Already Making Plans

 A few hours ago, I was made aware of other people's travel plans. Plans that don't include me and I am okay with that because not all is lost. All I can think of doing is make plans.

The plans I seem to be making are bigger projects to do around the house. Nothing extravagant but I'd like to take care of a couple things. I would really like to really organize the laundry room, seriously clean out the fridge and take care of that huge pile of junk that sits on the dining room table.Things like that don't really get done when everyone is home.

The biggest thing that I want to accomplish is using up some more candles. I see the best way to do that when everyone will be out of town is to burn two of them at once. But all of these plans require some thinking and planning though. I have two dogs that like to counter surf, so I have to be home if I have candles burning. I've never had candles burning and left the house to go do something else. With sixty plus candles, I don't have much of a choice as to start burning two at a time and what better way to do it than when everyone is out of the house. The two scents that I have picked out so far are Honeycrisp Apple and Rosewater Ivy. But in the meantime, I need to keep burning one at a time.

More Body Stuff to Review

 Clinique Happy is a throwback perfume for me. Happy came on to the market my sophomore year of high school (I know that I am dating myself). A few girls, along with myself did wear Happy but it seems like we seemed to stick with Bath and Body Works Cucumber Melon. Working at minimum wage job for only 15-20 hours a week isn't a ton of cash and affording something a little more expensive than Bath and Body Works at the time was a luxury. When I was younger, and in high school, I did spend quite a bit at Bath and Body Works.

I don't ever recall trying out Happy's matching soaps and lotions but I now have had the opportunity to try out the gelato body cream. The body cream felt rich and decadent when I put it on after my shower and I really did enjoy the feeling while applying but I did notice about an hour in, the body cream doesn't seem to be enough for my dry skin. It might be leaving my skin feeling a little softer but not exactly moisturized. It might be due to the fact that it's almost 90F outside and pretty dry outside. This is where I think that I  have gotten a little too used to Chanel and Amouage body products. The Happy gelato cream does smell like Happy but there isn't a ton of scent to the cream. With Chanel and Amouage products, I don't really need to apply the perfume on top of the body products. This is probably a shrewd move on Clinique's part to get people to buy more but I'm not going to grudge them on that. I find the lotions to be nice enough but it doesn't really suit my needs in terms of lotion.

It's a rarity for me for me to use one of those pore strip things. I've never had problems with pimples, acne or blackheads. Once in a while I do use the pore strips when the sides of my nose look a little clogged up. The original pore strips got some of the crap out and I wanted to see if the charcoal pore strips would work any better. This turned out to be a bit fat no. The only thing that I noticed is that it was just easier to see what kind of crud came out of my nose than anything else. Do the Biore pore strips really work? Can't really say for others but for me, they don't really work all that great.

I just seem to be striking out with a lot of things come lately and all that I am hoping for is that we actually do get rain tomorrow even if it's in the form of thunderstorms.

Spring Seems to be Here

 It looks like the weather has skipped over spring and went straight to summer type weather. Ohio weather just does it's own thing. I am just sitting around trying to muster some kind of focus to see what I can come up with but it's not working out to well at this point. Just too much anxiety and with a couple problems with my health insurance not wanting to pay for a test, and hasn't wanted to for months, what happens is is going to happen. The more specialized the test means that it's more expensive and naturally, I can't get the authorization for it no matter what. But I can't exactly go paying for that test on my own. I can't afford to worry myself into a panic attack over something like this, it's not going to change what has already happened.

Since there have been summer temps this week after boatloads of rain and cold, it looks like it's going to stay warm, if not hot. I could have dug of Diorissimo but wasn't exactly feeling it and dug out some vintage Chamade instead. I'm going to tell the truth, I think that Chamade is much better than Diorissimo when the weather heats up. I think that I enjoy the hyacinth and the crush green stems are better suited to hotter weather. At this point, I've pulled out what is pretty much going to be the bulk of my summer perfume collection.

The choices for summer are Deneuve, Chamade, no 19 and Worth Courtesan. Yes, three of them are greens and the other is a fruity type of perfume. I really want to start working on Courtesan since the bottle that I have going is pretty wonky and seems to be evaporating and with no consistent way of being able to get more (without breaking the bank), I'd rather it not go to waste. This doesn't mean that I won't wear other perfumes but I think that these will be probably be the most predominant perfumes.

