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BPAL Madness!
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perfume-related ramblings that can't go anywhere else because I'd bore the pants off anyone reading

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Well, my imp box is getting full...

so I guess it's a good thing that I'm not crazy about this update. While I'm eager to /try/ all three, and am prepared for the possibility that I might like any of them, none of them are scents I can't live without. Although admittedly I have a good feeling about this version of 13. I don't know why, because it has The Dreaded White Chocolate in it... but I've just got a feeling.   there are only three spaces left in my "A" imp box, or will be when all of my scents arrive. My two Queen of Diamonds decants will be moved to their bottle and King of Diamonds will probably be swapped, filling up space that will be swiftly occupied by my shortie of Havisham. My "B" box is for blends to sell or swap, and my "C" box is intent blends. I need to start consolidating my collection... unfortunately, i'm emotionally attached to rather a lot of it. Which is absurd, given how many scents I have and how slowly I go through them.   And I still need to buy 5mL's of Tarot: The Hermit and Brisingamen! Tarot: The Hermit especially is one I see using a lot of next year, for quiet study and reflection.   On the up side, Snow Moon is lovely. I swapped my 5mL of Bitter Moon for it (as lovely as Bitter Moon is, the imp will suffice, I think -- I just wasn't wearing it that much :/) and I don't regret it. snow Moon is like all the parts I liked about Snow White, minus the parts that I didn't -- the watery coconut sweetness that drove me into headaches if I wore it for too long. Snow Moon is also a less-musky dead ringer for Ice Queen, which is good because I can wear it without feeling guilty about the cost of today's parfoom   I have decided to keep Snake Charmer. I have so many snowy icy scents that as nice as Snow White 2004 is, I'm only a little sorry to see my 5mL go, and I /like/ Snake Charmer. It stays.
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Unjustifiably mad

mmkay. So I enabled a friend a while ago, and since then we've had a pretty loose arrangement regarding swapping BPAL. For a while I bought her BPAL and she paid me back in rave tickets, which worked out for everyone. I've also given her some things: most notably, I passed along first an imp and then my 2/3 full bottle of Voodoo Queen, because much as I liked it it smelled better on her than it did on me. If I see something I know she wants, I'll swap from my pile of stuff to get it for her. And that's why I'm a little bit frustrated, and I know it's not justified.   There's a scent I /love/ -- Ingenue. Damn hard to find. A while ago she saw an imp of it for sale, and bought it for me -- and then she fell in love with it. :/ You can see where this is going, I think. I'm a little cheesed off, because in the past I've given her things I knew she'd enjoy, even though they were rare and swappable, and I could've used them to collect things I wanted. It's not fair to give a gift with the expectation of getting something in return; that's not really giving, and it's not fair to either party. At the time I didn't think that was what I was doing, but I find myself a bit upset that I gave up things for her, and she's not willing to do the same for me - even for one decant. It's not going to drive a wedge through our friendship or any such thing, but I'm materialistic enough that it annoys me.   The biggest problem (insofar as there is actually a problem, which is debatable) is that there's nothing I can do about it. I didn't pay for it, she purchased it as a gift (and informed me it was such) before she decided to keep it; and I can't be angry at her for not reciprocating a feeling I had, or a way of doing things that I decided to follow. It just makes me upset, and I don't think I'll be looking out for her wants in the future. :/
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Two Orders

Two Orders BLUE MOON -- in Early June   2x5mL Blue Moon $40 1x10mL Tarot: The Hermit $26.50 [$66.50] 1x5mL Brisingamen $15 [$81.50] s/h $7 [$88.50]   JULY -- in Early June   1x5mL Cancer $20 1x5mL /July Moon/ $20 [$40] 1x5mL Boomslang $18 [$58] 1x5mL Moxie $26.50 [$84.50] s/h $9 [$93.50]     I have some saving to do
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Tval: new bath and body obsession

