Last Night/This Morning and Samples (of Perfume)

I think yesterday may actually have been my first all-nighter? To the extent that I have been awake since 8 am yesterday morning (it’s now three minutes after 4 pm, today). And I spent the night hanging around outside in Paris, so I don’t think you can really ask for a better first nuit blanche (all-nighter in French). Interestingly, this also coincided with Paris’ Nuit Blanche music and light festival, so there was lots to see and do. And the Marais is always pretty active on Saturday nights.

I have many more things to say about French Tinder (Did I already mention that there are SO MANY PEOPLE NAMED QUENTIN?) like I now know how to say mind games. These are the important life skills.

But in the meantime I just want to talk about perfume.

As in if I could magically have the samples that I want most (that aren’t on m decant wish list) what would I pick? (Also I bought Rose de Nuit by Serge Lutens on eBay recently and I’m super excited! I have been wanting that perfume for quite literally 6 years.

Also did you know there are more Dior Private Collection scents in the stores in Paris that aren’t available in the US? I have to say I didn’t find any of them particularly enrapturing, but they were fun to visit. My favorite would have to be Jasmin des Anges, which was much more a tart blackberry than a jasmine. But it was a pretty nice blackberry.

Okay, back to the topic at hand.

• Ce Soir ou Jamais- Annick Goutal: A super nice and musky overblown rose that I haven’t yet had the chance to try in any meaningful quality. I think I might love it.
• Rose Trocadero- Jardin Retrouve: I seem to be in a rose mood. I want this to be the fresh green garden rose of which I have been dreaming.
• Kingston Osmanthus- Eric Buterbaugh: Too bad 10 mLs costs three weeks of groceries.
• Equestrian- Sonoma Scent Studio: Obviously I can’t leave alone anything doing with horses.
• Miyako-Auphorie: This one got a whole lot of buzz not too long ago and I still haven’t tried it. But I’m here for fruity suede osmanthus vibes.
• Onyx- Sage Machado: Musky coconut? Neat. I want to try.
• Noir Exquis-L’Artisan Parfumeur: I tried a bit of this in store and one point and think I may be very much a fan. SO cozy!
• A bunch from Zoologist. But if I had to pick it would be Nightingale or Civet. Followed by Dragonfly, Panda 2017, and Elephant.
• Suede de Suede and Dojima- Mona di Orio: There are two new Mona di Orios and I haven’t smelled them yet. Shame.
• Mardi Gras- Olympic Orchids: Speaking of Civet.
• Acqua Celestia- Maison Francis Kurkdjian: I keep smelling this in stores and wishing for a bit of my own.
• Joyeuse Tubereuse- Guerlain: Only if I can’t find my sample. I have the sneaking suspicion it’s still in the USA.
• Tabacca-Costamor/Frank 3-Frank: You know you need to smell it when you’ve been waiting so long the brand and scent name changes.
• Tabac Tabou- Parfums d’Empire: Tobacco, honey, narcissus. Give me.

By the way also all of these from DSH 😛

French Tinder

I did something kind of dumb- which is, having never had a Tinder in America, I created a profile when I got to France.

It’s been a good way to practice French, truthfully, but also I’m learning (and noticing) some odd things. Fill me in- what’s normal for Tinder and which of these are weird specific to a 40 km radius of Versailles?

• I’ve learned a lot of great but not widely applicable/appropriate words and phrases. Some favorites:
  Enculer- to ass fuck
  Je te mange le cul- I can eat your ass.
• A guy named Adrien who looks weirdly like Adrien Brody.
  I do not mind.
• A lot of Yankees hats.
  I DO mind.
  Yankees suck.
• A good number who are mutual friends with friends of mine from college and even high school. It’s a small world after all.
• The stereotypical douchebag look (lots of squinting, a fair amount of pouty lips and duck face, etc.) is alive and well across the Atlantic.
• Someone who said their favorite things are penguins and waffles. Am ready to marry.
• Too much facial hair. Although I do understand this is a matter of opinion.
• A lot of people from this Middle East. I think because I am closer to the Middle East here.
• A lot of guys giving health advice in there profiles. Like “Eat healthfully and live well, strawberries are good for the stomach.”
• So much smoking. So much for living healthfully and strawberries.
• A lot of guys named Quentin…?
• Speaking of names… I never realized there were so many Thibaults. I dig it.
• Also a lot of Mehdis.

Never Too Old For High Fantasy

High fantasy: fantasy set in an alternative, fictionalized world

I haven’t stopped loving high fantasy as I’ve gotten older, even if I read it less than I used to.  Reading a story that wakes up your imagination is at once comforting and thrilling- comforting because that’s a part of mind that I associate with being younger and the security of being little and taken care of. Thrilling because I can be transported to another world.
It’s this world building that’s always been my favorite thing about fantasy- the maps in the front pages of the book (that sometimes fold out!), exotic names for places and people, fabricated family trees, and the existence of a whole new sequence of history and code of rules waiting to be discovered.
I even dreamed of writing the next great fantasy novel (I can remember so many that I started and never got very far with- “Under the Eye of the Dragon” being a title that springs to mind 😛 ), but characteristically got bogged down in the planning of the details, which was honestly the most exciting part for me.  Drawing maps of my own kingdoms, diagramming my own (very convoluted- I read too many books about Tudor England) ancestries, cataloguing the horses in my imaginary stable (with names, breeds, and ages, of course), drawing a floor plan of said imaginary stable on graph paper, and drawing up adoption booklets filled with fictional beasts (and then making my parents adopt them so I could send them postcards from the adoptees).

So I never got around to writing the next great fantasy novel.  But that hasn’t stopped me from reading them and appreciating other people’s world-building, character choices, and well, patience, which was the thing that I really lacked.
(Guess what? I have it now and sometimes write short stories! But not so much for people to read, because I know I overuse adjectives and adverbs and comparisons. It’s very self-indulgent writing 😛 )
So if you feel like curling up with fantastical happenings, heroic adventures, and sometimes romance, here are some suggestions that i think do a good job of appealing to the child in all of us while still being well-written and innovative enough to not offend our adult sides.

2 Links, 2 Fun

A la Fast and Furious 2: 2 Fast, 2 Furious, I bring to you the second installation of Links for Fun (see the original here).  And just in time for the weekend.  Just interesting things I’ve pulled together from different corners of the web.

Happy Friday!