Clinique Happy in Bloom EDP Review

 

Clinique has always been a pretty solid brand. Clinique has always been pretty affordable in terms of price. Where you can afford a little bit better than the drug store brand of makeup, skin care and perfume. Better than Bath and Body Works in terms of perfume too. I haven't really paid much attention to Clinique in about 20 years. Twenty years ago, I was a broke ass college student and didn't have the means to go replacing makeup or Clinique Happy. I couldn't even afford the drugstore stuff, I was to worried about being able to afford my classes and books and then I noticed that two of my favorite lip gloss colors were discontinued. But now it's time to take a little bit of a look at Clinique Happy in Bloom.

Any serious perfume nut seems to have a fairly dim view of flankers. Once in a while, there is a flanker that is very good and sometimes, even better than the original but not often. I don't take flankers too seriously and I do find them a little gimmicky and a company trying to maximize profits.

I do enjoy the original Happy and find it to be a really good spring/summer perfume and I do have to retry Happy Heart (the bottle I had gone bad). I wasn't even aware of Clinique releasing anymore flankers of Happy until I nabbed a little travel/sample set from Ulta. In Bloom does have the Happy DNA in it but it distinctly different. In Bloom is more of an aquatic type of floral deal that would work really well in late spring or early summer. The longer In Bloom stays on skin, the floral part takes the shape of muget and a very aquatic one at that. Most of the time, I do dislike perfumes that are aquatic but this doesn't bother me too much and I kind of like it.

In Bloom stays fairly close to skin and sticks around for about 5 to 7 hours. I still wouldn't really consider getting a bottle but I think that this travel spray will last me quite a while. Do I have the desire to test out the other Happy flankers? I don't see an overwhelming need to.

Amouage Opus I Review

 My massive bottle of Estee Lauder Pleasures arrived a few days ago and I am admiring the sheer size of the box. It always takes me a few days before I actually open the box to get to the bottle. My points balance from Ulta seems to be growing at it's own accord but I am banking those points for later on for a bottle of Chanel. I don't know which one and I do hope around Christmas time, Ulta will offer more travel spray options.

Currently, my mind is running through the list of things that I need to do tomorrow night and Saturday morning. It's always the stupidest, smallest stuff that gets to me. The never ending cleaning list, my mother's birthday is next week and want to finalize any kind of odds and ends I need to get before her birthday. But her gift is pretty much finished.

I haven't really kept up with Amouage after Lilac Love was released. I might have sampled something after Lilac Love but all I know is that I didn't really like what direction Amouage was going perfume wise. Still not very interested in acquiring more samples at the moment and definitely no full bottles. I've already spent too much cash on perfume and so early in the year.

While I did pay a whole lot of attention to Amouage, especially early on, I didn't pay too much attention to the Opus line. Amouage prices have always been a little scary for me but knowing what I know now, I can check out Fragrancenet and BeautyEncounter for my Amouage needs. 

Opus I is a strange tuberose dominant perfume. Normally, I abhor tuberose as a dominant note in any perfume. Tuberose is usually too dense and overwhelming and really overpowers everything else. The tuberose comes close on a few occasions to overtake everything else but doesn't quite to that. Opus I is described as a chypre and I do get that vibe. I think what keeps the tuberose from taking over is the old books note and I think that is why I am calling the tuberose strange. Opus 1 kind of hums along without being loud. Lasting power is about what I do expect for an Amouage, about 8 to 10 hours. Right now, while there are aspects I like, I am still not sure about the tuberose. At best, I can say that I am indifferent to this Amouage offering but I do think that I need to wear this a couple more times before I can make a sound judgement and hopefully pick out a few more notes.

Vacation Recap

 

My vacation is coming to a close and it is back to work tomorrow. Now I just have to wait until my next vacation but that is in August.

The weather was too cold and wet to really do anything. It was so much of a pain in the butt trying to find something to do that was indoors and I didn't need to make advanced reservations for. So I organized some things and cleaned up some things. 

