Bosphore, Clermont, Turkey, Kansas City...

Last Friday evening, Kyle Eastwood was supposed to play at le Château de Clermont (the castle of Clermont, if you prefer).

I happened to work there that very same evening. Yeah. Cool.
But it was an outdoor show. And it was pouring. Too bad. Some of my colleagues asked for some autographs. And photos. I didn't. No. I watched the guy pass by. He seems nice. He speaks French very well. It would have been nice to hear him play and get an idea of how nice Inspector Harry's son sounds like.
But we all went home instead.

On the Sunday evening - last day of work at the castle for me - I was given the chance to witness some Danish beauty - well, especially the one on the bass I have to say (drool-love-love-drool-drool-love [the feeling comes in a much more elaborate form in my mind but writing in down makes it look stupid, damn]) - and suddenly come into a better understanding of the wonderful world of sexblogger Maïa Mazaurette (who so often speaks of Danes).

 

Yes, "Thornbjorn Risager". This guy has some Viking ancestors, if you please.
And he sounds much like Ray Charles.
Go wonder?
Not at all. 
"Go travel!", that's what a Viking would have said I guess.

But, whatever, anyway, that leads us to Saturday, you know, the day in-between Friday and Sunday. Yes.
Flee market day in Annecy.
That's a lovely mirror I passed by :

Flowery. Yes. I'm fond of floral perfumes, remember?
And what am I holding in my lovely tiny precious hand?
Yes.
A lovely black bag.
No, it's nothing gothic.
It's a L'Artisan Parfumeur bag. Yes yes.
And what did I buy on this marvelous Saturday morning?

 

A lovely tiny candle (15 euros) !

The Traversée du Bosphore, yes, which is, actually, not such quite strongly flowery to me.
No. I passed by the candle many times during those last few days (I lit it up in the bathroom, at bath time, and left it there) and once put out as well as lit up, it still smels like a nice warm gently spicy sweet vanilla, slightly syrupy (the alcohol side of syrup). Nice. Yummy. A perfect sent for winter. A perfect comfort sent. A nice oriental "pot-pourri". Yummy.
Good. I finally found one thing I enjoy in this boutique. Maybe I'll go as far as buying la Traversée, the perfume version? I don't know yet. Not sure. I have Arpège (Lanvin) in mind too, very much so. So...

On the picture you can see another thing I bought on that Saturday morning (cheap), in a sort of spirituality/esoterism/bouddhism and so on kind of shop. Some storax, from Turkey.
I had no idea what it was.
I don't think the guy working there was very well informed either.
It smells sweet, it smells... "flowery" (?) says the label, for an instant yesterday evening it reminded me of mint (mint and mint liquor and other sorts of aromatic stuff, such as Jägermeister maybe... Maybe. Or fir-tree liquor...? Anyway), my mom doesn't like it... It's some resinous wood of the styrax family, the same family that breeds benzoin.

But I'm telling you one thing: my nose is not at its best right now. Actually I feel like I have something like half of a nose.
I think that sex excess does wrong to the olfactory sense.
Be warned!
You'd better turn into a monk if you want to smell right.
Today I wore Coco (Chanel) and it was nothing as wonderful as the two first times I wore it (last june if I remember right). It's so so so much upsetting. I can bearly smell it now, although I put it on only about 6 hours ago... The two first times it had lasted much more than that. And it had developped and grown and morphed... And Damn. Damn. Damn. All I could tell about it this afternoon is that I like it. How terribly awfully dull is that?!

Oh and on this Saturday morning I also bought a Roger Gallet soap for my mom: the Jean Marie Farina soap. She loves it. Me too.

 

And, now. Guess what I got in my mailbox a few days ago?

A For Strange Women samples lovely box, yes! Straight from Kansas City, yes!
It came along with some dried up rose buds, yes, isn't that sweet what money and internet can do?
Lovely.
I haven't tried them yet - the samples, not the buds -but I'm glad I'm going to have the chance to do so.
100% natural botanical oil perfumes. Quite all hand made, obviously. How lovely!

 

 

 

Annecy life style

All in all, at the moment, my life is rather nice.

