Alternate title: “On the Road”
There will be intermittent postings for a bit while I’m on a road trip with the BF. I brought along a USB Wireless connector so that I could be connected to the Internet while we drove, but the gadget doesn’t seem to want to play nicely (or at all!) with my laptop, so I’m limited to web connecting when I can sit down and set up in a hotel room or friend’s house, etc.
Below is a photo that anyone who’s ever been on a road trip will recognize as the near universal symbol for “Are we there yet?”:
“No, really . . . are we THERE YET?”
While West Texas is not the most fascinating landscape to travel across, the highways are long and straight, and the speed limits range from 70 to 80mph, which is fantastic when you’re trying to get somewhere fast.
El Paso came, and El Paso went.
We stopped for the night in Scottsdale (from Dallas to Scottsdale — it was an excruciatingly long drive) at The Mondrian hotel, and let me just tell you — What. A. Dump! They charge an arm and a leg and think they’re really hip, but the place was cheap, dirty and run-down. We just laughed about how crappy our room was, especially for the ridiculous room rate we were paying. Live and learn.
To add insult to injury, they’d rented out their lobby for a Lifetime Channel movie production, so their bar was closed for the night we were there. The dorktastic front desk guy made certain to let us know that though the bar was closed, we could make our own drinks from the mini-bar in our room. Really? Gee, thanks. That’ll go great with your non-existent room service.
I have photographic evidence. I’m saving them for a more thorough blog-screed later on, but below is the hallway that led to hell . . . or, rather, to our room for the night, but that was kind of the same thing in this case:
Abandon hope all ye who enter!
We skedaddled first thing in the morning (like bats out of), and headed to Las Vegas where we have some business meetings before we head off for more driving and viewing of the American landscape through the windows of an SUV. Speaking of which, the new suspension bridge they’re building at the Hoover Dam location is a technological marvel:
Someone’s package is obviously getting stimulated.
The photo was snapped from out the car window while we were driving past. Story of my life.
Le Labo Labdanum 18 has been a trusty travel companion so far — easy to enjoy and adaptable to any situation.
{ 8 comments }
Nathan – I continue to be fascinated by our scent twin-ship. I toughed out Thanksgiving on Harbour Island in the Bahamas, and the only fragrance I wanted to bring was Labdanum 18.
Unfortunately, my husband had yet to act on the clanging hints I’d dropped since July (Santa finally coughed up the frag), and all I had of L-18 was a linen scarf with the remnants of the whore’s bath I’d given myself in Le Labo with their tester.
Although I’d brought a travel size of Bulgari Black with me to Harbour Island to “fake the delight”, I spent the holiday snorting in the fading L-18 on my scarf like it was some kind of fetish item. Shades of Nijinsky’s “Afternoon of a Faun” with the nymph’s scarf.
And now that I have my very own bottle of L-18, I’ve gone a bit hardcore with my search for total barnyard immersion (TBI). I wear it with several hearty dabs of Bal a Versailles parfum. I’m officially an olfactory scat freak. But it’s an amazing combo – so sexy!
On the lighter side of equine poo, L’Artisan’s Dzing! is a cozy little number, I know you’ll agree.
Happy trails,
Katie
Oh! Labdanum 18 and Bal a Versailles . . . that sounds like an eye-popping combination (and I mean that in a good way). I have a small bottle of Bal a Versailles at home that I now want to rush back and grab so that I can test this combo for my very own.
I did, however, bring along some Aftelier Leather Essence and CB I Hate Perfume Ethiopian Frankincense, both of which layer extraordinarily well with Labdanum 18.
And I can totally empathize with the mindset behind lugging a bottle of Bulgari Black along with you only to question your sanity about that decision later. Bulgari Black has that effect with me — it seems like a great idea in theory, but then it opens its mouth and the fantasy is obliterated.
Congrats that your Santa has such great sense in fragrance gifts! Who knew that Santa was so sympathetic to the Frenchy boutique cause? Usually, he’s just lobbing Calvin Klein N2U grenades down random chimneys.
The. bar. was. closed.
I think I need to go lie down.
The four saddest words in the English language.
After nearly sixteen hours straight of driving, I was ready to kill for a drink and hearing “The bar is closed” was like poking a hungry lion with an electric cattle prod. It’s a testament to the restraining effects of modern law and order that the poor desk clerk is still alive.
That hotel hallway is scary – looks like something out of a B horror flick. After sixteen hours of west Texas, I think I would have taken an ambien and gone straight to bed, given the lack of a functional bar.
That was almost the plan, but we were so hungry and the hotel didn’t offer room service (what kind of self-respecting hotel doesn’t offer room service?), so we were forced to go out and find something to eat at the hotel restaurant (overpriced and not all that great, naturally).
We had to wait for the scene they were filming in the lobby to finish and for the director to yell “cut!” before we could push our way through the throng of extras, stepping over bunches of power cables, to find the restaurant.
I’ll tell you what — the horror movie hallway looked even scarier after a couple of martinis.
Bear in mind that my layering Labdanum 18 and Bal a Versailles fits in with my tendency to go all “Coldstone Creamery”, as the husb terms it. You know, when you think, “Hmm, I like caramel ice cream,” and you order a scoop of dolce de leche, then add a scoop of pralines’n'cream, then chop in some Heath Bar, then top it with hot caramel sauce. And then you’re eating a hell of your own making.
So L-18 and BaV might be a tad Coldstone Creamery in the barnyard dept, but I am a thrillseeker, y’know.
But I think what might actually be brilliant with BaV is your fab new Aftelier Leather Essence. Try that too and report back!
Mission accepted!