Today you can call me Zelda, because I'm bringing all the Link-age.

Hello dear reader!

Today I'm going to offer you all this list of links of fun and interesting things, perfumey and non, that I have come across on the tubes during my long dark winter of plaguery. I recommend all the items on this list if you've got an hour to kill and want to do a little web exploring with me. This list is lovingly brought to you by me and my beloved elder cat, Terric.

~ First, let's talk about the perfume linkage:

While I was trying to defeat the plague, it appears everyone has released their winter 2013 lists, because there are a group of bloggers one could consider the Five Families of Perfume Blogging, and in case you haven't noticed, they tend to simulcast these things. Instead of rushing to give you mine, I'll give you a list of links to everyone else's and a few words of my own about each. Really nothing like critiquing the critique, is there? Yeah, I'm being lazy. Sorry.

• Angela of Now Smell This! gives us her list of Top 10 Scents for Winter.  I love this list, and would echo two of her choices: Annick Goutal Duel and Aftelier Wild Roses. If you've never read Angela's writing, she's terrific, and her regular posting day is Monday.  

• Grain de Musc also released its Winter Top 10. I can't really comment on this list because I haven't tried any of these scents, but the By Kilian's In the Garden of Good and Evil and Arabian Nights scents are already in my LuckyScent basket, so hopefully I'll get to those soon.

• Here you will find Perfume Posse's Top 10 Winter Scent List written complied from six of PP's fabulous bloggers. Of this list I'd endorse Bvlgari BLV Pour Homme, CB I Hate Perfume Winter 1972, and Le Labo Vanille 44. I still need to try Prada Candy.

• Bois de Jasmin's Favorite Fragrances for Winter Days includes a few personal favorites: Donna Karan Black Cashmere, DSH Perfumes Winter White (Holiday No. 4), and biehl parfumkunstwerke eo01.

• And last but never least, there is a winter scents offering from Tom of Perfume-Smellin' Things. Since Tom is located in So Cal, he admits there hasn't been a lot of call for wintery scents, but the comments mentioned Bal a Versailles, which I think is nice for February for all sorts of reasons (smexy!), and I have to give a winter shout out to this sexy scent, as well as Guerlain Shalimar, which I love in cool weather.

So there you have it. A list of wintery scents I like that are also endorsed by the Dons of perfume blogging. Can't beat that now, can you?

~ And while I'm on excellent perfume pieces, allow me to also recommend the following:

• In a Non-Top 10 Winter Scent list offering, this "Perfume Primer" piece of the "Much Maligned Fruity Floral"  from Perfume Shrine is great.   I myself have written two third of my own version championing those fruity florals I enjoy...and then left to malinger in the dusty corners of my hard drive.  Until I can get my act together, this is a good read. It also includes a lot of history of the development of the fruity floral that I was not previously fully aware of, so give it a gander.

• From Perfume Posse, there's a nice piece about the best perfumes not enough people know about.  I myself haven't found the hidden greatness of Puredistance, but I agree with a few of the others on this list.  In fact, maybe I'll make one of my own...

• Perfume-in-Progress has a brief but interesting piece on the artisanal business model of perfumery, with a link to an interview with Mandy Aftel wherein she reflects on her life as a independent business owner/perfumer.

• Also, I meant to share this super hilarious piece from Parfümieren months ago about the twelve step affirmation of perfume addiction. It is a truly great, and I am sorry I sat on it so long. (Ed. note: Sadly, this blog has gone private recently due to online harassment, so I've removed the link. It is too bad; it is a great site.)

And then there's the perfume SHOPPING! I offer the following:

• The lovely and talented Amanda at Essentual Alchemy wrote in with the following note:

As some of you know, Kevin had a difficult battle with cancer. About a week ago, Kevin caught one of the strains of flu that was going around, in spite of his flu shot. Who knew! While he's recovering I need to put my business into high gear, and generate fast income. 
So I'm here to offer a BOO FLU event - BOO FLU equals more good smells for you! For one week, starting Tuesday, Feb. 5 through Feb. 12. 

Here's a couple of options to play with me:   

~ Buy 4 EdP sprays, get 1 free!

~ I'll have a special coupon – Please use code: BOOFLU at checkout to receive 25% off your total.  