This is the kind of place I work at:

The door and kitchen floor of an old farm. The lady who lives there doesn't have cows or rabbits anymore but she still has some hens. She offered me 6 eggs once. A glass of blueberry sirop another time.
Eventhough what I do is nothing super sexy or super intelligent... Well, it's a job. Sometimes as I'm working I get the feeling I'm just home, doing my own cleaning routine. That's just that. Cleaning. I didn't get any particular training, I just do my best, do as much as I can, as well as I can. Sometimes I work in an appartment in town, sometimes in such an old house in the countryside, sometimes it's a small place, sometimes a large one. I get to travel, to listen to some music while on the road. I guess it could become a serious kind of adventure in winter, on small countryside roads, under the snow.
I'm not sure yet wether I'm going to be hired for a longer amount of time or not... This was meant to be a summer job but they might keep me... And if not, I guess I'll look for a similar job somewhere around here.

An abandonned farm, next to a house I worked at today.

 

My nephew loves car. "Vroum vroum!". He always wants to get inside and play with all the boutons and levers : he happened to brake one lately so we're more carefull now and keep the doors locked...

Yes, he's fond of cars... All sorts of cars! He's only two (precisely today!), blond, blue eyed, maybe slightly under weight for his age but, never mind! already quite strong and very very dynamic! He doesn't speak much yet, but still makes some sorts of speaches sometimes, go wonder what he means! He can say simple words such as "coucou", "boum", "gn'acky" (which stands for knacky, a kind of sausage he's particularly fond of) or "caca" (when he's filled his diaper!). He enjoys walking barefoot everywhere and persecuting the dog and the cat. He's a half devil-half angel kind of creature, very irresistble.

My franticompulsive obsesspassion for perfumes that seams to have burst out of nowhere last May doesn't seem to be fading.
Right now I'm trying Early Roses by Teo Cabanel.

I tried it first at Les Galeries Lafayette last Saturday. A pshit on a... argh, what is the English word for "mouillette"... errr... you know, those tiny pieces of paper you can make collection of and keep in books?

Well, anyway I gave Early Roses a go last Saturday and at first (oddly?) I thought it was just another one of those sweety juicy florals (a bit like Jeanne (Lanvin), I'd say)... But I kept the little piece of paper, I put it away for some time and the next day sniffed it again and it had transformed into a more fully bodied kind of ambery rose, very nice one.
I wonder why Cabanel doesn't get more reviews... I wouldn't say this rose is a stunning one but it's, well... Lovely. I put some on my wrist and some on my nightgown (sort of an ancient pure cotton one): it ages much more slowly on the cotton.
It seems to me to be quite a realistic rose, as a woman very simply dressed up... Simply but nicely. I was able to notice some jasmine and soft spices at the very beginning but now there's just a nice musky rose left on my skin while on the cotton, it smells still a bit fresher, slightly gently spicy.
To me if feels a bit like an autistic kind of rose, a bit closed on itself, in its own lovely rose world. Plain and simple.

Last Tuesday morning, I didn't work and was able to go chasing some butterflies and samples. Going to L'Artisan Parfumeur boutique, I didn't mean to ask a sample of La chasse aux papillons extrême but was offered one anyway and one of Drôle de rose as well: I couldn't decide which one I liked best...
When I say "like best", actually I'm not sure yet L'Artisan Parfumeur has anything to get me seriously hooked on. I wanted to try something with tuberose. I tried Nuit de Tubéreuse something like a month or two ago and just got smashed in the nose by an extremely spicy green kind of thing (on skin; later I put some on a piece of tissue and only then could catch the "mango" note). La chasse... and Drôle... seemed to be much more educated. Sweet. Soft. Pretty. Tender. Nice.
L'Artisan getting so many many extatic reviews everywhere in the perfumistas world, from here to America, I tend to deduce from all this fuss that there must be something in this shop for me too!
So I wore La chasse... all tuesday afternoon (on my shirt), and it's lovely indeed but after a few hours I'd say I was getting tired of so much good education, softness, politeness, discretion. And it's not like this Cabanel rose I'm wearing now, that is just lovely too, and almost as gentle... But not quite so, for it reminds me of the real rose, with it's thorns, the dew in the morning, the spiders hidden in the flowers and so on. You never realy know what you're about to touch when you reach out for a rose in a garden.
La chasse..., in comparison, to me, looks a bit like a painting of a garden instead, not the real thing.
I still have to try Drôle de rose though... And as in the Artisan boutique there's a perfume kind of bar, with glasses filled with a piece of material sprayed with perfume, I was able to smell several things and got a bit caught by La Traversée du Bosphore. I don't remember which notes the sellwoman told me about but I was surprised such notes were appealing to me...
So now I have this silly desire to go back there and buy a tiny candle of La traversée... And at last I'll own something by L'Artisan... It's quite pathetic in a way... A bit snobish. Maybe I'll hate it in the end... Maybe it'll allow me to be offered a new perfume sample?!

