it herself and maybe let the chickens have the run of her house.
Animal Control did a home visit to see that the chickens would be clean, comfortable and pest-free. She was approved for six chickens, a feat only slightly less bureaucratically arduous than fostering a human child.
THEN she paid $50 for a chicken permit.‡
Finally, she ordered -- I love this part -- an assortment of chicks.% Which come by post. From mypetchicken.com.
Getting on the Internet and ordering the six chicken assortment and "mypetchicken-dot-com" made me so happy. Some days, just knowing things *exist* out there is totally happy-making.
*************
You will all be delighted to know the sleeves of the guitar sweater for TFN's birthday are on their holders§ and I'm roaring down the sweater body with speed and something approaching accuracy.
Intarsia also makes me happy.¶ Frankly, I'm usually not that big on the look of a lot of it, but it's engaging knitting, the kind where time flies.
*************
I'm beginning to think the new Big Girl Phone may be too much phone for me.
I'm wondering if I want to be *that* connected. Ah, well. I signed a contract. I'll live with it for a couple of years and probably become one of those asshole people who can't leave her phone alone for two minutes and insists on texting at her own wedding.#
It does take nice pictures, doesn't it?
*************
My father is getting married August 22nd. I am in charge of two things: the music for the wedding itself†† and the food‡‡ for the "bachelor party"§§ the night before.
I'm kinda hoping I get some ripe tomatoes from my garden before then.¶¶
*************
Speaking of gardening, did you know cucumbers don't put out big root systems? They have to be watered more frequently than, say, tomatoes or peppers because they won't go looking for the water, you have to take the water to them.##
This was a lesson hard-learned. I lost many baby cucumbers††† before I read that particular bit of cucumber wisdom.
*************
[SARAH! DON'T LOOK! AVERT YOUR EYES!]
Hammacher-Schlemmer apparently heard from my nephews about my spider preferences. They sent me an email about this today.
I'm assuming Batman is posing under the spider arbour rather than Spiderman because he's better colour-coordinated...?
*************
No. 4: Diagonal - Gareth Pugh & Emilie Coppermann (Part 4 in the series)@
Marin says: Dill! Seconds of dill, then off to a very close-to-the-skin, very warm woody scent that could be a spice or richer floral tempered by a delicate amber. I certainly like it, which is good since nobody else is likely to know it's there.
For the record, I put this on mid-afternoon and the next morning I still had a very steady amber/musk finish clinging to my wrists. This would be great for long meeting days when I don't necessarily want to be remembered for my perfume, but I may still need surreptitious sniff during water breaks to boost morale.
Six Scents says: "Contrast, ambiguity, duality. Gareth Pugh said about his style: "it's a struggle between lightness and darkness." this is what I tried to translate in this perfume. The contrast between different raw materials, masculine and feminine, rough and smooth, dark and light, fresh and sensual." - Emilie Coppermann, Perfumer
Ingredients: Dill,$ Black Pepper, Nutmeg, Palissander, Black Tea, Amyris, White Amber,$ Musk.$
Hans says: Well, now, that smells like some kind of food. Mushroom? Fried mushroom? Actually, it doesn't smell like mushroom at all, but I'm sticking with it.
*************
Speaking of Hans, he went to his college roommate's wedding this weekend. The photographer had a ring of lights thing set up, so the wedding guests took turns seeing who could take the best cheesy prom photo.
I believe Hans and Trav‡‡‡ win.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): If nothing else, it's the foundation for this whole pig-licking and I couldn't very well leave it out.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Annual. $50 a year for a chicken permit. You have to pay $50 every year for your chicken permit. By "you," I mean, "Mary Beth." I just love saying "chicken permit."
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Apparently, chicks can live without food through the first 72 hours after they hatch so they can be packed up in boxes and mailed.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): In the grand tradition of circus knitting, I am going to attempt to knit both sleeves at once on two circular needles, in situ. I see no reason it can't be done. Speaking of circus knitting, did you see some guy at Sock Summit was knitting seven pairs at once? Hmph. Been there, done that -- way ahead of you, big guy. I guess if SOME OF US had just gutted up and gone to Sock Summit, we could be famous for our Xtreme Knitting too.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): And intarsia in the round makes me feel like a superhero.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): This is not an immediate danger, just an example.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): The temptation to abuse this power is fierce. I could do two hours of very pointed songs. I won't, of course... the Electric Slide will almost undoubtedly feature, but I *could* propagandise.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I'm thinking a couple of homemade pizzas, a big ol' salad, some finger food in case a poker game breaks out and a cherry pie made from cherries I picked myself. Hi! Remember me? Susie F. Homemaker?
§§FOOTNOTE (backhanded bachelor party): In quotes because, as Brother said, "You have to have some kind of activity, but clearly we won't be making the bachelor do shots of Jager until he barfs, and the standard substitutes (like paintball) probably won't work..." There will, of course, be no naked girls. Or boys. Or porn of any kind. So it's not so much a bachelor party as a "get Dad from underfoot so the evil stepsister doesn't kill him before the wedding" gig.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (round, ripe tomatoes on the vine): Not quite so much because I'm looking for quality ingredients as I'd like to show off.
##FOOTNOTE (cucumber trellis): Thank you, Dr. Science!
†††FOOTNOTE (stake the cucumbers!): Very sad -- they go dark brown and crispy.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): You should go check out Nathan's pictures of the packaging. Kinda freaky, in a skully-good sort of way.
