Tom Ford Black Orchid Review

Okay, I am a little less than a week out from my surgery and still pissed that I have a drain. My post surgical appointment is on Monday and I am hoping that my drain can be removed on Monday.I want to start being able to sleep on my right side, be able to take a shower normally and not have to deal with all of these extra steps. I'm tired of how the area around my drain in sore and I am tired of how the bandages and tape pull on my stomach. I just want to resume more of my normal activities.

I don't have a whole lot going on in my extensive free time. Since both of my parents are home, I haven't been able to burn any candles. Last Monday was the last day that I was able to have a lit candle and with the potential of having some minor winter storm, that means that we might lose electricity and that means I will have a candle going. It would probably be when the sun starts to set then will I have a candle going. I keep hoping that for once, I will be able to polish my nails while on a vacation. Every vacation I do keep meaning to do that but something either comes up or I just forget about it. So maybe this time around, I will actually do it.

Since I have all of this free time, I decided to give Tom Ford's Black Orchid. Sephora was having one of  their sales and I decided on getting a travel spray of this one. Sometimes I do feel like I do give Tom Ford's line up the short end of the stick. Tobacco Vanille is a little to powerful, Bitter Cherry would have been great if it hadn't been for the prominent tonka note. So I figure that I would give one last shot.

What got me to get a travel spray of Black Orchid was the fact that I was pulled in by the product description by rum soaked. Let's just say that there is nothing rum soaked in Black Orchid. It's a whole lot of nothing to my nose. I get an aquatic jasmine/tuberose thing with hints of vanilla and maybe some patchouli. I thing Tom Ford said that this is elegant or classy. Considering what Tom Ford's ad campaigns are, I would not consider this classy nor elegant. I think Black Orchid just sucks.

For the price of Tom Ford offerings, I do expect better. If you are going to charge Amouage range prices, I do expect a hell of a lot. I expected something boozy, more full figured, a little more fleshed out. Not something thin and watery smelling. While Black Orchid did have lasting power, there would be no way that I can spring for a full bottle. At this point, I don't think that I will be buying anything more from the Tom Ford line, I don't think that I would even get decants of this line up.
 

 

Well, It's Gone

Welp, my gallbladder is now a memory as of Wednesday morning and right now life sucks. Besides my gallbladder being full of stones and sludge, the stupid thing was inflamed along with my liver. so now I have a drain coming out of me. It's not a small drain at this stage. It's a long ass tube with a bulb at the end. Funny thing is that any kind of bile or fluid is supposed to be going to the bulb. But right now, any kind of fluid that wants to come out, seems to come out around the base of the tube near an incision. I am debating on if I should be concerned or not. I am not smelling anything foul, seeing pus, not having uncontrollable pain or fever. Maybe the tubing is either blocked or maybe got dislodged. I will call the doctor and see what is the best way to handle this. It hurts to cough and it hurts to laugh and I don't even want to contemplate the pain if I have to sneeze.

What I want most is a shower though. Any kind of bathing that I have been doing is some spot washing. Washing my forearms, face and neck aren't exactly cutting it at this point.Bending over is pretty scary and a little on the painful side and the medical people don't want me to have a lot of water on my abdomen quite yet. Tomorrow will be the day where I actually put cling wrap over my stomach and see if I can clean myself off a little better. I want to really wash my hair and face. I honestly think that the tubing could have been a little on the shorter side of things. I think a plastic cup and a bucket would be the best thing for me. Let's just hope when I change the bandage to my tubing I can actually fit some kind of more thorough cleaning without someone having a fit.

I haven't been so interested in perfume the past couple days even though I did wear the smallest dab of Chanel no 22 parfum on the day of my surgery. I just applied it on the inside of my ankle. Some women don't leave the house without lipstick, some have to have earrings and I am one of those who has to have some perfume before I leave the house (most of the time). As soon as I get a better self car regimen down, I can really start to feel better.

Today, I had to order myself some pajama pants that don't exactly look like pajama pants and some slide on shoe because I know that eventually I will have to leave the house and all the shoes that I have have laces and if I can't tie my shoes because I can't really bend over to do it, what good are they. The pajama pants look like something that I would be able to wear out of the house to do errands and not look like a slob. If I can avoid looking like a slob in public, I will surgery or not. I honestly didn't really think the whole wardrobe thing out before my surgery. What was the point of getting clothes and shoes that I might not have really needed? So let's hope that what I ordered arrives soon.
 

Cellphone Upgrade and Other Stuff

 Yesterday was the day that I got around to upgrading my cellphone. My Galaxy s10 was starting to get a little funky on me and off to the Verizon store to get a new phone. I forgot how much of a pain in the ass getting new phone can be.The Verizon store that I normally go to is usually pretty empty but my dad and I didn't exactly want to wait around until noon for the Verizon store closest to me to open at noon. So it was the next town over that was open a little earlier. That Verizon store was a little on the busy side. Maybe because people were taking advantage of the trade in deal. I know that my dad and I were taking advantage of the trade in deal to. The only caveat was that I had to upgrade my cellphone plan to a 5G plan. I am not a fan of paying at least $50 more per month and the whole cellphone business has gotten really stupid. No matter what carrier you go to, the plan alone isn't as cheap as they used to be. Cellphones aren't as cheap as they used to be. There was a time that you didn't have to buy your phone, let alone pay for an upgrade when it came time to renew your contract. Now you have to pay for your phone outright or a payment plan tacked on to your cellphone bill. Verizon is really starting to push these little add-ons. For an extra $10 per month, you can get a streaming subscription or whatever else is available. I do not watch videos on my cellphone. But my dad and I spent an hour and a half getting new phones and setting them up. My dad got a little confused when the bill came due. Yes, you have to pay a little something upfront when you get new phones. I am dreading the next cellphone bill due to activation fees.