Tval. Go now, to the nicey smelly body stuff and drool.   Based out of St. John's Newfoundland (which is where I am right now) they also sell through www.thesoapboxco.com -- another place I drop huge wads of cash. I am trying to rein in my body product obsession and restrict myself to a few favourites, and so far it's working, but the Tval tub treats are really too templting to resist -- and at $3 apiece, are much less expensive than Lush's monstrosities. They also don't smell as strongly, which may be a negative for some but in my view is a plus as I do not like things clashing with my perfume (this is why I don't buy Lush hair products anymore -- apart from being stupidly expensive, they also smell to the high heavens. /Days/ after washing my hair and I still can't get rid of the smell of American Cream.) I just had a bath with a Frosty Pop treat, and my skin is soooo soooooft, and with just the barest you-really-have-to-look-for-it sniff of vanilla pine. Yumm.   They also make a line of products scented like Green Tea Ice Cream. Luff at first delicately-scented sniff.   My Staples Villainess Scintillating Smooch Villainess Scintillating Soap Tval Green Tea Ice Cream Skin Smoothie Tval Green Tea Ice Cream Soap for summer -- Heaven and Earth Essentials Voodoo Punani Whipped Body Souffle for summer -- Heaven and Earth Essentials Voodoo Punani Bath Bombs   Almost every girl on my Xmas list is getting /some/thing from Tval this year. You have been warned.
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Today I am Wearing: Pink Moon 05

I have a bottle containing about an imp of Pink Moon 05, and it doesn't get pulled out that often, largely because I don't /have/ a lot. But today I decided it was a Pink Moon day, and since Pink Moon 2007 is stuck in my mailbox in Boston, this was it. ((inhales wrist)) mm! I'm so glad I have this space to just ramble on about how much I love the scent of things, because honestly, Pink Moon 05 is beautiful -- a sweet, light, springy floral with a delicately candyish tone that just makes me smile. Nessa might like this one.   If I can find another 5mL of Pink Moon 05, I'll make up an imp of it for Nessa, along with an imp of my aged Snake Oil () and something else from my collection that she might like. Mayhap I'll send her some Shub, although I think that's more of a me scent than anything. Yaay enabling!     I am eating physalis and enjoying them immensely. The tiny tangy orange fruit taste weird, almost tomatoey except I detest tomatoes, and on occasion I quite like them. It's like eating a concentrated summer day, complete with everything I love and everything I dislike.
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Things I would kill to have rezzed

INGENUE -- I'd buy three or four bottles of the stuff, and all of them Unseelie -- everything I've heard suggests that it's shockingly beautiful. It sounds like my kind of wispy, ethereal floral-with-character. Hopehopehope...
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The Next Order

m'akay, here's how the next order is shaping up:   Milk Moon April Fool's Blend [$35] The Ghost [$50] Tarot: The Hermit [$76.50]   April 1, I can/not/ wait for you to get here...   I'll ignore Rose Moon, so I should be safe next month (:S) but my beginning-of-June order is gonna start like this:   2xBlue Moon [$35] Brisingamen [$50]     oh yeah, and I totally caved. Got a partial bottle of Black Moon. :/
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The Ex who Couldn't Let Go

^_- riiight.   Opened my PR journal today. Latest read: [username of my girl's ex-girlfriend]. This is the third or fourth time.   I can understand being curious. But especially since /she/ dumped /Amy/, it's getting a little odd.
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TAL Reviews: Radiance of Ra + Block Buster for banishing negativity