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): And if I weren't so lazy at the moment, I'd Google "palissander" to see if it might qualify as "woody."
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (long and winding road): Trav is a friend of the groom's from out of town. Hans found him delightful.
For some reason, sitting around knitting and reading and communing with the North 40 is just so much better when I realise Hans is in the office working.
*************
You know what those 13 little stars mean... we're going to lick the pig!
*************
This is not my story to tell, but I feel I must relate it anyway.† Many of you don't know Mary Beth and most of you weren't there when she was telling it. I feel I would be remiss if I didn't spread the word.
Wherever you live, there's a good chance the question of urban chicken coops has come up recently. I thought it was that way in Denver because of recent changes to city ordinances, but it turns out it's just part of this big push toward organic self-sufficiency.
Anyway, Mary Beth is going to raise chickens. Which takes a lot of paperwork and governmental meddling.
First, she had to be issued the application from Community Planning and Development and Neighborhood Inspection Services. The completed application was then filed with Animal Control.
Somewhere in here, she bult a chicken coop which apparently rivals the Ritz Carlton and Mary Beth wants to move into it herself and maybe let the chickens have the run of her house.
Animal Control did a home visit to see that the chickens would be clean, comfortable and pest-free. She was approved for six chickens, a feat only slightly less bureaucratically arduous than fostering a human child.
THEN she paid $50 for a chicken permit.‡
Finally, she ordered -- I love this part -- an assortment of chicks.% Which come by post. From mypetchicken.com.
Getting on the Internet and ordering the six chicken assortment and "mypetchicken-dot-com" made me so happy. Some days, just knowing things *exist* out there is totally happy-making.
*************
You will all be delighted to know the sleeves of the guitar sweater for TFN's birthday are on their holders§ and I'm roaring down the sweater body with speed and something approaching accuracy.
Intarsia also makes me happy.¶ Frankly, I'm usually not that big on the look of a lot of it, but it's engaging knitting, the kind where time flies.
*************
I'm beginning to think the new Big Girl Phone may be too much phone for me.
I'm wondering if I want to be *that* connected. Ah, well. I signed a contract. I'll live with it for a couple of years and probably become one of those asshole people who can't leave her phone alone for two minutes and insists on texting at her own wedding.#
It does take nice pictures, doesn't it?
*************
My father is getting married August 22nd. I am in charge of two things: the music for the wedding itself†† and the food‡‡ for the "bachelor party"§§ the night before.
I'm kinda hoping I get some ripe tomatoes from my garden before then.¶¶
*************
Speaking of gardening, did you know cucumbers don't put out big root systems? They have to be watered more frequently than, say, tomatoes or peppers because they won't go looking for the water, you have to take the water to them.##
This was a lesson hard-learned. I lost many baby cucumbers††† before I read that particular bit of cucumber wisdom.
*************
[SARAH! DON'T LOOK! AVERT YOUR EYES!]
Hammacher-Schlemmer apparently heard from my nephews about my spider preferences. They sent me an email about this today.
I'm assuming Batman is posing under the spider arbour rather than Spiderman because he's better colour-coordinated...?
*************
No. 4: Diagonal - Gareth Pugh & Emilie Coppermann (Part 4 in the series)@
Marin says: Dill! Seconds of dill, then off to a very close-to-the-skin, very warm woody scent that could be a spice or richer floral tempered by a delicate amber. I certainly like it, which is good since nobody else is likely to know it's there.
For the record, I put this on mid-afternoon and the next morning I still had a very steady amber/musk finish clinging to my wrists. This would be great for long meeting days when I don't necessarily want to be remembered for my perfume, but I may still need surreptitious sniff during water breaks to boost morale.
Six Scents says: "Contrast, ambiguity, duality. Gareth Pugh said about his style: "it's a struggle between lightness and darkness." this is what I tried to translate in this perfume. The contrast between different raw materials, masculine and feminine, rough and smooth, dark and light, fresh and sensual." - Emilie Coppermann, Perfumer
Ingredients: Dill,$ Black Pepper, Nutmeg, Palissander, Black Tea, Amyris, White Amber,$ Musk.$
Hans says: Well, now, that smells like some kind of food. Mushroom? Fried mushroom? Actually, it doesn't smell like mushroom at all, but I'm sticking with it.
*************
Speaking of Hans, he went to his college roommate's wedding this weekend. The photographer had a ring of lights thing set up, so the wedding guests took turns seeing who could take the best cheesy prom photo.
I believe Hans and Trav‡‡‡ win.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): If nothing else, it's the foundation for this whole pig-licking and I couldn't very well leave it out.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Annual. $50 a year for a chicken permit. You have to pay $50 every year for your chicken permit. By "you," I mean, "Mary Beth." I just love saying "chicken permit."
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Apparently, chicks can live without food through the first 72 hours after they hatch so they can be packed up in boxes and mailed.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): In the grand tradition of circus knitting, I am going to attempt to knit both sleeves at once on two circular needles, in situ. I see no reason it can't be done. Speaking of circus knitting, did you see some guy at Sock Summit was knitting seven pairs at once? Hmph. Been there, done that -- way ahead of you, big guy. I guess if SOME OF US had just gutted up and gone to Sock Summit, we could be famous for our Xtreme Knitting too.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): And intarsia in the round makes me feel like a superhero.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): This is not an immediate danger, just an example.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): The temptation to abuse this power is fierce. I could do two hours of very pointed songs. I won't, of course... the Electric Slide will almost undoubtedly feature, but I *could* propagandise.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I'm thinking a couple of homemade pizzas, a big ol' salad, some finger food in case a poker game breaks out and a cherry pie made from cherries I picked myself. Hi! Remember me? Susie F. Homemaker?