Need Valentine's Day gifts? I love putting together custom perfume packages for people. 

As a victim of this year's dreaded flu season, I feel Amanda's pain.  Also, cancer seems to be touching a lot of people in my life right now, so I have a special place in my heart for Amanda, Kevin, and Kevin's post-cancer health struggles. Hitting the BOO FLU event isn't just shopping; it's a mitzvah, and you get nice perfume as a bonus.

I have reviewed a number of Essentual Alchemy scents, so don't forget to check the review list.  

• Also, from the lovely Dawn Spencer Hurwitz at DSH Perfumes:

Love is in the air at DSH! It's our Valentine's Day Sale.

In the midst of the winter chill, we're staying cozy and warm with the delicious kisses of our favorite softly spicy and gourmand scents-- so perfect to celebrate Valentine's Day. St. Valentine, Piment et Chocolat, Vanille Botanique and our fab Les Rouges Collection Box top our fave picks and to make things even sweeter we're giving 15% off site wide through 2.18.13.

Just use coupon code: sweetheart13 for you or your sweetheart this Valentine's Day & share the love! 

I have reviewed a number of DSH Perfumes scents, so again don't forget to check the review list for suggestions. I'm doing a Valentine's recommendations post soonish as well, so keep an eye out for that.

In non-perfume related items, I found these interesting:

~ The Terror Of "Twin Peaks": His Name Is BOB presents a terrific piece on the mystery and terror that is Twin Peaks's accidental boogeyman. Massive spoiler for the initiated.  Massive.  Seriously.  This will ruin the series for you if you haven't seen it all the way through to the bitter end.  If you have, though, read away! Thanks to my friend and reader Anna F. for the link!

~ Dedicated Hunger Games fans found the Quarter Quell’s  arena shooting location on Google Earth. How freaking dedicated do you have to be to search the globe for that kind of image!?! So awesome. My hats off to those District 12 sponsors. I should be so lucky to have such fans some day.

~ A group of friends has spent the past 23 years playing an elaborate game of 'tag.' My favorite part is that the lawyer of the group drafted the "Tag Participation Agreement" and they all signed. Now that's some lawyering I can get behind.

~ This list of bizarre twists on classic fairy tales is at least partly familiar to me (Cinder is on my 'too read' list and El Hubs has collected Fables since it began – we both love it) but there are several I wasn't familiar with. I'm most intrigued by the western Snow White for I love the western motif, and I am definitely going to find a copy of Anne Sexton's Transformations. Poetry + reinterpreted fairy tales? I'm already in love.

~ The lovely Smith sisters, both Audrey and Ashley, sent me this great photo essay showing Former Secretary Hillary Clinton in every country she's visited as Secretary of State. Apparently she set a new record for foreign visits. Are you ready for the count? 112! Incredible. And all over the world, we had this smart, thoughtful, passionate, shrewd woman representing our country. I'm deeply proud she was our SoS.

~ If you like dystopian, paranormal & supernatural YA reads and you aren't already stalking HarperTeen's Pitch Dark Days site and following their twitter, you should be. My favs in this group are: Boundless, the conclusion of Cynthia Hand's Unearthly trilogy; Everbound. the sequel to Brodi Ashton's terrific Everneath; and Requiem the conclusion to Lauren Oliver's dystopian world where love is a disease. But I have to say, I find routinely new authors to love among the Pitch Dark Days collection, so get if you like your YA dark, then get thee to the website and start browsing!

~ Just in time for Valentine's Day, Crave Online brings readers this piece on six loving couples Marvel recently destroyed. I really enjoyed it, both for the couple histories, and for the critique of how hard it is to have a relationship as a hero, particularly if Jason Aaron has anything to do say about it. Reading all the way to the end certainly made me appreciate how easy David and I have it with our random arguments over whose turn it is to do some neglected chore. Also, it underscore that a love that last fifty years or more is bound to encounter big challenges, so be generous with one another and appreciate the time you have.  A good message as we approach the Cupid season, or any time of year, really.