The phones that my dad and I went with were the Samsung s24 phones. We are already familiar with the Samsung line. I could have gone with the Galaxy flip smart phone but I know that I would bust that in a half an hour since I am a retail employee and like most retail employees, I carry my cellphone in my back pocket. I am not thrilled with resetting passwords on my phone (I do tons of online shopping among other things) but I am enjoying a brighter screen and a bigger screen.

Since I am going in for surgery on Wednesday, I am trying to get as much done as I can before I go. Tomorrow is the day that I find out what time my surgery is and when I have to be there. In some ways, I hope that my surgery is really early. Early as in I have to be at the hospital at 5am. The reason is that most surgeries have the direction that you can't have anything after midnight. So I wouldn't be able to have a cup of tea before my surgery. I would only be able to have a sip of water when I take my medication. Only a sip because they want an empty stomach for surgery. The whole reason why I want to get as much as I can done now is that I won't be able to do it after my surgery.

Thus far, I have slowly been working through my way through my candle collection and current candle is the Bath and Body Works Diamond of the Season from their Bridgerton collaboration. Diamond of the Season is a dead ringer for Sunshine and Daffodils from Bath and Body Works. Since I am going to be off for a while, I can work on using up more candles. I have no idea on why I want to use up more candles if the Bath and Body Works Candle Day is coming up. I have enough saved up in gift cards to get 3 candles, maybe 4 if I play my cards right. But we shall see how that goes.

Coming Down to the Wire

In a little less than 7 days, I will be having gallbladder surgery. I keep thinking if I should honestly wear perfume the day of my surgery. The last time I had surgery to have 8 teeth removed, I wore perfume but this time it's a little different. The first time, it was my teeth and this time around it is going to be on my stomach. If what I am reading is true, it's no lotions or perfumes. But I am thinking of the tiniest smidgen on my ankles.

Will I be going for heavy hitters like any of my Amouage offerings or some vintage Mitsouko? It's going to have to be a hard no. The last time I had surgery I wore Chanel no 22. I can't help but think that it might work better this time around. When I wore no 22 for my teeth, there was only the EDT version and the parfum hadn't been released yet. Since I have the parfum version, I can put the smallest dab that I can on my ankles. I could go the Sarrasins or De Profundis route but I honestly don't think that it would fully work. Sarrasins is too much of a slutty, leathery jasmine but actually De Profundis might work but I am not fully sure I would want to wear De Profundis for my surgery. At this point I am limiting myself to perfumes that I can dab on my ankles. I am sure that I have a few others that I can use as well but I have so many strong perfumes.

Another option for me is maybe a dab of no 19 extrait. Less is more at this point when it comes to the day of the surgery. It's a different version to the title of Why I wore Lipstick to My Mastectomy type of deal. Worst case scenario is that I don't wear perfume but instead of my ankles, I might just go with in between my toes. What I am looking forward to is being able to wear what I want when I want. Maybe I won't be wearing so much no 5. There is the other option of that is exactly all I will wear while on medical leave even if I don't wear anything on the day of my surgery.

 

It's My Gallbladder

I thought I was making some kind of progress with getting better with my stomach problems but apparently not. I ended up in my local ER Wednesday night instead of the one a half an hour away. I wasn't exactly in the mood to deal with this crap again of waiting for hours after a blood draw to be seen. I managed to be taken back, have a blood draw, urine test and was examined all within 15 minutes. The nurse that was doing the examination had said that it was probably my gallbladder and ordered an ultrasound. The biggest thing is that I was given pain and nausea relief and I wasn't waiting for hours and not have anything done except a blood draw. The ultrasound had confirmed that my gallbladder was the issue. I was given scripts for pain, nausea and directions for a surgical consult. I made that consult before I left the ER. So Monday afternoon, I go for that consultation. The total time that I spent in the ER was probably 3 and a half hours. After complaining for around a year, I am happy to have some answers. My endocrinologist and my regular GP had pretty much decided that keeping an eye on it was the only thing to do.

The hard part is just managing the pain and nausea. Before the medication, I couldn't eat period without vicious amounts of pain that would last for hours. Now I can eat a little more but I am kind of limited and will be limited for a while on what I can and cannot have for a few weeks. It will be a very bland, low fat diet and I am not looking forward to that. But I am looking at a month with less than $75  coming into my bank account per week for about a month and I am seriously not looking forward for that part.