METHOD: Anointed a small natural-white paraffin pillar candle with Radiance of Ra + Block Buster to banish circling negative thoughts. Worked very well.   I found myself stuck in a rut of negativity, where I was feeling down on myself in general and convinced I'd done something wrong to alienate one person in particular. There was a lot of negative self-talk, which not only felt crappy, but also impeded my ability to get on with my life.   I dressed a candle with Radiance of Ra and Block Buster. I envisioned bright rays of sunshine breaking through the fug of negativity, clearing out those heavy shadows in the mind, and busting through the blocks of insecurity and negative self-talk I'd stacked up in my own path. I thought about eliminating the "lies and deceptions" of low self-esteem, which were telling me that I'm not good enough and soon everyone would find out.   As soon as I lit the candle, I felt better. I stood up straighter, and the circling negative thoughts just -- stopped. I wasn't distracted by self-criticism. I attacked a task I'd been avoiding and felt good about it. I cooked dinner and enjoyed it. I reread the email to the person I thought I'd alienated -- which I had been avoiding -- and concluded it was perfectly harmless and if he didn't like it, that wasn't on me. I realised I'd done the best I could, and I should continue to do the best I could, and that was that. I just felt better right away. It was amazing.   I haven't experienced any vim and vigor yet, and I don't feel particularly energized, but that might be because I'm pretty sleep deprived right now. Will report back if that changes.   Additionally: I'm thinking of starting to make my own hand-poured soy wax candles using TAL oils, 
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Sooo muuuch LFV (and removing my head from my ass)

The process of extracting my head from my butt has been long and arduous, but I think I've made progress. I almost let _perfume_ damage a friendship with someone I care about. I'm such an idiot. :/ I sincerely hope i haven't fundamentally changed our relationship for the worse... although I guess now she's seen what a selfish tard I can be. Um, yay honesty. I'd write about that more, but I can just say it in person. GOD I'm such an idiot.   In other news, we have lockets! I'm wearing my Brimstone locket right now, and h_f's gorgeous White Rabbit locket is sitting in its little velvet pouch on my bathroom counter. At first I looked at mine and thought O.o damn that's big -- but surprisingly, given that I usually don' tlike large jewellery, I'm very fond of it. It's quite elegant, and when strung on a ribbon is a lovely simple statement piece. I'm wearing it with LFV inside right now.   Speaking of, I nabbed some more La Fee Verte. Okay, I think I have enough of it now. Srsly. Three decants, three bottles and two more bottles on the way (four of those bottles are partials, but even so -- about 40mL). I have enough of it to last me a lifetime, which is exactly what I intended. I also have a total of seven decants of Dark Delicacies. No more of that one, either.   I've built up enough stuff-to-swap that if I'm really hankering for anything, I have a chance of finding it -- some SNs, some unreleased blends, Passion. I need to get more Green Tree Viper before it goes down, and perhaps bottles of Brisingamen and banded Sea Snake... but other than that, I think I'm done.     ...Oh God, I'm _so_ not done. Maybe I should just stop trying to convince myself.   Finished Season II of House. I need more House! Whyyyy?
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Sleeping Paralysis

Am I the only one that this happens to?   Sometimes when I wake up, I can't move. Or I can move imperfectly. I'll be awake and conscious inside my head, screaming at my body to forget getting up, just move my fingers properly, and they just won't. Sometimes I can't move at all, oftentimes I can kind of flop around -- like I'll be able to shift my arm a little bit, but forget fine motor control, and moving anything major is out of the question. Oftentimes I have some degree of control over my head -- I can turn my neck, but occasionally I have imperfect control over parts of my face, so I either can't open my eyes properly or it's a struggle to close my mouth. It doesn't happen often, but although it's been happening since I was about nine it still creeps me out every time. It lasts anywhere from ten or fifteen seconds to, on one memorable occasion, about a minute and a half. Usually what happens is I have to focus on the part of the body I can move, and make it move as much as I can, which will often increase slightly with time -- and then all of a sudden I'll manage to jerk it particularly far, and my control will come flooding back again all at once.   I wonder what this is?
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Shuuuuuubbbb...