~ Thanks to our lovely friend and reader, Jillian, for the link to this unique fashion tumblr, which provides outfits based on characters from literature. It is a great tumblr! I don't care what you're a fan of – they've got it. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Classic Greeks like Antigone 
• Modern YA favorites like Karou from Laini Taylor's Daughter of Smoke and Bone and District 12's gritty heroine, Katniss Everdeen 
• Harry Potter characters good/bad/ugly, like the loathsome Rita Skeeter 
• Classic literary figures like Street Car Named Desire's Blanche Dubois 
• Long time youthful favorites like Sweet Valley High's famous twinsome, Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield 
• And last, but never least, in honor of my deep and unabiding love for The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, the wonderful author Jane Austen. (Yes, they have all our Pride and Prejudice favs as well!)

The full character/outfit list is here.

Okay. That's it for me today. Hope this gives you lots to click through, keeping you busy and entertained until I return. Work is busy but good, in a trying-to-keep-my-head-above-water sort of way.

Until then, dear reader, don't forget to read deeply and smell pretty!

BREAKING NEWS! Emergency Posting in Response to Developments in The Lizzie Bennet Dairies

{SPOILER WARNING! If you are just starting/have not yet started The Lizzie Bennet Diaries follow NO LINKS.  NONE OF THEM.  Start at the beginning, right here. For the rest of you, read on.}

Dear Reader:

I must interrupt this week's run of plague-related musings to bring THIS EMERGENCY UPDATE wherein I share, in GIF form, my reactions to yesterday and today's developments in The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, generally relating to the rogue known as George Wickham and his dealings with the totes adorbes Lydia Bennet, aka THE LY DEEE YAAAH!

Here, in graphic form, are my various stages of coping with the wickedness of Wickham following yesterday's reveal:

THIS CANNOT BE HAPPENING!

SERIOUSLY? IS THIS REALLY HAPPENING?

And then while externally I am doing this...

...so my housemates don't realize I am genuinely unhinged

 over the twists in a story I already know the cannonical ending of, inside? 

I feel like this...

...which quickly becomes this...

...and also this....

So then I turn to my other LBD fans for comfort.

And they help me...or at least, they try.  

But really? We're all SIMULTANEOUSLY 

FREAKING THE F*** OUT...

...so it ends up being more like this.

At times like this, there's only one thing left to do:

And when it comes to saving Lydia, we all know who we need:

Though is this particular case it's more like...

And when I remember to have faith in Darcy, I feel like this.

And there you have it!  All the stages of my Lydia/Wickham-related freak out.

But remember ladies, here in the really real world, don't be too swept up in your Darcy-worshipping. Instead, keep these fine words from The Doubleclicks (aka my college friend Angela and her talented sister Aubrey) in mind when deciding whether the boys of your current daydreams has the good Darcy qualities or the....less ideal ones:

(Ed. note: Apparently when I am emotionally unhinged, I cannot spell the word 'diaries.' Fixed now.)

Notes from the Plague Den - The Beginning of Exile.

A week of reviews: perfumes, bath salts, body oils, books, digital content, and more!

Hello dear reader:

Are you tired? I am. I am emotionally, mentally, and physically exhausted. Switching entire career fields is demanding! And bonus: I have managed to come down with the actual, honest-to-god, knock-you-on-your-derrière flu. I've been in bed for over two weeks, which has made it difficult to smell…well, anything really. And yet, I have smelled terrific the whole time, which has been a joyful note in the cacophony of task-shifting and illness-ridden noise in my life.

It's funny how much my mood can be affected by the presence or absence of scent. Six or seven years ago, I'd never have thought of it as important. Now, it can turn a whole day around. Scent is no longer incidental to my life. It is a kind of presence that weighs on me in its absence. I love; you don't know how much you are missing, then once you have it, missing it is so much more than never knowing.

Want to know what I've had to sustain me for lo these many sleep-filled days and nights? Well, first of all, my only real company has been this tiny Eeyore. If you are estimating his height at no more than three inches, you have the size correct. Thank goodness David insisted I pack it. I resisted, but being sick and three thousand miles away from my kittens? A little snugglie, it turns out, goes a long way.

As you might expect, I also have this bevy of cold and flu crap: orange juice, daytime and nighttime cold and flu tablets, Emergen-C, various soups from every local Chinese delivery place in the area, whathaveyou. Two things I want to point out, though, that have been extremely helpful. Neutrogena Norwegian formula hand cream, and Rosebud Perfume Co. distributed Smith's Minted Rose Lip Balm.

