Springtime....

We find ourselves very much in the heart of winter, and man... it. is. LONG.

In my northern area of the world, spring doesn't take on the same sheen as other places. It's long-awaited (usually truly manifesting somewhere late in May, ripening in June), and only lasts a few weeks. As such, the lead-up is cold, slushy, stormy, dark, all-round depressing, but ever tantalising in the small hints that drop themselves here and there, hints like the changing quality of the light, the slightly-shifting angle of the sun, a day or two that might slip up towards the freezing/not freezing point.

Around this time, I do perk up a little, and wonder how on earth I could feel so uninspired for so long - in the winter, I feel a little useless and tired, getting up to very little in the way of creative endeavours, like art, cooking and blog posts. I miss the blog posts, I love doing these.

Today, I am off work with a sick day. Watching a lot of Sex and the City...

Over the holidays, I came down with a very nasty cold that has hung on with a vengeance. I caught it on the 29th of December, and I'm still sick. The bulk of it was over with by the start of the second week of January, however today the fever has come back everything aches. As such, I thought I might stay and drink herbal tea all day and take a shot at a post.

As spring comes into sight and starts to seem like something that might actually come about and isn't just a figment of my imagination, I invariably am taken with thoughts of :

1. Warm days

When warm days are far away, a warm-weather-fix can be had in cookbooks about far-away places. For instance, Tasting Rome. I love these books because I love to look at the interesting food, the dishes and flatware, and above all else, the scenery. These are like travel books that feature nothing but beautiful vistas and zesty, uncompromisingly delicious food.

2. Summery-smelling things

Okay, so fruity perfumes are not the most classy things ever and the perfume snobs hate them. Much as I can be a little snobbish in that I like high-quality perfumes with something to them that is interesting/unusual, there is nothing wrong with reaching for something that just plain smells good.

Incanto shine is a lovely perfume - it's by Salvatore Faragamo, unfortunately it's a flanker, which I hate on principal, but I'm still glad it exists, even if I would prefer that they gave it its own darned identity. It's fruity and bright, juicy, fun, warm, fresh, everything nice.

On a tangential note, I don't like flankers. To me, it's laziness. It tells me that they didn't want to spend time working on a new launch, finding a new name, working on a new picture through a new lens. It tells me that the company would rather bask a little longer in the success of a perfume they've already launched and are happy to rest on their laurels as the money flows in. But it cheats a perfectly worthy fragrance out of it's full potential. What's more, it cheats women out of one of the most coveted qualities of their perfume: its persona. When a woman is asked what perfume she's wearing, isn't it more impactful to respond "I'm wearing Dior Addict" than it would be to say "I'm wearing Dior Addict 2 Sparkle in Pink"? Tacky! It's a different perfume. Don't make it piggy-back on your last project. Enough said.

3. My birthday!

As my birthday approaches, I am beginning to wonder what I'd like to treat myself to, if anything. I've been having a bit of a window-shop online, and he's what I've come up with so far... (keeping in mind that I'd likely pick one item, not buy them all)...

I've never had an Hermès perfume before, so maybe this...

Considering trying a new foundation, I've heard good things about this one:

My cat broke my glass teapot last summer, knocked it onto the floor and it smashed. I am considering replacing it soon (Eva by Simax):

So that's all for now! Wishing everyone a moderate winter and good health!

A.