Someone frimped me a sample of Shub soap. I just bathed with it, and I am sooooo glad I have a bottle of gingery Shub-Niggurath-y goodness coming my way.   Also, Bruja is divine. I have half a bottle and it's not a MAD QUEST FOR MORE scent like Ingenue... but of course, another DC I had to fall for. :/ Ah well.   Mom fell in love with The Ghost -- I gave her a frimp of it and she wants a bottle. And there's probably going to be an April fool's blend when Milk Moon goes live. So the Milk Moon order is looking like this:   -1 bottle Milk Moon ($17.50) -1 bottle Therianthropic (?) ($17.50) -1 bottle The Ghost ($15) -1 bottle April Fool's blend ($17.50)   Sheila Ross also fell in love with my Brimstone locket! So we're getting her a Phoenix locket for her birthday, which has passed. I think I may slip some soaps in with that order...
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SCREAM

I called the Superintendent of Pfoho, and /finally/ got ahold of him He said he's going to mail out all my packages to me today! YAAAAAAY!!!   I really hope he does! Oh that's so good, i really want my goodsmellies.
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Running out the door, but...

Snow Bunny = teh SEX.   I may need another partial bottle to make up one full bottle. I like it better than I like Snow White... it reminds me a lot of Snow Angel, actually, which is a good Now I'm just trying to convince myself /not/ to try Black Moon... even though I'm pretty sure I'll like it, Dark Delicacies fits in the same niche, and I already have a bottle and 7 (yes, seven) decants of that one coming.   Mouse's Long and Sad Tale is okay. It dries down to a pleasant sweet vanilla-amber-sandalwood that reminds me a bit of Underpants, only cuter and nicer. I may keep the bottle.   RUNNING TO h_f's PLACE!
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Rotting Wedding Flowers = love

((inhales wrist deeply)) mmmmm....   I think I'd sell a kidney for more Havisham. My love affair with icy, snowy florals is official.   Purchasing Plans: -2 bottles of Blue Moon, when it comes out -a bottle of Milk Moon, when it comes out (depending on what else is in it...) -the Cancer astrological blend, when it comes out -some Brisingamen with my next order -some Tarot: The Hermit when I have the cash lying around   So far we're looking at (est. $17.50 for LE's) $113.50 without shipping. And that's only the ones I *know* I'm buying.
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Product Love, Take Two

My hoarded, standards, best-beloved and kept-in-stock products   LUSH Snowcake soap *** Lip Lite lip balm Butterball bath bomb   Villainess Scintillating smooch! Scintillating whipped!   Tval Frosty Pop skin smoothie (custom blend) Frosty Pop bath treat
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Prices are up...

...and normally I don't care who spends money on what. But lately I've been noticing a trend in some parts of BPAL fandom -- prices are on the rise, in a huge way. This always happens to a certain extent between updates, but I've seen a couple of bottles go for amounts that really make me raise my eyebrows, if only because I can't compete with that kind of cash. I throw around a lot of money -- aside from Starbuck's, my BPAL collection is basically the only thing I spend my spare cash /on/ -- but I can't compete with some of this, and it's making me blue.   Storyville -- $140 for a full 5mL Queen of Spades -- $113 for a 60% full 5mL   these are just two that I remember off the top of my head. I feel very lucky to have managed a swap for an imp of Storyville, and so I'm content; I just hope that this increase in prices isn't going to continue and become 'normal'. I have enough of a problem keeping cash as it is... this'll either make me totally broke, or make me break my habit.
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POTENTIAL Veils and Mists: will update with TAL review once I get ahold of it

You know when you look back on something you've done, or a way you've behaved, and you just want to disappear and hope nobody ever thinks of you again? You know when you read articles about toxic people and you're like... "Wait, I think *I'm* the toxic person. The call has been coming from inside the house this whole time!"   ...perhaps it's just me. Either I have overactive guilt/shame reflexes, or I just do crappy/embarrassing things more often than most people, or maybe both. Who can say! In 20 years I'll probably have enough perspective to tell the difference. But right now, I'm pretty sure I've done the wrong thing. Again.   I'm still working on finding solutions to the behaviours in myself that I want to change. That's an ongoing process, and it feels sometimes like it's just a sequence of falling on my face again - and again - and again - and irritating, aggravating, or hurting any number of people in the process. I do look at myself now and see that I am miles ahead of where I was five years ago, which is good. But in the interim -- sometimes I just want people not to think about me, or talk about me, or feel any type of way about me at all. I don't like being the subject of gossip, and I don't like the idea that my behaviour could get someone else down. In those moments, I just want to draw a veil over myself, separating me from the rest of the world. Giving me a little peace and respite from other people's thoughts and feelings, and giving other people a little respite from the effects and consequences of my behaviour.    That, I think, is a good place for Veils and Mists to come in. I'd never thought about it as a TAL I'd want to have in my life, but increasingly it feels useful or even necessary to me. I'm not sure how I'd judge its effectiveness because that would require proving a negative, and an impossible one at that -- "Prove other people HAVEN'T been privately gossiping about me or feeling bad about things I said or did!" Nevertheless, I'd like to be able to send that energy out into the world, with some serious oomph behind it courtesy of the Lab. I'll try and get my hands on a bottle and update this entry if/as events warrant.
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Okay, that was weird.