The Neutrogena Norwegian formula hand cream, which was provided by my hotel, has kept my hands, my cuticles, and my elbows moisturized despite my frequent crazy hot showers, my cranking the heat in my hotel room, and spending hours buried under blankets and pillows. I'm impressed that this relatively cheap moisturizer has done such a handy job. I'm sure there are better products out there, but for the price point? Terrific. I'll never leave home without some again.

Smith's Minted Rose Lip Balm I would have sworn by prior to this incident. However, having suffered through dry, high winds and incredibly low temperatures followed by a terrible flu, the fact that my lips are still intact -- no flaking, no drying, no cracks or bleeding -- has made an unwavering devotee of this $7 gloss available at Sephora or through Beautyhabit, which is where I first found it. It is a little flavorlessly waxy and a smidge on the sticky side, but I will trade those minor shortcomings for a gloss that gives healthy lips even in the harshest of conditions any day.

I rarely stray from perfume into recommendations on other beauty products because, honestly, I feel completely out of my depth endorsing one over another. I don't hoard, errr, I mean collect them the way I do perfume. But when I run across a low priced, knock out product that I feel truly good about? I see no reason to keep such info to myself. So expect me to continue to drop a little bit of cheapskate-oriented beauty product knowledge on you going forward. I splurge heavily on perfume, but I tend to be pretty chincy on everything else, so if you're cash strapped, I'm happy to provide you a few tried and true items that would make great stocking stuffers or 'bad day' retail therapy-related purchases.

As always, know that this is based solely on my own product experience, and comes with all your latin-based buyer beware caveats. Deal? Deal. Moving on.

Since my world has consisted of nothing but delivery food and bad cable TV for the last week, let me tell you what I've been watching online. The internet at the hotel was too slow for Hulu or Netflix, but it was good enough to run one of my new obsessions: The Lizzie Bennet Diaries. A friend pointed me toward this awesome online adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. The story, told as a series of online interactions between modern versions of the main characters through tweets, tumblrs, jams, and vlogs, it is a surprisingly compelling remaking of the classic tale. I like the real time aspect. I appreciate the emphasis on the ways the themes are just as engaging today was they were when the book was written. And most of all, I love the hilarious modern twists -- Darcy as a hipster? Hilarious!

The best way to catch up is to follow the story link, so you don't miss a single nudge,wink, or Q&A. It takes…okay it took me hours to catch up, but it was worth it, and it didn't cost me a penny! Now that's entertainment. I could wax poetic for hours about this, particularly given that we just celebrated the 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice.  Instead, I am going to point you toward my delightful friend Thu, who not only introduced me to The LBD, but did her master's thesis on Pride and Prejudice, and wrote this awesome piece in celebration of the pub-a-versary.

As for scents, I had the opportunity to try a few different items, including some bath salts, a terrific scented body oil, and a couple of perfumes. But….

…right now I need to sleep.

So come back tomorrow and I will talk to you about adventures in scent, as well as a couple of YA books that helped me get through the week of plague.

I disappear in your name, but you must wait for me.

A little fiction, a birthday reflection, a giveaway, & a review of EnVoyage Perfumes Go Ask Alice

First: The Fiction

"It's tough being an Alice.

Being an Alice is about being something more. People think there's no magic in the naming of things, but those people are wrong. Plainly, dumbly wrong. Alice is more than a name. Being an Alice means something.

Some people call it a curse. Some people call it 'a touch of destiny.' Some think the name chooses you, because the universe can see the spark inside you. Some think it's the name that brings you to it, challenges you to greatness.

Me? I think asking that question is like asking what came first: the chicken or the egg? The darkness or the light? The music or the misery? 


There's no point in it. Am I an Alice because I rose to the occasion of the name, or was I christened Alice because, from the moment eyes fell on me, there was no denying that's what I was?

It doesn't matter. Either way, I am one of them. Another girl in the world, one of the strange motley army of Alices, each of us a destiny, a point of fiery potential energy burning against the bleak emptiness of time and space.

No, for me it's not so much a question being an Alice as much as it is, what kind? 


Even the plainest Alice isn't normal. She isn't average. She can't hide in the shadows or fly under the radar.  She's no wallflower or shrinking violet.  It's all there in the name. I say, you hear: Alice. Then world thinks what it wants of me: saint, sinner, madonna, whore. 