§§FOOTNOTE (backhanded bachelor party): In quotes because, as Brother said, "You have to have some kind of activity, but clearly we won't be making the bachelor do shots of Jager until he barfs, and the standard substitutes (like paintball) probably won't work..." There will, of course, be no naked girls. Or boys. Or porn of any kind. So it's not so much a bachelor party as a "get Dad from underfoot so the evil stepsister doesn't kill him before the wedding" gig.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (round, ripe tomatoes on the vine): Not quite so much because I'm looking for quality ingredients as I'd like to show off.
##FOOTNOTE (cucumber trellis): Thank you, Dr. Science!
†††FOOTNOTE (stake the cucumbers!): Very sad -- they go dark brown and crispy.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): You should go check out Nathan's pictures of the packaging. Kinda freaky, in a skully-good sort of way.
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): And if I weren't so lazy at the moment, I'd Google "palissander" to see if it might qualify as "woody."
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (long and winding road): Trav is a friend of the groom's from out of town. Hans found him delightful.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
The Corner of Lust 'n' Love†
Or the corner of Marin 'n' Quebec.
[SUMMARY: Potayto, Potahto.‡]
Kari was out walking her boy yesterday when she came upon this Greenwood Village street sign.§
And sent me the picture.
[SUMMARY: Kari is my new best friend.]
Guess what I want for my birthday?
It's a big YouTube day, isn't it?
*************
No. 3: The Spirit of Wood - Light Source & Philippe Paparella-Paris (Part 3 in the series)
Marin says: Grapefruit and cigarette smoke.
Right around the edges, a hint of something brown sugar sweet -- fig or currant, maybe. The grapefruit burns off quickly, leaving smoke and a hint of something brown sugar-sweet.
Another light, long-lasting scent. The final amber -- or maybe sandalwood -- throes stuck around until the next day's shower.
Six Scents says: "The inspiration for this fragrance comes from Cosmic Wonder Light Source's nature oriented fahion collection. Inspired by the designers memory of a scent experienced during a walk through a eucalyptus forest, a selection of fresh green top notes were combined with fig leaves and enlightened by green grass playing with fresh cut cypress. The idea was to create a rough and natural fragrance, using a lot of essential oils with a focus on the woody notes such as vetiver and himoki."¶ - Phillippe Paparella-Paris, Perfumer
Ingredients: Green Grass,# Fig Leaves,$ Cypress, Elemi, Coriander, Cedar wood, Vetiver, Himoki, White Amber$
Hans says: It's very earthy. It smells like something I smell a lot, like... trees. Pine trees. I'm getting a lot of wood. I feel like I'm eating wood right now, chewing on bark.††
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Thus:
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Quebec being well known as the City of Love.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): For those unfamiliar with Denverish suburbs, Greenwood Village is one of the best villages, and certainly has the best street signs.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Oh, yeah. Just like I said... grapefruit and cigarettes. *ahem*
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): The bitter end of green grass has a LOT in common with grapefruit. *ahem*
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): Yes, I'm taking credit for fig leaves. If I don't want to wreck my midterm grade, I should probably fight for credit for "maybe sandalwood" as the closest I got to wood all day. heheheheheheh. Wood.
††FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): For all the Hansisms, Hans got the perfumer's vision much better than I did. In a snit of jealousy, I believe I will start calling him Cosmic Wonder Light Source.
[SUMMARY: Potayto, Potahto.‡]
Kari was out walking her boy yesterday when she came upon this Greenwood Village street sign.§
And sent me the picture.
[SUMMARY: Kari is my new best friend.]
Guess what I want for my birthday?
It's a big YouTube day, isn't it?
*************
No. 3: The Spirit of Wood - Light Source & Philippe Paparella-Paris (Part 3 in the series)
Marin says: Grapefruit and cigarette smoke.
Right around the edges, a hint of something brown sugar sweet -- fig or currant, maybe. The grapefruit burns off quickly, leaving smoke and a hint of something brown sugar-sweet.
Another light, long-lasting scent. The final amber -- or maybe sandalwood -- throes stuck around until the next day's shower.
Six Scents says: "The inspiration for this fragrance comes from Cosmic Wonder Light Source's nature oriented fahion collection. Inspired by the designers memory of a scent experienced during a walk through a eucalyptus forest, a selection of fresh green top notes were combined with fig leaves and enlightened by green grass playing with fresh cut cypress. The idea was to create a rough and natural fragrance, using a lot of essential oils with a focus on the woody notes such as vetiver and himoki."¶ - Phillippe Paparella-Paris, Perfumer
Ingredients: Green Grass,# Fig Leaves,$ Cypress, Elemi, Coriander, Cedar wood, Vetiver, Himoki, White Amber$
Hans says: It's very earthy. It smells like something I smell a lot, like... trees. Pine trees. I'm getting a lot of wood. I feel like I'm eating wood right now, chewing on bark.††
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Thus:
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Quebec being well known as the City of Love.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): For those unfamiliar with Denverish suburbs, Greenwood Village is one of the best villages, and certainly has the best street signs.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Oh, yeah. Just like I said... grapefruit and cigarettes. *ahem*
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): The bitter end of green grass has a LOT in common with grapefruit. *ahem*
$FOOTNOTE (on the money!): Yes, I'm taking credit for fig leaves. If I don't want to wreck my midterm grade, I should probably fight for credit for "maybe sandalwood" as the closest I got to wood all day. heheheheheheh. Wood.
††FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): For all the Hansisms, Hans got the perfumer's vision much better than I did. In a snit of jealousy, I believe I will start calling him Cosmic Wonder Light Source.
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
There Is an Elephant in the Way
It's the moment you've been waiting for, the storm of the century, ladies and gentlemen, it's time to Lick the Pig!
Bet you never thought the day would come.†
[SUMMARY: Long time no lick.]
*************
We had a fire drill yesterday.‡
We filed in a calm and orderly manner down the stairs, then congregated in the parking lot kitty-corner from the office.§ Hans and I are fire buddies,‡ so we checked to be sure we were OK. The fire wardens for each floor wore their red Fire Warden hats‡ and checked us in on their fire warden clipboards. Then they let us back in the building.
Dude.
I've been four and I've been twelve...
[SUMMARY: I'm ten.]
*************
Speaking of school daze,¶ Brother sent me these:
Consensus is that the elephant is the funniest one.
While Brother thought the lack of humour on the part of the grading parties was noteworthy, I think "Very funny, Peter," made me laugh almost as hard as the funny Peter made to get that accolade.
[SUMMARY: Humour is subjective.]
*************
This morning, I got a parking space on the only street in downtown Denver with no meters and no time limits.#
I have a feeling I spent all my kharmic green stamps for the next three years to get that spot.
[SUMMARY: Kharma is subjective.]
*************
Did I mention I got Bronco season tickets over the weekend? Second-hardest-to-obtain season tix in the NFL?††
[SUMMARY: I may be in kharmic debt after that.]
*************
I took brother to see Leonard Cohen at Red Rocks last week.‡‡ If you get the chance, ya gotta see him. First, he has some of the best musicians I've ever seen/heard backing him up. Then, not only did he play for three-and-a-half hours, he skipped off the stage every time he left.
Skipped. A 74-year-old man.
And he's funny.
Great Leonard Cohen paraphrase:
"It’s been 14 or 15 years since I walked this stage. I was about 60 then, full of a young man’s dreams. I’ve taken a lot of Prozac since then. And Paxil, Wellbutrin,§§ Ritalin, Focalin… but I never took any of the little blue pills.
You see, I was deep in religious study at the time.
I didn’t know Prozac suppresses the libido.
I thought I had transcended desire."
[SUMMARY: Leonard Cohen would definitely understand Kharmic Green Stamps.]
*************
The tiny little Tomato Plant that Could gets stronger all the time.
Every day when I leave for work, I have separation anxiety because¶¶ I'm afraid a tornado will go through the alley or we'll have [more] hail and I'll come home to find it washed away.
[SUMMARY: Parenthood has its stresses.]
*************
Speaking of plants,¶ I planted the north forty this weekend and ended up with an honest-to-Jebus farmer's tan.
[SUMMARY: There's a little white trash in all of us.%]
*************
Speaking of weather,¶ with the current and recent levels of humidity in Denverish,## my hair has become large and unruly.
I give up. The hair is on its own.
In other weather news, I finally bought an umbrella, so it hasn't rained on my walks to and from the office in days.
[SUMMARY: This is me... this is the universe revolving around me...]
*************
And in the lick of a pig, I'm off.
*************
No. 2: Wicken 3000 - Bernhard Willhelm & Lucas Sieuzac for Six Scents (Part 2 in the series)†††
Marin says: Alcohol *flash!*
Aldehyde *flash!*
Soap *flash!*
A brief *flash!* that makes me want to quote Grains de Musc on Jean Claude Ellena,‡‡‡ then licorice and bay rum under heavy cloud cover.
This is so watery and close to the skin and disappears so fast -- even with three direct hits from the bottle.
It's inoffensive.
It's almost not there.
Six Scents says: "A light, fresh, clean scent that embodies a fusion of the elements. The idea was to create a perfume close to the elements of water and air,but with a futuristic approach.§§§ Express "the Back to nature" side of Bernhard with a pure & essential fragrance." - Lucas Sieuzac,
Perfumer Ingredients: Sea Breeze Accord, Bergamot, Water Jasmine, Sheer Musk.
Hans says: Whew! There's a lot of alcohol! It smells like a gin and tonic. It's definitely very light. I like it, but it's very... it smells like, um, summer mist off a... weeping willow.¶¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): I may be overestimating your excitement over pig-licking.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Srsly.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Not the one I take pictures of all the time... the one across the street from that.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): We were.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): I'm not telling you where.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): For those of you scoring at home, the Green Bay Packers are harder. heheheheheheheh
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Jealous? Oh, please be jealous.
§§FOOTNOTE (I'm just a little confused): sp?
¶¶FOOTNOTE (staked tomotoes): Because I'm a tomato dork.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Except maybe Nathan.
##FOOTNOTE (the pounding moist): Unheard of humidity! Humidity on a grand scale! A swamp's worth of humidity!
†††FOOTNOTE (tick tick tick): That sounds so 60 Minutes, doesn't it?
