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following the sun

I'm off for my 5-week Grand Tour of Europe that will include:

Barcelona
Nice
Rome
Venice
Berlin
Paris
Amsterdam
Brussels
Prague
Vienna
Budapest
Salzburg

(Roughly in that order)

I'll try and update while I'm gallavanting, but if not, sit tight! Au revoir!
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done AND done

I just finished my last tutorial for term! Insane! I was so relieved that my tutor actually liked my paper - I started it the night before... as it is with all my paper now.

What Oxford has taught me: how to procrastinate, and procrastinate well.


Anyway, now I have to figure out the insanity that is my Easter break - 5 weeks traveling around Europe! I'll share my intinerary later, but what I'm most excited about is spending 10 days in Paris with one of my best friends, Jansa, who's flying in from Houston just to see me! Let's hope we don't kill each other by the end of the trip!

Anyway, what's particularly exciting for me about Paris is that it is the site of a store that I've been waiting to go to for what seems like my entire life: Deyrolle.

Deyrolle is a taxidermy shop, one of the oldest in the world, and absolutely beautiful. It burned down last year, but they've rebuilt since then. I admit, taxidermy is kind of creepy, strange, and offensive, but I have a perverse love for it and everything about Deyrolle is so whimsical and elegant.

Here are some pictures:






Fantastic right? I love the "Deyrolle blue" of the walls. I mean, everything about it is gorgeously macabre. Dead animals having a tea party? Right up my boat!

For more on taxidermy, a more personal take, check out this audio essay by Melissa Dixon, "the urban taxidermist". She's self-taught - how cool is that??? The NYTimes interviewed her as part of their "One in 8 Million" series.
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gallery of non-scents


One random thing that's been gaining interest for me is perfumery. I don't have a very sensitive sense of smell and am not discriminate with anything I wear, but I find the science and mythology behind it fascinating. Perfume is such an emasculating term and I feel self-conscious admitting my interest sometimes - all of which is silly. The thing is, I'm more entranced by the idea of perfume than the actual scent itself. My poor nose just compresses them into the simplest of categories: musky, floral, fruity, etc. It grosses me out when people wear really heavy cologne.

In the WSJ's most recent issue, Jean-Claude Ellena, a perfumer for one of the business's most important houses, Hermes, discusses his personal associations with scent.

My favorite, though, is perfume critic (isn't that an odd profession?) Chandler Burr, who writes a column for the NYTimes periodically. It was his column that initially got me interested - I read everything that they publish on their blog, The Moment. I find the prose really evocative, much like the idea of scent itself. Perhaps that is what's compelling: trying to put into words the idea of something so sensory. The very nature of perfume requires some semblance of poetry.

One of the most interesting perfumers in NY is CB I Hate Perfume, which is an independent perfumer based in Brooklyn. If we're talking about evocative, then CB can't be beat: he bases his perfumes on ideas and memories, such as "In the Library" and "Mr. Hulot's Holiday". Each perfume is a story - a scent story unto itself. It's certainly Proustian. It's a highly personal mode of perfumery that contrasts with that of, say, Calvin Klein.

I went there periodically when I still lived in the city - my favorite was "Winter 1972". Try to imagine what that smells like before reading the description.
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cribz

Okay, so I realize I've been terribly remiss in actually sharing anything about my life here in England so today we're going to start off with the place that I live: the Hertford Graduate Housing Centre which is zillions of miles from my actual college, St. Catherine's. They put some of the visiting students here because they ran out of room over at Catz. I definitely enjoy having a room (and bathroom) of one's own, but I also feel like I miss out on a lot of stuff back at the college.


Welcome to my crib!


My desk and my pitiful wall. Send me stuff to put on it and maybe you'll get a...

POSTCARD!
My fave.

Beloved towel warmer.


And a real wardrobe! (sadly, sans lions, witches, or Mr. Tumnus too keep my company)


My favorite aspect of living here is that we're right by the River Isis, so I have a wonderful view outside my window:

Looking into the city.

Christ Church Meadows.

And the dock where the "asshole swans", as I call them, congregate at night and squawk, squeal, and do all sorts of unmentionables.


Anyway, my brain is too frazzled to actually write anything of interest. Thanks, Jess and Elizabeth for the mail!
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missing persons report


Promise I'm not dead - I'm just... resting?
BRB, mon amie.