I'll never be just me. I'll always be an Alice, some extreme version of the self. The human imagination is obsessed with us, archetypically speaking. Drink me to be tall. Eat me to be small. Either way, I fall out of proportion, my dimensions at odds with the world around me.

Will I be a naive and inquisitive Alice, chasing rabbits? Will I singing songs with the mothering, mean, menacing flowers and be surprised by my own revolutionary acts? Will the powers of the world call for my seemingly none-too-bright head?

Alternately, there's psycho Alice, a more recently embraced archetype. Will I be blood-thirsty and wield kitchen cutlery like accessories, their blades agleam with the reflection of my wild eyes? Will I try be strong and fight against those that would abuse or harm me and, in turn, be thought of as callous, murderous, a fiend?

And still, there are more choices: 

•  Alice, the innocent, respectable and strangely silent in her woodcuts? She faces the unknown with her hands clasped demurely behind her back, as though she cannot forego the social grace demanded of her station enough to prepare for what might come next? 

• Alice, the increasingly lost sensualist, a strange girl led down a bad road by a confusing drug trip, an escapist lost too soon who is only trying to feed her own head? 

• Alice, the Lolita, too big for her tiny girl clothes and the object of inappropriately-aged lust and affection? The kind that inspires her own mythology more because of the perceived effect she has on a man than who she is as a person?

• Alice, the warrior, her hardness offset by the creature she holds, implying both protection and threat? Is she here to help the rabbit, or help herself to rabbit stew?

When you're an Alice, the world will tell you which roles you get to play. It doesn't matter that the only Alice you want to be is you. The name says everything. 

 So you tell me: who do I get to be today? You kidnapped me, stuck a bag over my head, dragged me here. Now you claim its just for an introduction, but you knew who I was when you came for me. You already knew everything there was to know.

After all,  you knew my name."




~ ~ ~

The Review: EnVoyage Perfumes Go Ask Alice EDP

First, to the perfume. Then to the ranting:

Go Ask Alice is a wonderful scent, particularly for the Spring days growing warmer here. If you like patchouli, I cannot imagine you won't like this scent. If you think you don't like patchouli (I didn't when I first got into perfume), I challenge you to try this one. I'm still a little on the shy side when it comes to the mean green patch, and consequently I sometimes weed out scents that list it as a strong note.  Go Ask Alice is a unusual take on patchouli and one that challenges (me, at least) to reconsider where a focus on patchouli might lead to scent love.  Go Ask Alice was also the first-place winner of the prestigious Martha’s Vineyard Islander’s Choice Award, so you can feel confident it's not just my nose that loves it!

Shelley Waddington, perfumer extraordinaire, describes Go Ask Alice as a "unisex oriental-amber."  Go Ask Alice "con-temporizes the theme of the 1967 Summer of Love, a time when young Americans protested the Vietnam War, sold flowers, smoked pot, and trailed clouds of patchouli, and raises it to the level of a classy, wearable, and versatile perfume.” 

It has top notes of California orange peel, bitter orange Caribe, bergamot from Calabria, Sri Lankan black pepper, and orange flower laced with fresh raspberry and strawberry; heart notes of patchouli leaf tincture, mimosa blossoms, and rose absolue; and base notes of vintage patchouli Sumatra, sandalwood deux, cocoa, vanille, tonka, labdanum Spain, balsam Peru France, and beach-washed ambergris.

What I like most about Go Ask Alice is that, thanks to the patchouli-centered event it was developed for, it isn't an overly sweet or spicy "oriental-amber." It smells of amber, sure, but it also manages to be fresh and green, mildly herbal, pretty and softly sweet. Though it is a unisex and could be worn well by anyone, I find it deeply feminine. Donna at Perfume-Smellin' Things called it "silky smooth" and I agree with that assessment. Moderate sillage, so it was work safe for me and go lasting strength (~6 hours.) You can get .5oz of the EDP for $45.00 or .25oz of the parfum for $65.00 direct from the perfumer.

The mood of the scent is intended to be one of "joyous adventure," and I can certainly say that Go Ask Alice makes me feel pretty damned happy when I smell it. And that's good, because it's been a tough, sad few weeks here at Camp Wienergard. FN1. Which brings me to Part 3 of this post....