I had a very strange reaction to something. Whether it was the fact that the stupid pharmacy gave me generic medication even when I wasn't prescribed generics (for those of us who are hypersensitive, yes, it doesmatter!) or something strange that my brain has been sitting on for a while -- yesterday I was terrified. Just generally. Terrified of getting raped walking from the cab to the side door in the dark, terrified that someone would break into the house while I was there all alone, and (curse my active imagination) terrified of SOMETHING being in the dark waiting to get me. I am not a superstitious person, but my imagination managed to conjure up more ghouls lurking in corners or squatting under my bed or peering beneath my door that when I woke up at 4AM and had to pee, I couldn't get back to sleep.   It's hilarious now, but then, it was just -- scarily unlike me. Especially because the rational part of my brain was in overdrive the whole time telling stupid-me to stop being so ridiculous.   Thank God for my kitty. she slept beside me all night -- n ot just on my bed, but pressed up against my leg, a warm comforting presence. after forty minutes of the-house-is-scarily-silent mute unreasonable terror, I finally got back to sleep.   I woke up twice last night. I remember dreaming but don't remember what I dreamed.
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Oh, and... (H&EE)

Voodoo Punani amps the saffron on me. It's nice; I like it. It ends up smelling surprisingly sophisiticated, like I wanted Monster Bait: Underpants to smell. Underpants was just too vanilla, though. :/
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Nobody reads this blog (thank god)

which is why I feel okay about posting in here. I'm getting scared of my own disinterest. The only thing I seem to have any enthusiasm for these days is my perfume collection! Yes, all right, BPAL is wonderful and blahdy blah, but I know why it's become such an obsession for me: because right now, there isn't anything else. and that's terrifying. There is nothing else I can muster the energy to care about or do. I can barely even speak to my girlfriend, although her gorgeous self is present in my thoughts. I thought leaving university would make the apathy better. It hasn't. Maybe I'm being impatient? I've been home a week... It's not as though there's some magic wand to wave to make everything fine. But I hate this. I can't care about anything, and I'm just unhappy.
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Nightmares. Again.