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (I tracked it down!): "...one of Jean Claude Ellena's many variations on the smell of water." And a big auxilliary slurp to Nathan for that quote.
§§§FOOTNOTE (triple take): Hey, that's what I said!
¶¶¶FOOTNOTE (three pats for Hans): And this is why we continue to keep Hans around.
Bet you never thought the day would come.†
[SUMMARY: Long time no lick.]
*************
We had a fire drill yesterday.‡
We filed in a calm and orderly manner down the stairs, then congregated in the parking lot kitty-corner from the office.§ Hans and I are fire buddies,‡ so we checked to be sure we were OK. The fire wardens for each floor wore their red Fire Warden hats‡ and checked us in on their fire warden clipboards. Then they let us back in the building.
Dude.
I've been four and I've been twelve...
[SUMMARY: I'm ten.]
*************
Speaking of school daze,¶ Brother sent me these:
Consensus is that the elephant is the funniest one.
While Brother thought the lack of humour on the part of the grading parties was noteworthy, I think "Very funny, Peter," made me laugh almost as hard as the funny Peter made to get that accolade.
[SUMMARY: Humour is subjective.]
*************
This morning, I got a parking space on the only street in downtown Denver with no meters and no time limits.#
I have a feeling I spent all my kharmic green stamps for the next three years to get that spot.
[SUMMARY: Kharma is subjective.]
*************
Did I mention I got Bronco season tickets over the weekend? Second-hardest-to-obtain season tix in the NFL?††
[SUMMARY: I may be in kharmic debt after that.]
*************
I took brother to see Leonard Cohen at Red Rocks last week.‡‡ If you get the chance, ya gotta see him. First, he has some of the best musicians I've ever seen/heard backing him up. Then, not only did he play for three-and-a-half hours, he skipped off the stage every time he left.
Skipped. A 74-year-old man.
And he's funny.
Great Leonard Cohen paraphrase:
"It’s been 14 or 15 years since I walked this stage. I was about 60 then, full of a young man’s dreams. I’ve taken a lot of Prozac since then. And Paxil, Wellbutrin,§§ Ritalin, Focalin… but I never took any of the little blue pills.
You see, I was deep in religious study at the time.
I didn’t know Prozac suppresses the libido.
I thought I had transcended desire."
[SUMMARY: Leonard Cohen would definitely understand Kharmic Green Stamps.]
*************
The tiny little Tomato Plant that Could gets stronger all the time.
Every day when I leave for work, I have separation anxiety because¶¶ I'm afraid a tornado will go through the alley or we'll have [more] hail and I'll come home to find it washed away.
[SUMMARY: Parenthood has its stresses.]
*************
Speaking of plants,¶ I planted the north forty this weekend and ended up with an honest-to-Jebus farmer's tan.
[SUMMARY: There's a little white trash in all of us.%]
*************
Speaking of weather,¶ with the current and recent levels of humidity in Denverish,## my hair has become large and unruly.
I give up. The hair is on its own.
In other weather news, I finally bought an umbrella, so it hasn't rained on my walks to and from the office in days.
[SUMMARY: This is me... this is the universe revolving around me...]
*************
And in the lick of a pig, I'm off.
*************
No. 2: Wicken 3000 - Bernhard Willhelm & Lucas Sieuzac for Six Scents (Part 2 in the series)†††
Marin says: Alcohol *flash!*
Aldehyde *flash!*
Soap *flash!*
A brief *flash!* that makes me want to quote Grains de Musc on Jean Claude Ellena,‡‡‡ then licorice and bay rum under heavy cloud cover.
This is so watery and close to the skin and disappears so fast -- even with three direct hits from the bottle.
It's inoffensive.
It's almost not there.
Six Scents says: "A light, fresh, clean scent that embodies a fusion of the elements. The idea was to create a perfume close to the elements of water and air,but with a futuristic approach.§§§ Express "the Back to nature" side of Bernhard with a pure & essential fragrance." - Lucas Sieuzac,
Perfumer Ingredients: Sea Breeze Accord, Bergamot, Water Jasmine, Sheer Musk.
Hans says: Whew! There's a lot of alcohol! It smells like a gin and tonic. It's definitely very light. I like it, but it's very... it smells like, um, summer mist off a... weeping willow.¶¶¶
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): I may be overestimating your excitement over pig-licking.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Srsly.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Not the one I take pictures of all the time... the one across the street from that.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): We were.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): I'm not telling you where.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): For those of you scoring at home, the Green Bay Packers are harder. heheheheheheheh
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Jealous? Oh, please be jealous.
§§FOOTNOTE (I'm just a little confused): sp?
¶¶FOOTNOTE (staked tomotoes): Because I'm a tomato dork.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Except maybe Nathan.
##FOOTNOTE (the pounding moist): Unheard of humidity! Humidity on a grand scale! A swamp's worth of humidity!
†††FOOTNOTE (tick tick tick): That sounds so 60 Minutes, doesn't it?
‡‡‡FOOTNOTE (I tracked it down!): "...one of Jean Claude Ellena's many variations on the smell of water." And a big auxilliary slurp to Nathan for that quote.
§§§FOOTNOTE (triple take): Hey, that's what I said!
¶¶¶FOOTNOTE (three pats for Hans): And this is why we continue to keep Hans around.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
ibid
...I NEED this.