There's one thing I don't mind at all though: paying for samples. What bothers me is that not all perfumers have samples for sell on their website and some offer very chic generous kind of samples... Samples that come in nice phials, bottles, things... Nice and expensive. Last Tuesday I also went to the Sephora boutique and asked for a sample of Arpège (Lanvin). It was filled before my very eyes, put in a totally anonymous colourless phial and do you think I mind it doesn't look "good" or "special"? It's Arpège in there! That's all that matters!!
When I see the prices of La Via Del Profumo samples, for example, I think "Well, maybe for my birthday...?". And it puts me down a bit. I wonder how much would cost a 2ml sample of one of those perfumes if the phials were mere glass... Or maybe little plastic sprays such as those by Parfum d'Empire : very practical 2,6ml sprays, which is quite generous enough for me to try and re-try. Or why not making basic samples as well as collection phials for those who can afford it??
Arrgh... Budget...

What I've also started to go hunt for is some raw material:

There. The Arpège and a Coco sample on the left, along with some tuberose abolute (Aroma-Zone), some fake tuberose that I got on ebay (don't always trust Ebay sellers!), two phials offered by a specialist (a tuberose absolute dissolution and a reconstitution) and a jasmin (grandiflorum) absolute (Aroma-Zone) on the right end.

The tuberose absolutes got me totally lost. It doesn't remind me of Fracas or Jardins de Bagatelle, at all. The AZ absolute comes in a solid form that I'm going to have to dilute a bit into alcool to get a better view of it, have I been told. It makes me think of walnut, walnut cake, walnut licor. And the absolute dissolution I was offered reminds me of dried smoked meat... Something salty and something a bit waxy too... I don't get it!!!
I won't even try to say anything about the jasmin absolute. I won't.

One thing though: it seems my nose got tired lately: this summer I got a special guest who spent 3 weeks with me (he left 10 days ago) and I'm not used to so much company and I'm quite sure it resulted in some unusual tiredness that put my nose down a bit.... I've just given the jasmine absolute another go and it seems that it talked to me a bit. I heard it a bit, as if I was starting to be able to catch some words out from a new foreign language... Well. Interesting. My nose would be recovering?...

Oh and there's been a huge storm here in Annecy yesterday... Well, not exactly huge but very brutal although quite short. Hail :

 

Under the bench, on the balcony.

This morning, at 8, as if automn had come...

 

And there's this photo I took two or three weeks ago now, in the Saint Pierre cathedral, in Annecy:

 

"Flame free system - switches on automatically"

We can kick fire out of churches but... Fire and ice from the sky?

 

 

 

 

The lonesome boatman

Once in some ancient times was a man who'd had a long and rich life as a merchant: he'd travelled to distant lands all across the Mediterenean Sea, he'd met many peoples and learnt many languages and musics. He lived on a sunny shore with his young wife, a fey kind of a woman. They were often out to sea, they'd eat olives, dates and goat cheese and drink sweet wines as the waves would gently rock their days and nights. The man's hair was turning to grey but his hands were still strong and as they laid side by side on the deck of their little boat, her wife often felt as if Neptune himself had come to visit her.
And this man had a son from a previous mariage and his son, as quick temperd as Apollo, had come to grow jealous of him and his wife, he'd grown to desire the woman and was secretly in love with her and one day he sent some of his servents to go and get her and he kept her prisonner for himself.
But so it is that his love was true and it touched the woman's heart and so she came to love him as dearly as she loved his father.
And that was her fate, and that was her curse.

 

Smelltrack: Sables - Annick Goutal.

 

 

 

Chore

 

Chore (routine/unpleasant task): corvée (c. ménagère, etc...)

