All the Frills: Scents

This week’s edition of the All the Frills Friday is about scents – more specifically, my little home perfume station (also known as the oversized plate I bought at Target 5 years ago as a Halloween decoration and just loved too much to box up when the holiday was over). Like many, I’ve experimented with a lot of different scents over the years but have landed on 4 as my signature ones: Fendi, the classic Chanel No. 5, and Thierry Mugler’s Angel and Alien (these are special favourites as the bottles are refillable via a perfume pump that most major department stores have, so repeat purchases are less costly and wasteful in terms of packaging. They also have a little perfume club going where they send free stuff on your birthday…that’s why I have the lotion versions of both scents, as you can see in the photos). 

The little skull box is one that I snagged at a super kitschy shop in Salem, MA, the last time I was there – back when I was still living in Connecticut and finishing the PhD. It’s where the helpmeet and I keep our wedding bands. And, strangely, we actually have multiple ones. When we got married we purchased replica sixteenth-century English poesy rings (yeah, that was my idea) that are very nice but not at all costly. Well, over the past 8 years of marriage we’ve both lost our bands at least once and replaced them, only to have the originals resurface. So we each have a few of those. Then my helpmeet’s friend won a gift certificate for two wedding bands at a wedding expo and gave it us as he and his fiancé had already picked their bands. Well we ordered a new set of bands and they arrived with a gift certificate for another set! So we ordered another and they came with a new certificate, and so on. Seriously, we still have an unused gift certificate to use and that will end up with us having another new one to use! I keep meaning to email the company with a friendly suggestion that they rethink that policy but I’ve been too busy cashing in on wedding bands that I don’t really need. 

Suggested Weekend Reading:

• This is not at all surprising and yet still terribly depressing and anger-inducing.
  
• Check it out, the Pope’s got a glossy mag in his honour!
  
• You gotta be careful with those Facebook settings.
  
• This is awful but as someone who has taught many times at the university-level I do have sympathy for the level of frustration that comes along with students who are ill-prepared for higher ed and seemingly unwilling to work at improving.
  
• The origins of seven common English idioms – this is an interesting read!
  
• Thanks to the awesome Laura for the Blog of Worldly Delights for this delightful video of curious cats subbing in for velociraptors in Jurassic Park.
  
• So upskirt photos are legal in MA. Hopefully not for long but, regardless, this was a depressing article. Anyone who thinks feminism is redundant in this day and age and that the fight for equal rights is over is a fool.