From ThinkGeek, the people who brought you† the Bone Chillers skull and crossbone ice tray, comes the Crawling Zombie Torso Gelatin Mold.
How much do you want to make Zombie-shaped JellO shots right now?‡
*************
No. 1: Urban Tropicalia - Alexandre Herchcovitch & Joachim Correll for Six Scents
The backstory: Six Scents: Series One@ is a collection of six fragrances featuring collaborations between perfumers and fashion designers. An undisclosed portion of the proceeds will go to Designers Against AIDS (DAA) International AIDS Awareness Education Center in Antwerp, originally scheduled to open in December of 2008, but re-set for some time in 2009.
I have procured dollops of all six scents%... do you sense a theme emerging?^
Marin says: Sharp, bitter orange or maybe lime, then it morphs into pine, with a dry something behind it -- like a cedar branch, needles and all. A whiff of lemon lolls in the middle of it, surprisingly similar to the pine.§
There's a definite strata of fresh, white flowers solidly behind, and I would swear I'm getting fig or currant or some other dark, elusive fruit.
As the brighter notes fade off -- and they don't really fade so much as mellow -- a warmer, rounder something flirts with the composition. The floral starts looking like a spicy carnation,¶ just warming from the florist's fridge,# pine still singing in the chorus.
Now, I don't exactly smell amber, sandalwood or musk, but there's definitely something from that classic family. Apparently nothing too loud. Through it all, that cedary dryness just reining it in and making it a bit mysterious.
I think this is a very well-crafted perfume, cohesive, slightly unusual and mischeviously elegant. I like it.
Six Scents says: "The inspiration for this fragrance was driven by the way that Alexandre creates fashion. The creative liberty he uses to design fashion which can be used equally by men or women. This fragrance can be worn at any time, for any occasion, as a form of self expression, to be daring, or simply for the pure pleasure of wearing a fragrance. The Alexandre Herchcovitch scent evokes freedom ad sensuality, and similar to his fashion, the perfume is striking, emblematic and tanscends categories." - Joachim Correll, Perfumer
Ingredients: Erogenous†† Cedar wood$ - Amber Fond,‡‡ Lemon,$ Cassis De Bourgeons,$ Lime,$ Green, [sic] Apple,§§ Apricot, Jasmine, Tagete, Freesia, Cinnamon, Musk.$
Hans says: Tree sappy.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Well, brought me in any case. Left it right on my doorstep.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): I am looking at you, Lyda Kay.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Presumably, they are planning on a Series Two.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Due in no small measure to the (continuing) bad influence of one Nathan Branch.
^FOOTNOTE (careted): We're all about the themes here at the Rickety Blog.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Juno dropped some fine science on me the other day proving lemon and pine have more in common than household cleaners, but if I had the energy to go dig that up, I'd have the energy to write a real post.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): For those of you who don't troll the perfume blogs, carnation IS spicy. It's kinda like freesia or some other distinct white flower with a touch of clove and maybe a hint of cinnamon. Next time you're going past the 12-for-$2.99 bucket in the supermarket floral department, stop, close your eyes and give the carnations a good, deep, thoughtful sniff. Nobody will point and laugh.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): I believe I've already relayed this olfactory trigger, but my sophomore year in college, my mom sent me a giant Christmas floral arrangement that had roses, carnatios and pine boughs. That's exactly where I get stuck with anything that has both pine and flowers.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Which has to do with erosion rather than sex. I know. I learned about erogenous sinclines during a roadside geology lesson with my dad and have never quite forgiven the geologic world for that not being even half as lustful as it sounds.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I don't know. Google doesn't know. Google thinks "amber fond" is an agony aunt or maybe a 21-year-old in Fond du Lac. Google thinks perhaps I meant to say "amber found." That's the second time in a week Google has been no use to me at all.
§§FOOTNOTE (double sniff - like a double take, only with your nose): Ahhhh. This is why I try really hard to never look at the notes or the perfumers hype before I do my review. I would have TOTALLY gotten green apple (or green, apple) through the power of suggestion. Funny how much lemon and pine smells like green apple. Srsly.
From ThinkGeek, the people who brought you† the Bone Chillers skull and crossbone ice tray, comes the Crawling Zombie Torso Gelatin Mold.
How much do you want to make Zombie-shaped JellO shots right now?‡
*************
No. 1: Urban Tropicalia - Alexandre Herchcovitch & Joachim Correll for Six Scents
The backstory: Six Scents: Series One@ is a collection of six fragrances featuring collaborations between perfumers and fashion designers. An undisclosed portion of the proceeds will go to Designers Against AIDS (DAA) International AIDS Awareness Education Center in Antwerp, originally scheduled to open in December of 2008, but re-set for some time in 2009.
I have procured dollops of all six scents%... do you sense a theme emerging?^
Marin says: Sharp, bitter orange or maybe lime, then it morphs into pine, with a dry something behind it -- like a cedar branch, needles and all. A whiff of lemon lolls in the middle of it, surprisingly similar to the pine.§
There's a definite strata of fresh, white flowers solidly behind, and I would swear I'm getting fig or currant or some other dark, elusive fruit.
As the brighter notes fade off -- and they don't really fade so much as mellow -- a warmer, rounder something flirts with the composition. The floral starts looking like a spicy carnation,¶ just warming from the florist's fridge,# pine still singing in the chorus.