 

 

Slough off

The regular visitors of this blog probably wonder what's happened to me. They might think I'm faking it, this new interest for perfumes. But I tell them: it's not an interest - an interest comes from the mind and, as far as I'm concerned, I can say it can also come from the Heart (I guess it's then called compassion) - but no, this isn't mind/Heart business, it's an obsession, this is a sensory obsession, the senses are involved, my root chakra has gotten mad, my nose is at the steering wheel : "I" is no longer in charge, sorry.

But still, my mind still functions and I keep an eye on the blogs I used to visit "before", in my kind of "reac"/"hard-hat" (?) past life.
Didier Goux's blog http://didiergouxbis.blogspot.com/ is one of those I visit the most, everyday when I'm home: his blogroll is quite practical, allowing to see quickly who's updated recently.
And that's how, yesterday, I gave a try to this, that I had not before: http://archischmock.blogspot.com/2011/06/osez-le-gourdin.html

Yeah, be glad that I'm not that mad yet.

Although it got me thinking and, who knows? One day I might end up filming myself sniffing at Fracas: you'll see, it's outrageous!!

 

So, my obsession leads me to explore the net in directions I had not tried before, guided by my nose, I found this today: http://arosebeyondthethames.blogspot.com/2009/09/minted.html
Doesn't she write lovingly about L'Occitane?

"a lady never sweats, she perspires"

Ah! So British! And I so much agree, now!

I used to talk about my "sweat" and other such uneducated things, but now I am changed.
Into a lady.
Yes.
Believe it or not, I shall not care.
I "prespire" and will never sweat anymore.
Especially now that I'm wearing Capucine by Fragonard.
How could one ever sweat wearing such a sweet beautiful fragrance?
I'm glad I bought it. Eventhough now I tend to catch sight of a light kind of soapy note that bothers me a bit but there's still the rose, the wood, the warmth, the powdery touch... Arrrgh! It's lovely!

You see? It makes me use underlining. I'm becoming tidy. That's insane.

Today I've tried Wazamba, by Parfum d'Empire, and that's been as walking into Saint André's church in Grenoble, on a burial or Christmas/Easter day, I guess (I'm not a "tradi" specialist, sorry): lots of incense! A lovely, simple, rather bare, sober incense, with a little subtle apple note (and maybe I noticed it because I read of it in the brochure) that made me think of a beautiful caramelized apple pie just coming out of a talented cook's oven, crispy as can be (the pie, not the cook). Lovely.
I kept it on for 6 hours, then, as it didn't seem to want to evolve much more, and as I wanted to go buy some new black trousers for work (starting Saturday evening), I washed it off and went downtown... and ended up in Sephora. I wanted to try to discover some new acclaimed rose fragrances ("new" to me). I had made a list.

I put on some Sa majesté la rose by Serge Lutens and Calèche by Hermès:
SMLR appeared to me as the most realistic rose fragrance I have ever tried and yet, paradoxically, very synthetic. It's weird. As if a part of my brain was telling me: "Watch out! Fake!". It held quite well on my skin and was quite invading, well present... It should have been nice but it was too much of a kind of suspect realism. A "too good to be true" feeling.
This is the third Lutens I try and don't like. Hum. Could my nose be not in tune at all with Lutens?... Sephora has got almost all of the line (except the tuberose, damn it!), so I'll see...
Calèche reminded me of Louve, by Lutens, that I tried yesterday: on my skin, a little bitter almond grows and will not leave (much smaller than in Louve but stubborn). For the rest of the fragrance, I just cannot tell what it is... I may look at the pyramid if I like, yes, but I mean my nose didn't recognize much of anything, except a quaint cosmetic creamy feel that went off...

And it made me wonder how old those perfume testers are in those shops, and for how long have they been opened?
Could those disagreeable effects that I got from some perfumes that I tried in perfumeries come from the age of the product, exposed too long to air and light? But I guess they pay attention to that sort of things in perfumeries...?

And so I washed it all off and splashed my forearm with Capucine, for relief.

