Viktoria Minya Hedonist Absolute Review

Back in 2013, I was still in the habit of buying full bottles of perfume without testing them out first. At that point of time, the packaging still had some sway over me. Around tax time that year, Andy Tauer came out with Noontide Petals and Viktoria Minya released her debut perfume Hedonist.

You have no idea on how hard I fell for the pictures of Hedonist online and fell even harder when Hedonist arrived on my doorstep. It was a good thing that the original Hedonist matched my expectations. I loved the peach, the rum and the osmanthus. 

In 2019, Hedonist Absolute was released and I knew it was going to be a long wait before I could get my hands on this. I was looking for a more intense version of Hedonist and I'm not sure what really happened. The absolute is a stripped down version of the original with too much birch. A touch of birch could have added something interesting but the birch just doesn't fit. The birch, I think, is trying to make Hedonist a little more masculine but it doesn't seem to play well with the other notes. 

I find that Hedonist Absolute just doesn't play well on my skin and I am blaming the birch for it. The original was toothsome and more of my vibe. I do love a boozy perfume when it is done well and I do like woody notes when those are done well too; but the both of those elements combined are not the greatest idea. I have no idea why this isn't working for me right now.

But I do have to swing back to the packaging though. I love the black bottle with the gold embellishments. What I am not really loving is how I cannot see the juice inside. I have Memoir for women and that bottle is black but I can still see how much juice that I have left. With the Absolute, I don't have the ability. I would have loved to see some of those crystals in the bottle just like in the original Hedonist. The crystals in the bottle really fit the whole Hedonist vibe. I think it's not so much Hedonist Absolute but it's a me problem.
 

Well, That Was Interesting

Let's just say it has been an interesting few days. When Prime Day came around, I only had a $10 gift card on my account and used that to get 2 fairly cheap books. I was hoping that I would be able to find either a movie that was on sale or a couple books that I had been eying on sale but they were not. The movies that were on sale were something that I already have or just not interesting. So I had to content myself with two books. I'm not mad but I find that Amazon Prime Day not as exciting as it used to be. I am not seeing the sales that I have seen in years past but maybe it's because my financial circumstances are diminished but slowly stabilizing. The pesky cellphone bill, dog food and a couple other things pretty much eat up my paycheck and I have to make sure that the obligations are taken care of first.

Somehow, I had the pleasure of losing my internet service. The bill was paid and nobody could tell use what the hell was going on. We had a ticket and someone was supposed to show up on Friday but never showed. Then we had to wait until Monday afternoon to have someone come and replace our router and mess around with something else. Friday and Saturday were the days were I could take advantage of my work's WiFi system but the rest of the time, I was pretty much burning through my cellphone data. That does remind me to look into upgrading my cellphone service but pennies have to be saved up for that one.

It is amazing how dependent one becomes on the internet. I remember the days of dial up and you really couldn't use the internet for much or long without tying up a phone line. With DSL, it's a whole different matter. I couldn't play my Xbox, wasn't able to stream Netflix, I was limited to the books and movies that I downloaded to my kindle but there wasn't that much to really keep me occupied. There is only so much cleaning that one can do as well to kill time. Now I am playing catch up on a few things.
 

Roja Dove Diaghilev Extrait de Parfum Review

There are very few perfumes that I want to try but in ways I am scared to try them. It could be for a variety of factors, cost, vintage, how hard is it to find and a couple others. Amouage exceptional extraits are one of them due to cost even though I tried the Epic one. But then came Roja Dove Diaghilev extrait de parfum.

For the longest time I wanted to try Diaghilev but was hesitant. Mainly due to the $1050 price tag. I can't afford to love any perfume with that kind of price tag. But I have a dabber sample and decided to test it out. I figured what is the worst that can really happen?

Let's just say that this is Diaghilev is divine. To my nose, it's a cross between vintage Mitsouko and vintage Givenchy III. Some have said that it reminds them a little bit like Amouage 25 but I am not getting that vibe. I absolutely love vintage Mitsouko in all of it's oakmoss goodness but have just a little bit of Givenchy III. Diaghilev has the lasting power of nuclear waste and some pretty good sillage for my having just a dabber sample. So if you have enough Givenchy III and or vintage Mitsouko, you can get away with not having Diaghilev.

In all honesty, while I love it, there is no way I can swing over a thousand dollars for 100ml. Not even with Afterpay and I am okay with that at the end of the day. I have enough vintage Mitsouko and enough of Givenchy III to where it's not in anyway saddening that Diaghilev is out of my reach. Sometimes I think that the prices of some of the niche offerings is outrageous. I might buy some niche but sometimes that I think even mainstream prices have gotten to be a little much. I know we are coming out of a pandemic but sheesh. I don't care if it is extrait de parfum but over $1,000 for 100ml isn't something that is really worth it to me.