I've gone through my whole life without nightmares. Why now?   Tonight's were strange. That I can remember... there was one where I was in the company of a young boy whom I thought was a serial killer, and I had to get away without making himsuspicious, and it was in the middle of nowhere and Sophia wasn't pickin gup her phone. There was a part where someone shut a girl's face in a waffle iron - a blistering-hot, plugged in waffle iron. There had been steam coming out of the device before, but as it covered her face and she struggled to get it off the steam turned red... it sounds comical now, but it was really horrible. I wanted to wake up.   The earlier one, that I remember less, was one where the world had gone strange... I remember that /I/ had been in another world, a through-the-looking-glass type of experience, and as frightening as that world was I had to go back there, it was my job to fix something. (And for me, th way that I could get back into the world was to drink a cup of tea -- Green tea, said the man with the fingers, was the easy way. Black tea was the respected way. Red tea wasn't spoken about, but it was clear that there were three options, so red tea must have been the third) I rode the bus (yes, there was a bus) from the other world into this one, intending not to stay long. I wasn't supposed to stay long, but then I thought, what if I got some supplies? Flashlights, batteries, stuff I could use. And I had to get back, but I think I decided to get some supplies. The world-that-is-this-world was strange, it was dark... and I was walking through an aboveground tunnel, made of brick I remember, and I was a little scared because it was after dark and the tunnel was small and I'd never really liked them anyway. There were people around me -- not many, there were two people ahead of me and some people behind. And I remember I was a little scared as a young girl, of the man ahead of me.. but then, the young couple behind me just sat down. They just sat down cross-legged in the tunnel, as though they couldn't go any farther. And after a few steps, so did the man in front of me -- this tough guy in a leather jacket -- just sat down too, like he'd given up. I went a few metres farther, out of their sight and round a curve, an then I sat down too, more because I was tired than anything, and some people from university (Leo and Elyssa and I think Boyce) came through the tunnels. They were talking about someone, someone dangerous -- a practical joker gone too far. I asked them what was going on, and the said that all of a sudden the world had gone strange, dark and dangerous. I asked them why everyone was just sittin down, and Elyssa said, "They've givenup -- they don't know how to deal with this world. The tunnels are full of them." And I asked what the current danger was, who they were running from, and Elyssa and Leo exchanged a look, and Elyssa said "Well -- it's cats."   And then I woke up.
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Neon Genesis Evangelion

I watched Death and Rebirth and The End of Evangelion today, because apparently I like pain. I keep coming back to Eva at different points in my life, watching it again and hoping to find some kind of answer -- because of how it resonates with me, and always has. I haven't found the answer yet. Or maybe it's there but too uncomfortable for me to think about. Either way, it's an exercise in frustration -- both because the series resonates so closely even now, and because it doesn't pretend to solve its characters' problems, and by extension my own.   Whether or not it's because I saw the series years ago and it made such an impact that the ideas were buried in my brain, many of the things Shinji thought and said are things that I did as well. Do, sometimes. Sometimes I think that giving up individuality isn't too high a price to pay for an end of loneliness and fear. Sometimes I just want it all to stop -- the constant insecurity and needing. There is no way out of that.     You can think yourself out of anything, if you try hard enough. The reason that despite some experimentation with drugs I seem incapable of getting high, is because I think myself down from it -- even though I've felt the physical effects of every drug I've tried, I've never experienced the concurrent effects on the mind, and people around me notice no change in my attitude or behaviour (except for wobbly walking). This is something that distresses me, because I could seriously use some chemically-enforced release, but also that I'm perversely proud of: see my iron self-control, look what I can do! My iron self-control has gotten me through a lot. It is also part of the reason that I am unhappy. I'm a creature of extremes: to find some resolution I'll need to either disregard that control entirely, or embrace it completely. The latter option, as isolating as it is, looks so tempting. Because I /know/ how to do that. I don't know how to be normal or let go.   These aren't new thoughts -- they're realisations i've come to before. That makes me wary of them, because it's like a groove I have worn in my brain, but it also makes them easier to believe. To sink into I-don't-know-how-so-I'll-give-up is to really take myself one step further towards turning into Shinji.
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My HAEE order came today!

and it smells good!   I can't use the bath bombs or the tub cake yet because of my navel piercing, which hasn't healed... so if I want to take a bath, I have to get some tegaderm (first thing tomorrow). But the bath stuff is huge! So much larger than Lush stuff and so much less expensive! I'm not a huge fan of Lush anyway, except for Butterball and Candy Bar, but I may have just been converted. While the Lush bath bombs look nicer and are more firmly packed, the HAEE bombs are much larger -- I could probably use half a bomb per bath and get the same amount of fizz. The tub cakes are literally twice the size of the equivalent Lush product, and while I haven't tested their bubblebility yet, it can't be *that* much different. They also smell amaaaazing.   I ordered everything scented with Voodoo Punani It smells like I wanted Underpants to smell -- like coy, pin-up girl smex.   I also found rose-scented toothpaste. Yeah, I know. It was from a japanese company called Breath Palette -- they make toothpastes in 31 flavours. Like Baskin Robbins!
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