Oh and I didn't find any black trousers downtown. That's insane too. I tried several shops such as H&M, Etam, Camaieu, Promod and Zara and the word "patapouf" (pata"tart/slut") came back to me (sorry, "patapouf" is not really translatable in English, I'd say, it's a wordplay here, sorry). The realm heavens of "patapouf". They were probably some lovely stuff hidden amongst the shameless awful mounds of stuff I passed by but... I saw a few black jeans, yes, but so slimy I wonder how can one get their legs in there (and keep on breathing/feel confortable). Or there was some shiny black trousers at Zara... God. Sales are roaring and no simple black trousers to be found. Black trousers are probably out of fashion this summer, I guess? Shame... I'll have to put on my dark blue velvet ones on Saturday...

 

 

 

 

Come back

June 2011 - some holidays - Zurich - because (perfumes stuff at the end).

Niederdorfstrasse

A reading corner, in a church
(comes with many bibles in many various languages)

Freaks - Gross Münster

Roofs - Gross Münster

At Lindenhof

At Lindenhof

One of the craziest things I've ever seen: a symphony orchestra in a train station,
with ceiling lights.

Sommernachtsball from Caroline on Vimeo.

 

The observatory

Another very crazy thing - "Maman", by Louise Bourgeois

A Bruno Weber sculpture - Uetliberg

Can't get much higher than this...

The most lovely train station ever - Ringlikon, Uetliberg

Hauptbahnhof

 

I also visited the lovely Osswald Parfumerie (http://www.osswald.ch/) near Paradeplatz... A dream perfumerie! A very helpfull young woman sprayed some tissues with a few tuberose perfumes for me (I had a list) and put some Do Son (Dyptique) on my wrist... I will have to try the others on my skin too (Carnal Flower, Tubéreuse (Goutal), and Beyond Love - I kept the tissues in a plastic bag, it smells wonderful) but this Do Son seemed the most insteresting to me that day, quite close to Fracas - as far as I can remember/tell - and it held on my skin quite longer (eventhough not as much as Bas de Soie (by Lutens, that gave me a very well cleaned "cellophaned" skin effect (made me think of Sanex shower gel)) and Chanel n°19 (that made me think of a Mitsouko with rose) that I tried on in others perfumeries... Oh and I also tried Flowerbomb and it should rather be called Juicebomb)... This shop has some italian brands I had not read about before, as Profumum Roma that has a "Tuberosa" that is said to resist even to a shower.
I guess I could be tempted to try it on some day...

 

 

 

Video diary

En musique, le 10 mai... :
Spéciale dédicace à tous ceux à qui j'ai eu suggéré de prendre des cours de chant: oui, je savais de quoi je causais:

 

One of my favourite songs from Caroline on Vimeo.
The Duke Spirit - Send a little love token

Et puis ce jour, j'ai eu envie de causer, un peu (in english again sorry):

 

Diaryfrom Caroline on Vimeo.

 

Et oui je sais, je suis incohérente: St-François de Sales, c'est trop loin mais le fort de tamié, à peine plus près - voir pire - j'y vais (enfin peut-être).
C'est que ça commence plus tôt, au Fort. Et que je suis (enfin étais) un peu imbibée.

 

Bonne nuit.

 

 

 

Love etc. Part IIIVXMXXX... etc

Hello hello, this is Sunday evening here, France, 8pm, and I'm slightly drunk if you please, sorry, but I have some excuses/reasons/explanations for it that I won't necessarily go into for now.
Maybe later.
The most important part of this story is that I'm still able to spell quite properly even after three... no, two and a half rum-orange drinks/glasses/things.

I can still talk to the dog straight (it's a real dog/poodle to be precise here and not a shadowy one, I swear), and guess by his look/eyes that he wants a biscuit and not just water.
Well. This is all just supposed to be an awkward funny short little note.
So I'll do my best to keep it that way.
Lately here I've talked about love. And sex and politics and sewing.
But one crucial thing I neglected to mention (sorry), because I'm such a very descreet/modest (pudique, en français) person is that for the first time ever in my life ever, this year (lately), for the first time ever, yes I want this to be clear: for the very first time EVER, a man tells me that he loves me. Not just by mail, no, and he did not tell me that he-thought-that-he-was-in-love-but-sorry-that-was-a-mistake, nothing so evanescent, no, no he really does say it and stick to it. For the very fucking time ever in my 34 years long life.

For those who don't know, I'm 34, yes, thank you.
So imagine my ... errrrrrr.... what am I to say?
Imagine you're 34 and for the first time ever on a horse's back. Or on a camel's back. Or on the mooon. That will do well as well. Then, once there, what are you supposed to say/do/write/...?

