Rusty: “So tell me again where do you plan to put that label?..”
Rusty and I have visited (virtually) lovely Birgit at Olfactoria’s Travels. Now I’m officially one of the People In Perfumeland.
With love,
Undina
Image: my own
Happy Thanksgiving to all my friends and readers. Enjoy the holiday but eat responsibly.
If you can still breathe come back in a couple of days to help me with data for the November statistics post.
With love,
Undina
Image: my own
I’m extremely busy at work recently and I’m not sure when it is going to change. I do not always work after hours (though from time to time that happens as well) but I get so tired that I have absolutely no strength left not only to write anything but often to read as well.
I know that not posting on my blog is fine: with the number of blogs on everybody’s reading list not posting might be considered a public service. But since the number of unopened blog subscription e-mails reached 600 I’m writing this card to say to all of my blogo-friends: I’m sorry for abandoning you. I’ll try to stay afloat or at least rise to the surface from time to time.
Miss you all.
Undina
Image: my own (picture of one of Thad Markham’s figurines)
I like Halloween and we usually celebrate it with friends but this year this holiday coincided with an extremely busy time for me in the office so I could barely breathe – let alone organize anything during the work week.
Ironically, with all that crazy work, my biggest celebration will be in the office: we did great werewolf-themed decorations; I thought of some type of costume (I will dress up as a tuxedo cat and wear Brainwave Emotion Controlled Cat Ears), cooked a dish for our traditional Halloween potluck and even drove to work after hours to put up my entry into The Best Werewolf Detection or Protection Device contest.
I made a “HAVE YOU SEEN THIS CREATURE?” twin-peaks-type poster with a picture of the werewolf, a figure of which we used to decorate the office; ten posters in different parts of the office urge everybody not to approach the werewolf and contact me. I plan to fight werewolves with silver but not by the old-fashioned intracardiac injection (a.k.a. silver bullet in the heart) but via the progressive nasal route of administration using Silver Rain by La Prairie in a beautiful drop-shaped silver bottle (I used to like this perfume and wore it for several years but not any more – so I’m glad I found some use for it).
Do you do anything special this Halloween?
Undina
Image: my own (it’s an actual picture, not a compilation)
I participated in the series Questions on Beauty on Lavanya’s blog. If you haven’t read it yet, you might be interested to check out what Suzanne (Suzanne’s Perfume Journal), Vanessa (Bonkers about Perfume), Mandy Aftel (Atelier Perfumes), Laurie Erickson (SonomaScent Studio), Sigrun (Riktig Parfym), Tara (Olfactoria’s Travels), Natalie (Another Perfume Blog) and Mridula Koshy find beautiful.
Have a beautiful weekend!
Undina
Image: my own
The weekend was great: warm, sunny and just perfect for a quick visit to Sonoma. The hardest part was not to wear any perfume: I had a hankering for vanilla perfumes recently, which were completely inappropriate for a wine tasting. But now I’m back and waft happily Spiritueuse Double Vanille (I need to get a decant of it!). My internal batteries and our wine cabinet got recharged but I’m hopelessly behind my blogs reading. But if you’re reading this I want to let you know: I’ll get to all of your posts.
Have a productive and fragrant week!
Undina
Image: a picture I took at one of the wineries. I think this is her site though I couldn’t find this picture anywhere online.
When I planned a three-day … well, I won’t even call it a trip – stopover in Paris I knew it would be not enough even to scratch the surface of everything that this city has to offer to a tourist, a perfumista or a foodie (who I am not but just saying). But when French air traffic controllers’ strike gave me a chance to meet Birgit and Sandra in Vienna at the same time it ensured I would have to revise whatever modest plans I might have had initially for Paris.
The lady who rented us the apartment was a little strange: she refused to talk to me on the phone claiming that “I do not see the need to call me. You have all the necessary information, and I am an honest and respectable 61-year French.” Persuasive, right? But I went ahead and signed the contract.
I’m not sure how we would have got into the apartment if it weren’t for Vanessa of Bonkers about Perfume who came to Paris on a train earlier (the last-minute change of plans because of the above-mentioned strike) and offered to meet us at the apartment. She was entertaining the landlady and not letting her leave for some important errand while our taxi driver first maneuvered through the Friday traffic and then tried to figure out how to get to the required point on the one-way street (I refused to do it on feet with suitcases!).
After we got in and the landlady left Vanessa and I discussed for a while if the woman could be 60+. We both agreed that even for a Parisian who doesn’t age the same as us, mere mortals, the woman to whom we just paid money for the stay looked suspiciously young… My vSO and I agreed that we weren’t sure what would upset us more – having paid to an impostor or acknowledging that the woman we saw was actually 61.
***
They say: Be careful what you wish for. I’d add: be careful what you do not wish for.
While we were planning our itinerary for the rest of the day, I mentioned that I didn’t really need to go to either Guerlain or Serge Lutens stores since I were up to date with the most current offerings and didn’t plan of buying anything there. But since I was in Paris it was just plainly wrong not to take a look at those legendary places…
You can read more about the events that followed that day in Vanessa’s post (the link above) but from me here are two pictures of the famous stores taken from the outside.