~ ~ ~

The Ranting

Sometimes life has a way of kicking you in the teeth when you least expect it. Some days are great. The sun shines, the birds caw, you sit in the warmth, feel the soft grass and warm sand under your bare feet and you think, "Things are going to be okay."

Other days are not like that. Other days you recognize, with a chilling clarity, that there is a good chance this is all there may ever be, just varying degrees of this, sun up to sun down, until there isn't another day.

If you're lucky, that is. If you're not, then someone may slut shame you in the national press for talking about birth control as hormone therapy. Because in case you've been living under a rock in the last two weeks, then the word you are most likely to associate with Georgetown Law student Sandra Fluke is "slut." Rush Limbaugh led the charge against Ms. Fluke, calling her a slut and a prostitute as he stated plainly that she merely wanted "you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex." Then he suggested Ms. Fluke could repay the debt by posting pornographic videos online.

Despite this intense harassment and shaming, Ms. Fluke says she'd do it again. She'd stand alone, the only woman allowed to testify before Congress on the issue of whether religious charities and schools should be required to provide insurance coverage for birth control pills along side things like Viagra, if only so a woman's voice could be heard in the tizzying din that is the discussion of our bodies.

“It can be overwhelming at times,” Ms. Fluke told TIME from Los Angeles, “but what I am trying to focus on is my main goal in the situation, and that is continuing to advocate on behalf of women affected by the contraception regulation and making sure that policy is implemented in a strong way.”

Sandra Fluke makes me feel proud to be a feminist, an activist, and a fellow law school survivor.  I fronted a statewide choice campaign while I was a 1L to beat back a parental notification bill here in Oregon (we won), and the reactions I received to my own abortion story being (literally) front page news pales wildly in comparison to the horrible crap being slung at Ms. Fluke.  She has my deepest respect and admiration.  She is, in my view, a kind of superhero.

How does this relate to Shelley's amazing perfume or the fictional monologue I started with?

I've been trying Go Ask Alice scent over and over in the last few weeks, and it is impossible to try the scent without thinking about the pop culture calls to its name.  There's the Jefferson Airplane song, "White Rabbit."  There's also the popular work of fiction (though initially presented as a real diary) Go Ask Alice.  Both are inspired by Lewis Caroll's Alice in Wonderland, which has inspired other songs as well as film adaptations and video games.


As I was trying the scent, I kept trying to decide which of many representations of Alice it most reminded me. While I was wandering around, ruminating on the various and sundry Alices, people vying to be the leaders of my country were seriously debating whether or not women's contraception should be legal.  And, because I'm me, this all became intensely intertwined in my feminist brain.

When I think about the Alices, it is hard not to draw parallels between their fictional variations and the archetypes the world is most comfortable with for women.  The most recent Alice in Wonderland remake by Tim Burton tries very hard to create an Alice whom, by her nature, means to confound expectations.  She is wildly different from the original Alice of celluloid, whom Disney made a revolutionary by virtue of accident, not intent.  My personal favorite is American McGee's Alice from the incredibly dark video game, a girl so twisted by the dark things that have happened in her life she makes it all the way through a return to Wonderland only to find the evil she seeks to destroy is the darkness in herself.

Awesome and brave
reproductive rights protester
at the Virginia State capitol.

But despite all these Alices to choose from, I never really found one I could relate to the scent.  When I asked myself why, I realized it was because I loved Go Ask Alice enough that I wanted to wear it myself. And I am not a two-dimensional character. I am a real woman, flesh and blood. I'm not a protagonist.  I'm no heroine. I didn't want to associate the scent with one of the Fabled Alices because I feel the scent is some  wearable part of me, and that isn't a cultural archetype.  It's a real person.

And as a real person, lately I've just been overwhelmingly preoccupied by how you have to pretty much be a G-D superhero to be a woman in the world at all, even if you don't feel like one.  Just to take it - the threats, the smears, the snears, the violence that is both dangerously outright and insidiously implicit - and still feel any sense of self-worth or pride? It is a miracle.  Every day.