Monday is the day I will know if I am having surgery and what type of surgery. I probably will not be wearing any perfume if I have to go the surgical route but I am debating on wearing either no 19 extrait, no 22 extrait or Iris Silver Mist. I want something that is subtle but with a little bit of backbone. Dabbing make most perfumes more subtle. The only one that might be kind of comforting is no 22. I will have plenty of time later to wear what I want.
 

Northern Lights and Adventures in the ER

For the past year, I have been having stomach issues. At first, I thought it was initially because I am 40 and a good chunk of it happened before my time of the month so I wasn't too worried until the 10th.

October 9th is when I started to have some stomach troubles and didn't really think much of it at first. But after dinner, I started to have more issues and went to the ER shortly before 4 in the morning on the 10th. At first, I was taken back pretty quickly and the nurse did a blood draw, urine test, put an IV in and sent me back into the waiting room. Mind you, this is 4 in the morning and there were 2 other people and I thought that the wait wasn't going to be take too long to be seen by a doctor. Well, I was freaking wrong. I waited hours without being seen by a doctor. I went to see what exactly was going on and I was given the response of I was next in the in line but no time estimate on when I was going to be seen. At this point, I was starting to get kind of riled. I had been in the waiting room for a little over 4 hours at this point with no health professional checking to see if my pain levels were worse, same or lessened. This is an uncivilized hour on a Thursday morning with 1 or 2 other people in the waiting room. I think that one of them might have been homeless and just wanted a warm place to sleep for the night. My boss had said that there might have been more important patients to attend to than a stomach ache. But my retort was that it could be something incredibly serious like a ruptured gallbladder. I decided to say screw it and have them take my IV out and leave. I was feeling a bit better but my GI system still feels yucky. My only directions were that I make a follow up with my regular doctor. I am still pretty pissed. It's almost like I was being treated like I was drug seeking or I just wasn't important enough to be seen. I have already made a complaint with the patient advocate because I should not be waiting over 4 hours in a level 2 trauma center that was at a slow point patient wise. What if it is still serious? What if I can't wait until next week when my GP appointment is?

I was finally able to see the aurora borealis later on that day. I wasn't expecting much since I wasn't able to see them the last time they came to my neck of the woods in Ohio. This time, there was a mention of using a cellphone camera to capture it and that is what I did this time around. And this time, I managed to get a few pictures. They might not be as good as a professional photographer but I am going to post a few down below as well. The one up top is probable one of the best pictures that I took of the whole thing.

 

Prada Infusion de Vanille Review

 At this point, fall is here. I am not talking about a false fall. A false fall is were you get a few days were it is cool during the day and pretty chilly at night. But after those few days, summer comes back for one last hurrah. Since summer is gone, I have started craving some of my vanilla offerings.

I am picky about my vanilla perfumes. Many vanilla perfumes smell like a bakery, smell cheap or just generic. I remember the first two vanilla perfumes that I fell head over heels with. The long discontinued Havana Vanille and Spirituese Double Vanille. I love the both of them but Havana Vanille has been discontinued and stupid expensive if you find it online. SDV is still stupid expensive and will have to stick to decants with that one. Andy Tauer's Vanilla Flash and Tom Ford's Tobacco Vanille are wonderful as well. I did notice that I liked my vanilla perfumes to smell inedible. It might smell like vanilla but it's an inedible vanilla. But vanilla isn't a huge part of my collection.

Last month was my birthday and just about every place that I shop at was either giving a freebie or some kind of bargain. Ulta was giving me double points all month long along with a birthday gift, so I loaded up on things that I was running low on. Sephora was offering me an extra 250 points if I made an order of $25. I am not the biggest Sephora shopper but I made an exception and spent some cash and got myself a travel spray of Prada's Infusion de Vanille. I figured that since I love Infusion d'Iris, I would probably like the vanilla one. A travel spray was in my budget and I figured that if I didn't like it, I could either return it or find someone who did like it.

I will say that it is a vanilla perfume that falls into the inedible category and not in a good way. Havana Vanille and SDV fell into the same character of vanilla but there was something that made them stand out. Havanna Vanille had a rum soaked cigar vibe and SDV had a burnt vibe to it that I loved. Vanilla is something that Guerlain has always done well. Infusion de Vanille seemed to be a generic vanilla perfume with some floral stuff in the background. I did read some reviews on Sephora (I think but don't hold me to it) and I saw that some people said that this was a sexy perfume. My response was, "sexy, my ass!". If this is sexy than you must of set the bar below ground and you must think that Kiehl's Musk Blend is out of control slutty. Maybe I am too used to MKK and vintage BaV. I can think of other perfumes that can be considered sexy like Shalimar or Mitsouko. Shit, vintage no 5 is pretty damn sexy but I wouldn't call any vanilla dominant perfume sexy. Might be on the comforting side of things but not sexy. Infusion de Vanille is a vapid perfume geared for people who want to wear and buy perfume but don't want to put a lot of thought and effort into finding something better.

I will admit that the staying power of Infusion de Vanille is pretty good and it isn't one of those really loud perfumes. Infusion de Vanille is well blended but the whole thing doesn't really sit nicely on me and I am not a big fan of vanilla perfumes being called sexy where there are better perfumes out there that can claim the whole sexy title.