I was hoping to get caught up on some stuff, like the books I had downloaded. I only got through two of them. I did manage to review a couple things and use up at least two candles and I was hoping to finish off at least 3 of them, if not more. Currently, I have a Rose Water and Ivy candle from Bath and Body Works going. My primary focus is really going to be on the single wick candles and not the three wick candles. I think that is where I kind of goofed up. Vanilla Bean Noel is nice but it wasn't my jam and I have two more of them to use. I am not so certain that I will enjoy the two White Gardenia ones that I have. The wallflower refill that's currently going is the rain forest gardenia. It smells like an aquatic tuberose and I have never been much of a fan of tuberose. My next candle is probably going to be a lavender cedar wood candle and after two heavy hitters, I need something less bombastic. Especially if I can't open my windows and keep them open at the moment.

Body Products and Vacation

 I have 3 full days of vacation left or 3 and a half, if I want to nit pick. Haven't really done a whole hell of a lot except hang around and do some minor cleaning and organizing. Slowly but surely, I am finishing off that Vanilla Bean Noel candle and hope that it will be finished off by tomorrow. The only sunny and warm day was Sunday and it's been cold, wet and full of rain, so there isn't much of a point of going out and doing a damned thing.

Last night, I had put on some of the Clinique Wrappings body lotion to see if I could warm up to Wrappings a little more. Turned out to be a "meh" type of thing. Sometimes, the body products can be completely different than the perfume or exactly the same. The lotion was more of a milder version of Wrappings. My skin was decently moisturized but my hands, especially my nails, didn't feel all that moisturized. So Wrappings is still a no go for me.

I finally busted out the Chanel Coco Mademoiselle body products today and enjoyed every damn minute of my shower. The lotion is what I expected since I have tried the no 5 body lotion. What I did really enjoy is the body wash and how it lathered up and didn't dry out my skin too much. I do think that the shower gel or body wash is far superior to the bar soap in terms of lather and just getting clean. I do think that the Mademoiselle bath and body products are better than the no 5 bath and body products by the simple fact that there are too many iterations of no 5 to really make the no 5 bath and body products great.

With Mother's Day coming up, my email has been really bombarded with all kinds of emails reminding my of Mother's Day. I have both a Mother's Day gift taken care of and a birthday gift just about taken care of. But Ulta in all of it's infinite wisdom, decided to let me know that they had Estee Lauder Pleasures on sale in all sizes. I was eventually going to get the family sized bottle but the eventually seemed to be today. Since perfume budget for the year has really been blown, I am okay with not getting anything for the rest of the year  in terms of perfume.

Juliette Has a Gun Lady Vengeance Review

 Like I meant to do, is try a new perfume and review it. And today it's Juliette Has a Gun Lady Vengeance. I got my mini when Sephora had their spring sale thing going on. This was a blind buy and I don't really do blind buys anymore, just can't justify spending tons of cash on the potential of me hating it. So a travel spray was more of my price point. I honestly thought that this might be a winner but sadly, it wasn't the case.

When I first sprayed, it looked like the clouds would part and the angels would start singing but that didn't happen. The rose and patchouli really started to hate me and the feeling started to be mutual. I do have a contentious relationship with patchouli, it depends on the perfume. I just couldn't really shake the feeling that I've smelled this before. After a few hours, I remembered where I smelled it. It's a combination of Voleur de Roses mixed with Rose de Bulgarie and a small pinch of Rose de Nuit. I don't like Voleur de Roses and sure as hell didn't like Rose de Bulgarie. I can only wear Rose de Nuit once in a while and I have to dab it on. Rose de Nuit is difficult to wear for me and I love slutty perfumes. I'm wondering if rose is becoming something that doesn't agree with me or just florals in general are not so much my thing anymore. Green florals are probably my thing at the moment or aldehydes at this point. Lady Vengeance? More like rip off of too many other perfumes to be it's own perfume. This one sticks around for 5 or 6 hours before it mercifully fades.

Today seems to be the day that every perfume is rubbing me the wrong way. I think that this week's weather is pissing me off. Cold, grey and full of rain and not the weather that I wanted to have for a vacation, let's hope that something will improve and I can finish up the candle that I have going now so I can start another one tomorrow. Since it will be pretty cold tomorrow, I might go with a heavy vanilla or go with vintage BaV.