To be slut shamed for talking about reproductive rights and insurance coverage for BCP as though it is an important part of healthcare for over fifty-one percent of the world's population, and probably ought to be covered accordingly. To accept that your elected officials want doctors to be able to lie to you about birth defects in the fetus growing inside you.  That if you get pregnant when someone rapes you, you should just "make the best of a bad situation," and no, that doesn't mean terminating the pregnancy.

As Libba Bray succinctly put it today: "Seriously, ladies, we better get our shit together and mobilize. The war on women is not just a catch phrase." Or to quote the lovely and talented Beth Revis: "I am continuously boggled by how what I often perceive to be equal rights is labeled as radical feminism."

A War on Women is happening right now, and all I could think about was how we, like the Alices, are an army.  We won't be stopped.  We won't be silenced.  And we are going to take and maintain control of our bodies, ourselves, whether you like it or not.

The Drawing

So who wants to try some Go Ask Alice? In honor of my birthday, which is today, I'm giving a sample away because I had two and I'm ordering some, as well as a few other samples.  Winners will also receive: a couple of mixed CDs of music that helps me feel strong, an issue of Bitch Magazine, of which I am a proud member of the Board of Directors, maybe a feminist button, general feminist-y whatnot.


To enter:  post here by 12:01 AM PST, Friday March 16, 2012. Say anything you like.  Open to everyone, both domestic and international.

________________
FN1. When my husband and I were planning to get married, Wienergard was the joint name highly recommended joint last name meld suggestion from my students at my old job. They even threatened to crash my reception wearing t-shirts that said, "Reconsider Wienergard." These would have been the follow-up to the first round of shirts that said, "I Heart My Wiener" with a photo of me on them. I still have one.

I wanna do bad things to you...

Waaaay back 2002, I read the first of the Sookie Stackhouse novels Dead Until Dark. You may know them as the “True Blood” series, but back then they were known as the “Sookie Stackhouse books” or the “Southern Vampire mysteries.” I think there were two of them. I remember thinking the book was passable. I never bothered with the second one.

I finally broke down and watched the True Blood recently and the HBO series was surprisingly good – much better than I remembered the books being. To my recollection, the books were – in terms of writing – not even as good a quality as the Twilight series and that is saying something. (However, True Blood, the tv series, is miles better than the Twilight films thus far. Trust me.)

Given how good the show was I decided to try the books again. I even gave myself a pass on the first book, and started with Living Dead in Dallas. The writing seemed as bad as I remembered, slightly below Twilight quality, only these books aren’t aimed at preteens. By the end of book three, Club Dead which I kept reading because (a) I’m an intellectual masochist and (b) they read fast and I was curious – see (a), the writing has risen to on par with the Twilight books. That said, I actually have bigger problems with the gender dynamic that goes on in the Stackhouse series, and I’d like to talk a bit about that since it is one area that does not all seem to improve over the books.

Firstly, I would like, just once, to see one of the female “sups,” or “supernaturals,” other than Sookie do something ‘heroic.’ I use air quotes there because a lot of the actions and decisions made by any of the characters in the book aren’t heroic at all, but at least they are intended to be in a sort of traditional, hegemonic masculine way – facing down danger, taking a bullet for someone, compound raids and daring rescues, etc. It seems to me that part of the reason that all the supernatural men in Sookie’s world seem to want her (unless the writer expressly connotes a preference for men – even if the character in question is supposed to be bisexual), is because, despite being the most breakable thing around, she tends to shove herself into harm’s way. While Charlaine Harris, the author, tries to pass this off as Sookie’s determination to be her own woman and take care of herself in order to maintain independence in an increasingly dangerous world, writing things like “After a second I realized my help would not be needed, and I decided the Goddess of Really Tough Gals would have to excuse me while I closed my eyes,” undercuts actual any actual strength Sookie displays by making it seem like a kind of show. Sookie wants to be seen as tough, but when she gets an escort to do some digging around in book three, the following lines define the new relationship:

“This was the way life was supposed to be, for normal people. It was morning, time to get up and work, time for a woman to cook breakfast for a man, if he had to go out and earn. This big rough man was eating real food. He almost certainly had a pickup truck sitting out in front of my house.”

“Alcide Herveaux looked plenty rough. He was as big as a boulder, with biceps that I could do push-ups on. He would have to shave a second time if he planned on going out in the evening. He would fit right in on a construction site or a wharf.

He was a proper man.”