Vanessa was such a great company that I didn’t want to let her go. But after the last excuse – helping us to book a taxi drive to the airport for the departure day – we had to say good-byes hoping to meet again one day.
The second (and the only full) day in Paris we spent alternating walking the streets and eating/drinking. In about eleven hours we covered a lot including an incredibly pleasant meeting with Neela Vermeire of Neela Vermeire Creations and the second in two days trip to Jovoy to finish the methodical sniffing Vanessa and I had to halt the day before because of the store closing and to purchase my vacation perfume.
Neela proved to be to the every last bit as nice as all interviews with and stories about her portrait her. I was glad she found time to meet with me despite her busy schedule. Now I look forward to testing the newest perfumes from the line – Mohur Esprit de Parfum and Ashoka – samples of which Neela was kind to bring for me.
It seems that my vSO enjoyed all the perfume-related interruptions during this trip. Or at least he was a good sport – and I’m grateful to him for that.
Oh, and if you were wondering what perfume I bought to remind me about this – my first – trip to Paris, I’ll tell you without asking you to guess: Bombay Bling! by Neela Vermeire Creations. As I said in my story about three perfumes from the line, “It is a full-bottle worth perfume for me.”
Images: my own
Vienna holds a very special place in my heart: that was the very first European city I’d ever visited and I was completely enchanted by it. Since it was just an overnight plane change (back then hotel was included into the plane ticket) we didn’t plan anything. My vSO and I hopped on the bus at the airport and went to the downtown.
It was a wonderfully warm June evening. Almost everything was closed but we didn’t really care because we had no money to spend anyway. We walked curved narrow streets with old but well-preserved buildings, wide boulevards and well-maintained parks and felt as if we were transported into one of those historical books we’d read as children. By that time we both had been to Moscow, St. Petersburg and even New York but somehow Vienna stood out of all the previous experiences and was just magical.
A year later on the same route we decided to stay in Vienna one extra night, which meant paying for both since by staying longer than necessary we were forfeiting the stay paid by the airline. It was too expensive for us but we loved Vienna so much and wanted to spend more time there.
Vienna met us cold and rainy and everything was a little off: the room (in the same hotel!) wasn’t as nice as the one for which we didn’t have to pay a year earlier; on our walk in the downtown we kept looking for places to get warm so architecture outside had less appeal; and parks were much less attractive under grey skies and gloomy rain.
We still managed to get something from the trip but it wasn’t worth the money we paid for it. So even though I still thought of Vienna as of a magical city somehow for more than ten years our trail didn’t go through it.
I wouldn’t have stayed there this year as well if it weren’t for my long-time wish to meet Birgit of Olfactoria’s Travels. Our original plan involved repeating the perfect experience of an overnight stay in Vienna with a dinner in a pleasant company as a culmination. At the last moment circumstances changed and the dinner was canceled. But luckily there was the second negative – air controllers strike in France, my next destination, – so a double negative has resolved to a positive: Birgit, Sandra, my vSO and I met the next morning for a breakfast (it was lovely) and a quick perfume sniffing tour (an added bonus that understandably wasn’t planned for the dinnertime).
The weather cooperated and we had the most wonderful time – walking the streets and parks, dining at restaurants with Austrian cuisine and maybe even finding a new perfume love. Vienna is a wonderful city! Oh, and I have to say that none of the pictures Birgit showed to us do her justice: she looks even younger and more beautiful in real life.
I wish most negatives in your life to resolve to positive!
With Love,
Undina
Images: my own
This year in Ukraine summer started earlier and it’s unpleasantly hot and humid. But as an upside to that I’ve finally got to smell blooming linden again. Normally linden blooms in July; it’s even reflected in the name for that month – Липень (in Ukrainian linden – липа). But thanks to the weather it’s in full bloom now.
I’m not sure I can find the right words to describe this scent. All I can say: it is even more beautiful than I remembered and was longing for!
Yesterday I went to my high school class reunion. It was an informal party picnic that left a rather pleasant impression. On my way home, as I was breathing in gorgeously gentle sweetness of blooming linden trees, I realized that I’ve got my wish granted: I am happy. Often people avoid saying something like that – not to jinx it. I’m saying it to acknowledge my appreciation for where I am in my life now. I’m grateful to everything and everybody who contributed to that feeling of happiness. And that “everybody” includes you – my friends and my readers. I took the picture for the postcard below thinking of you.
May your most special wishes come true!
With Love,
Undina
Images: my own
It was a wonderful almost summer weekend in Point Reyes, Northern California: it’s so strange that right now there are still places covered with snow.
That heart-shaped patch of shrubs that I saw from the window of the house where we were celebrating our friend’s birthday was just a perfect backdrop for the perfect event. I hope Spring comes soon to everybody who’s waiting for it. Stay warm!
With Love,
Undina
Undina's Looking Glass 