Now, I don't exactly smell amber, sandalwood or musk, but there's definitely something from that classic family. Apparently nothing too loud. Through it all, that cedary dryness just reining it in and making it a bit mysterious.
I think this is a very well-crafted perfume, cohesive, slightly unusual and mischeviously elegant. I like it.
Six Scents says: "The inspiration for this fragrance was driven by the way that Alexandre creates fashion. The creative liberty he uses to design fashion which can be used equally by men or women. This fragrance can be worn at any time, for any occasion, as a form of self expression, to be daring, or simply for the pure pleasure of wearing a fragrance. The Alexandre Herchcovitch scent evokes freedom ad sensuality, and similar to his fashion, the perfume is striking, emblematic and tanscends categories." - Joachim Correll, Perfumer
Ingredients: Erogenous†† Cedar wood$ - Amber Fond,‡‡ Lemon,$ Cassis De Bourgeons,$ Lime,$ Green, [sic] Apple,§§ Apricot, Jasmine, Tagete, Freesia, Cinnamon, Musk.$
Hans says: Tree sappy.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Well, brought me in any case. Left it right on my doorstep.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): I am looking at you, Lyda Kay.
@FOOTNOTE (atted): Presumably, they are planning on a Series Two.
%FOOTNOTE (percented): Due in no small measure to the (continuing) bad influence of one Nathan Branch.
^FOOTNOTE (careted): We're all about the themes here at the Rickety Blog.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Juno dropped some fine science on me the other day proving lemon and pine have more in common than household cleaners, but if I had the energy to go dig that up, I'd have the energy to write a real post.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): For those of you who don't troll the perfume blogs, carnation IS spicy. It's kinda like freesia or some other distinct white flower with a touch of clove and maybe a hint of cinnamon. Next time you're going past the 12-for-$2.99 bucket in the supermarket floral department, stop, close your eyes and give the carnations a good, deep, thoughtful sniff. Nobody will point and laugh.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): I believe I've already relayed this olfactory trigger, but my sophomore year in college, my mom sent me a giant Christmas floral arrangement that had roses, carnatios and pine boughs. That's exactly where I get stuck with anything that has both pine and flowers.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Which has to do with erosion rather than sex. I know. I learned about erogenous sinclines during a roadside geology lesson with my dad and have never quite forgiven the geologic world for that not being even half as lustful as it sounds.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I don't know. Google doesn't know. Google thinks "amber fond" is an agony aunt or maybe a 21-year-old in Fond du Lac. Google thinks perhaps I meant to say "amber found." That's the second time in a week Google has been no use to me at all.
§§FOOTNOTE (double sniff - like a double take, only with your nose): Ahhhh. This is why I try really hard to never look at the notes or the perfumers hype before I do my review. I would have TOTALLY gotten green apple (or green, apple) through the power of suggestion. Funny how much lemon and pine smells like green apple. Srsly.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
BSJ for Everyone!
That's what she said.†
This has been all uploaded and ready to go for over a month. Because of my understandable‡ postalphobia, I have a really hard time getting stuff to the post office to ship.
[SUMMARY: Inability to get to post office is related to blog photos. Somehow.]
BECAUSE one of these is for Sarah and her new arrival and I didn't want to post it before she got it.§
As always, the buttons are what really makes the Baby Surprise Jacket.
Then there's the one for my future stepsister-in-law, who decided not to find out the sex of the baby¶ so I went unconventional for the colours.
And got some very happy buttons to go with it.#
So for my dear friends who are new mothers, I hope you had a very happy first Mother's Day and I didn't mean you†† when I said I hate Mother's Day.
*************
Le Rivage des Syrtes (formerly PN1‡‡ or PdN1) - Patricia de Nicolaï for Parfums MDCI
Marin says: Now this has an aldehyde I can live with.
Most aldehydes are overwhelming to my delicate palate§§ and leave me thinking "Aqua Net." This one is bright and light and puts a fine synthetic net over a fruity floral.
I can't quite pick the fruit -- it's not exactly citrus, not exactly peach, not exactly mango. But it's definitely fruity. Perhaps like orange blossom, where the fruit hides in the flower. The flowers are strong and white and sweet like tropical blossoms -- maybe a dash of tuberose. And there's an edgy, slightly acrid depth that I'm starting to associate with ylang ylang.
As this dries down, everything mellows nicely, and there's a definite tinge of sweet oranges in the mix, complimented by a clean, clear tuberose. The aldehyde is nearly gone and there's a delicate golden depth -- amber -- that I find sophisticated and enchanting.
So my love affair with MDCI continues. They are so very French, to be sure, and so very well-crafted and slightly unusual.
This one is the brightest of the MDCI group so far and may be the spring/summer scent -- or one of them¶¶ -- that I've been looking for.
LuckyScent says: The top notes or [sic] orange, pineapple and galbanum combine in an unexpectedly radiant composition which fans of Nicolai will recognize as very much in her style. With the precious fruits secured as cargo, the search continues. Our hero gathers an abundance of heady florals— precious ylang, orange blossom and tuberose designed to delight any recipient of such a magnificent bouquet— and tucks them into a basket he has lined with grasses in order to protect them. Finally, the sailor’s attention turns to the most precious and rare essences– musks, incense and ambergris– eternal mementos of his exotic travels and worthy of none save the one who waits for him alone, praying for his safe return. A complex scent that evokes the bitter and the sweet, the tenderness and the wistful longing of romance.
