Happy hump day, y’all! I am ever so slightly under the weather with a bit of a head cold, but otherwise life is just lovely. The sun came out again today and despite the fact that I can scarcely breathe, I decided it was midweek and FFAF needed some action. I’ve been living in this outfit, as it’s not too cold here lately, but it’s not warm by any means, either. This is a nice balance because it’s super comfortable, and a great excuse to rock some color, too. I’ll admit I’d hardly given Spring a second thought until yesterday and all the Groundhog Day activity! The internets, they do not let you forget. My head is far too stuffed to continue on in any meaningful way, so let’s make a list of shows I’m obsessed with at present:

1. LOST, because it’s bananas:

2. The Tudors really needs to hurry up and get back on the air already. Sex, violence, religion, politics, corsets. Need I say more?

3. The Pacific, which is a new miniseries coming to HBO this March, a sort of complement to Band Of Brothers, which I really, really loved and always watch whenever it’s on. I need to own it. Maybe they’ll create an amazing box set with both series after The Pacific premieres.

4. Big Love is the show I want to be addicted to, but I’m not quite there yet. It’s in the queue! M & I watched an episode or two awhile back and were pretty ambivalent about it, but have since been convinced by friends that we need to start from the beginning and give it some time. (This better not be like True Blood, y’all!)

5. Last but not least, Grey’s Anatomy. This one is all my BFF’s fault. I’ve mocked her incessantly for years about this show. I’ve spent countless Friday mornings rolling my eyes over coffee while she went on and on about Izzy this, McDreamy that and last season, we somehow got sucked in. Unbelievable. Now we have the video game. Yang, of course, is our favorite, and now I know exactly what the BFF means when she says, “You’re my person.”

Scent: Forgive me, I’ve been so negligent in the fragrance department! I won’t pretend I’ve been

too busy – I have been busy, but also just sort of moving from Winter to Spring wrapped in a cloud of contentment. To tell the truth I was once so opposed to

that word, equating it with

tedium, mediocrity and perhaps worst of all, a sort of falsehood. Perhaps I am lucky in that it now means something else entirely, something epitomizing pleasure, satiety and a dreamy and genuine peace of mind.

Which brings me to today’s new fragrance: Ligea La Sirena from the Italian island of Capri’s Carthusia. This is so well named, “bearing the name of one of the three Mermaids who tried in vain to bewitch Ulysses, Ligea is a feminine, sensual nectar, surprising and full of passion, which combines the warm powdery scent of wild white rose with the fresh, soft aroma of mandarins.” It’s just…enchanting, really lovely. The citrus isn’t at all overwhelming, perfectly balanced with sweetness and the right amount of opoponax, or sweet myrrh – something earthy and almost salty to anchor it all down. I love it. I find it comforting!

Let’s take a closer look at the Carthusia logo, shall we? (It’s not a stretch to say that if I were into whimsical and playful tattoos, I would absolutely get this. It’s cheeky and awesome!)

PS. I’ve missed you all!

PPS. Bullocks! I left out the earrings. Delightful little art deco studs from Silver Crane Sterling – I love their shiny little things.

When: Friday, Feb. 27th, 2009.

What: Ivory dress by M by Madonna for H&M, vintage fur coat. Bra and panty set by Elle Macpherson. (I am in love with her website. The photographs with all the goosebumps and dimples and realness of yes, very trim women, but still more real women than we are used to seeing in ads, especially in lingerie ads, delights me.) Watch, Guess. Earrings from Juniper Tree. Rings, vintage and Laundry by Shelli Segal.

Scent: The very elegant Tubéreuse Criminelle by Serge Lutens, with notes of tuberose, jasmine, orange blossom, hyacinth, nutmeg, clove, styrax, musk and vanilla, from the exclusive range. Let me say this first: When M & I were married at San Francisco City Hall, it was in a cloud of giddy-yet-somber love reverberating through the rotunda and gently raining down tuberose, from my bouquet. I can’t help but sink fondly into this fragrance, even it comes howling like the devil out of the decant. Within moments it stops shrieking like a newborn from the womb and just nestles in, and if angels existed the soft folding of their wings to kneel down and gaze into the eyes of some broken creature with love so abstractly vast it melted your brain to even contemplate it, well, the sound of them would smell like this.

People love or hate this. They are so put off by its vulgar beginnings that they abandon it, or some version of tuberose so watered down it scarcely resembles the real thing has blinded them to the beauty of Criminelle. Some people think it’s mysterious, they marvel at its depth, its can’t-put-my-finger-on-it-ness. Some think it packs sexual power.

I love Criminelle because it tells the truth. Perfect. In every way.

Confession: I promised assorted FFAF readers that I’d post a blog with this dress and the fur, albeit not necessarily together. With the recent days of still chilly air veiled with clear blue skies and the faint stirrings of Spring, I knew my days were numbered where the fur is concerned. (Not that we really ever have fur-worthy days out here, I know you East Coast kittens are rolling your eyes at me so hard they’re loud as eight balls cracking against corner pockets.) So I paired the two, experimented with some trickery in Picasa and Voila!