Seriously. That’s the line. Sitting right there in its own paragraph. Just like that. “He was a proper man.” Damn, do I feel sorry for anyone who doesn’t drive an F-150 or have huge biceps. I guess any real expression of masculinity is foreclosed to them. It’s this type of stereotypical role writing that makes me crazy when it comes to these books. Even if I could ignore the weird repetitive exposition pieces – not from book to book like you get with a good series, like the Harry Potter books or the Anne Rice vampire novels, so that someone can pick up any book in the series and still get the gist of the world mechanics – but from very short chapter to chapter, as though there is legitimate concern that someone might pick up the book and start reading right smack dab from the middle, I cannot get around the weird traditional gender descriptions/dynamics. While, on the next page after the “proper man” line, Sookie is bitching about the “paternalism” of the men in her life, but she seems pissed if there isn’t some paternalism going on. If a chair isn’t pulled out, she notes a lack of “manners,” but doesn’t seem to link this with someone throwing themselves in front of her in the next fight scene.

At the same time, Sookie seems to dither when it comes to whether she wants to get into a “top/bottom” relationship with any of the men around her. (The tv show demonstrates way more sexual agency on Sookie’s part in terms of defining sexual relationships than the books do, and thank god for that or the show would be unwatchable.) I’ve read through over five hundred pages of Sookie, and not once has she made a legitimate first move on anyone. Sex just seems to “happen” to Sookie, even when her inner dialogue sees it coming for a Kentucky mile. When these interchanges happen, she rarely asserts her displeasure, and when she does, it is in a weak way that props up the myth that “no means yes” when she gets carnal with someone for five-thirty minutes before she exhales the equivalent “No, we mustn’t!” Sookie never negotiates her role in these exchanges. Personally I am all for relationships with established sex roles related to top/bottom, possession/ownership, etc. but Sookie repeatedly portrays herself as someone who has no say in the matter and is frustrated by it, all the while playing along. I want to scream at Harris – for the love of goodness, give us a freaking safe word!

While the Twilight gender dynamics may be just as static and traditional and possessory, Bella actually talks to Edward about her needs/wants/desires. Bella very clear talks about when she wants sex, how she wants sex, what she’s comfortable with and how she thinks things should occur. Critiques of the book feel that Bella is painted as weak and sex seeking while Edward is strong, noble, and virtuous (by, of course, denying his basic animal needs – wretch), but to them I say, what the hell is wrong with saying you want it? I may not love that Bella goes ahead and marries Edward to get sex, but at least there was a discussion, clearly defined terms, and a feeling that there was equal participation in sex decision making. In the books, Sookie has someone inside her before she considered whether or not she wants them there.

All of this said, I will probably keep reading the books. If nothing else, there are enough books I can definitely get a conference presentation out of the materials. Most of the critique I’m seeing aimed heavily at Twilight, but within the genre of the vamp novels/films/tv, of which I am an admitted lifetime addict, I really don’t find Twilight as terrible as the critique its taking. To me it just feels young. I remember feeling like Bella when I was fourteen, fifteen, sixteen years old. I remember feeling like the first boy I loved was the only one I ever would, and that living with my heart, once broken, was like trying to breathe without oxygen. I read the books and think, “I would have identified/do identify with this,” even if I do so now with a rueful head shake. I sometimes wonder if that is what scares the crap out of readers. We may not like fifteen year old girls identifying with Bella, and we may wish for a world that acculturates young women differently, but I have to say that Bella demonstrates more sexual agency than I did or most of my friends did until well into our twenties. My disappointments with the books, which are several and varied, don’t have a lot to do with Bella’s sexual relationships. Neither Bella nor Sookie are Nancy Collin’s Sonja Blue, and just once I’d like to see a vamp story with positive role models for top/bottom relationships between two women, but I’ll take Bella over Sookie any day.

What does all this have to do with perfume? Well, honestly, not a lot, but I never promised to talk exclusively about perfume here. Harris does talk about perfume some in the books, and Meyer talks about scent extensively, so maybe I’ll do a sister post that.

Also, in honor Sookie and her poor Southern roots (which I share), I will be starting a week of classic drug store scent reviews a week from tomorrow (8/3). Be on the look out for that. I’ll probably post again often before then, but I wanted to tee that up while I had a chance.