Some people -- I've heard them well since they were speaking to me and we were alone the two of us -- some people told me very plainly that they think I'm evil/a bad person (for some of them (and some of them only) just two minutes after having given me a full "french kiss" and just two minutes before giving me a full second one). Some people said to my face/ear that I'm a personified freezer, that I turn everyone down, that I'm sly, dishonest, mean. Those people must be thinking right now: "Of course you've never been loved before: you're baaaaad!".

I know they probably think so...
But at least one man now thinks and FEELS and SAYS (and write long and well) otherwise and I'm grateful.

Sorry if this looks like a 15 years old teen's blog: I've some homework wayyy behind schedule.

I'm listening to the 16 Horsepower's "Olden" album (yeah! let's steal horses together!) if that can put things into perspective (I mean it's a rather serious grown up kind of music).

20:40pm - 3 rum-orange drinks/glasses/things so far.

Oh and I love him, by the way.
(But I'm so much more used to loving that to being loved... oh... Well. Let's go watch tv instead of writing stupid teen's kind of blog notes... Sorry...The poodle is dreaming/whimpering under my very chair right now, how sweeet!! )

 

 

When the blackbird sings

Waking up at 3:30am and hearing the blackbird sing is an odd thing, when dawn's nowhere to be found yet and that's how I was left with another bit of insomnia tonight, listening to the blackbird.
And then an idea dawned on me, as some gloomy glimpse of a new day caught through mist, clouds and heavy pollution: it should make things much easier to think of some people as if they were dead, you know, those annoying people who once smiled so much to you and then just vanished from your life, leaving you with nothing but memories, memories such as invading flowers keeping you trapped, tangled up under their heavy scent.
A gloomy thought yet quite far from that bitter cold sounding line of The Undertaker by Puscifer: "You're dead to me".
It should be more something of a quiet fatalistic "Oh well, they're far gone, now", said with a faint smile and the quiet voice of an old wise lady as she remembers the lovers of her youth, while the blackbird sings, keeping her awake in the middle of the night... Considering those departed ones and leaving them to the care of the angels.

 

 

 

Snow effect

So, there, plenty of new pics in the previous note.
I felt like taking some more yesterday evening (outside freezing in the snow) but I went and picked up my mom at the train station instead.
Today's been awfully quiet. It's such a shameful luxury to have the chance to spend so many days just doing nothing...
There's still snow up in the mountain and it attracts me a bit and makes me feel like going up there to shoot myself and I some more.
Maybe put my bare feet in some frozen streams or something like that.
I wish I had some clever things to say but I'm afraid I'm too busy doing some... Doing. Very paradoxically.
I noticed that when you're busy living, you have less energy to spend on thinking of some big clever ideas.
When I was in my 20s, I would spend so much time thinking about big... sillinesses. And that was so much unproductive. But I guess I needed time to "mature"... Sure. Now, I work on living things. It's great to be able to think big, to have enough room in your brain for thousands of thoughts and ideas and plans but once you start trying to adapt your thoughts to your life, putting them into practice, you realise you may have thousands great thoughts and ideas, but turning just one of them into something real is going to be the work of a year or two.
I'm not even writing it down properly. I just don't have the energy to. I suspect myself not to eat enough. Eating gets more and more boring. 

Someone who produces some local punk music (his surname is Loaf, for the locals) offered me one of his co-productions lately: 12 people gathered to produce a 6 tracks vinyl by Passion Armée, an already split up band from Lyon. In return, I offered him a copy of the Varsovie album I produced. He was a little disapointed to get only a copy, not the real thing. I don't have so many cds to spread for free. His conclusion: it sounds too much like Noir Désir. I must haven't spent enough time listening to Noir Désir. I never heard the similarity, actually. Varsovie is going to play in Annecy. I think : "If I was a popular girl, maybe I could get one or two dozen of people to come to that show", but I'm not popular. I'm absolutly nothing popular and I'm working on becoming even less so. I'm amazed at myself. I'm working at making my biography just abnormal.
I mean, I wish my name will go on appearing in such various unpredictable places... Just like...

Yes yes. Third line.

Ouais.
This is what diaries are for. Collecting bits and pieces of the past, the weirder the better.