Notes: sweet orange essence,$ pineapple, galbanum, ylang ylang,$ tuberose,$ orange blossom absolute,$ incense, ambergris,$ vanilla, musk
Hans says: Mmmm. I get, like, honey. Like a sweet honey. Like a flower honey. Honeysuckle. Call it honeysuckle. I think my talents are waning.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): This is all my cousin Joe and I say to each other. It makes Thanksgiving really, really funny (to us) and made Mother's Day bearable (to me), but I think it irritates our grandmother.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): I hear you laughing.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): There's a protocol here, you know.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Which is both liberating and limiting, knitting-wise.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): If future stepnephew-in-law is half as happy as these buttons, he will have a fairytale childhood... "fairytale" in the modern-day connotation, not like Hansel and Gretel.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): For the record, FSSIL went into labour at about 1:00 Sunday morning and had the baby Sunday night. It's a boy. And Sarah had hers three weeks ago. Also a boy, but we already knew that.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Mine says "PN1" on the bottle because it was still in the working title stage when I got my set of MDCI samples. I consider this to be like my Metallica: Ride the Lightning tour shirt, which proves I got in on the ground floor. We, the uncool, clinging to the symbols of our occasional accidental hipness...
§§FOOTNOTE (tendrils and wafts and other delicate stuff): You're laughing again.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (arms thrown open): Why limit myself?
This has been all uploaded and ready to go for over a month. Because of my understandable‡ postalphobia, I have a really hard time getting stuff to the post office to ship.
[SUMMARY: Inability to get to post office is related to blog photos. Somehow.]
BECAUSE one of these is for Sarah and her new arrival and I didn't want to post it before she got it.§
As always, the buttons are what really makes the Baby Surprise Jacket.
Then there's the one for my future stepsister-in-law, who decided not to find out the sex of the baby¶ so I went unconventional for the colours.
And got some very happy buttons to go with it.#
So for my dear friends who are new mothers, I hope you had a very happy first Mother's Day and I didn't mean you†† when I said I hate Mother's Day.
*************
Le Rivage des Syrtes (formerly PN1‡‡ or PdN1) - Patricia de Nicolaï for Parfums MDCI
Marin says: Now this has an aldehyde I can live with.
Most aldehydes are overwhelming to my delicate palate§§ and leave me thinking "Aqua Net." This one is bright and light and puts a fine synthetic net over a fruity floral.
I can't quite pick the fruit -- it's not exactly citrus, not exactly peach, not exactly mango. But it's definitely fruity. Perhaps like orange blossom, where the fruit hides in the flower. The flowers are strong and white and sweet like tropical blossoms -- maybe a dash of tuberose. And there's an edgy, slightly acrid depth that I'm starting to associate with ylang ylang.
As this dries down, everything mellows nicely, and there's a definite tinge of sweet oranges in the mix, complimented by a clean, clear tuberose. The aldehyde is nearly gone and there's a delicate golden depth -- amber -- that I find sophisticated and enchanting.
So my love affair with MDCI continues. They are so very French, to be sure, and so very well-crafted and slightly unusual.
This one is the brightest of the MDCI group so far and may be the spring/summer scent -- or one of them¶¶ -- that I've been looking for.
LuckyScent says: The top notes or [sic] orange, pineapple and galbanum combine in an unexpectedly radiant composition which fans of Nicolai will recognize as very much in her style. With the precious fruits secured as cargo, the search continues. Our hero gathers an abundance of heady florals— precious ylang, orange blossom and tuberose designed to delight any recipient of such a magnificent bouquet— and tucks them into a basket he has lined with grasses in order to protect them. Finally, the sailor’s attention turns to the most precious and rare essences– musks, incense and ambergris– eternal mementos of his exotic travels and worthy of none save the one who waits for him alone, praying for his safe return. A complex scent that evokes the bitter and the sweet, the tenderness and the wistful longing of romance.
Notes: sweet orange essence,$ pineapple, galbanum, ylang ylang,$ tuberose,$ orange blossom absolute,$ incense, ambergris,$ vanilla, musk
Hans says: Mmmm. I get, like, honey. Like a sweet honey. Like a flower honey. Honeysuckle. Call it honeysuckle. I think my talents are waning.
†FOOTNOTE (crossed): This is all my cousin Joe and I say to each other. It makes Thanksgiving really, really funny (to us) and made Mother's Day bearable (to me), but I think it irritates our grandmother.
‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): I hear you laughing.
§FOOTNOTE (swerved): There's a protocol here, you know.
¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Which is both liberating and limiting, knitting-wise.
#FOOTNOTE (pounded): If future stepnephew-in-law is half as happy as these buttons, he will have a fairytale childhood... "fairytale" in the modern-day connotation, not like Hansel and Gretel.
††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): For the record, FSSIL went into labour at about 1:00 Sunday morning and had the baby Sunday night. It's a boy. And Sarah had hers three weeks ago. Also a boy, but we already knew that.
‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Mine says "PN1" on the bottle because it was still in the working title stage when I got my set of MDCI samples. I consider this to be like my Metallica: Ride the Lightning tour shirt, which proves I got in on the ground floor. We, the uncool, clinging to the symbols of our occasional accidental hipness...
§§FOOTNOTE (tendrils and wafts and other delicate stuff): You're laughing again.
¶¶FOOTNOTE (arms thrown open): Why limit myself?
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