Last night CB and I went out for a few drinks in the south (close to my class). We had a good time, and more imporatantly I discovered pistachio flavored jenever. I love, LOVE, all things pistachio flavored and the jenever is no different. I’d try to go find a bottle to have at home but I have no doubt I’d crush it in one evening without even meaning to, it is that friggin good, so for now I’ll just have to dream and drool over the memory of the lovely, pistachio-y goodness.

Anyway, on the walk back to the centre to catch the bus home we walked down the shopping street and something caught me eye: musk eau de toillette! Ooh, my favorite! I’m a big fan of musky smells but I find they are much more difficult to find compared to florals and fruit smells. I had a perfume from Victoria’s Secret called Tender Musk which I adored but they discontinued it and I was never able to stock up on it. My tipsy eyes got caught on the word musk through the window display and I glanced up to see what store it was. The Body Shop! Oh boy! Something I recognized!

“Look hun, they have musk! Why haven’t I seen this store before?” I pointed, feet still planted firmly in front of the dark store front.

“I don’t know,” CB replied, jiggling the paper bag containing two sandwiches (on brown bread, it’s sort of healthy, ok? And we were walking a bit…and it had veggies on it) that we were planning to eat as soon as we got home.

“I’m coming back tomorrow, seriously, I quit smoking, I’m eating well…for the most part, if I need to shop every now and then that’s not horrible is it? Can I please just have one vice??”

“What’s ‘vice’?”

“It’s a bad habit sort of…like you and sugar. Let’s go home…but I really mean it, tomorrow I’m coming back here.”

I woke up on the early side this morning and added some bling and little linky buttons to the blog, looked at my e-mail and had some quiet morning time. A phone call from one of CB’s friends woke him up and he emerged blearily from the bedroom.

“I’m going shopping today,” I said brightly, when asked what I was planning on doing today.

“Oh, I didn’t think you’d remember that.”

“Hell yeah I do, and I’m going shopping!”

So I took the bus to the centre while CB and his dad worked some more on the heating system (I realize I must sound really lazy, not pitching in with the work all the time but first of all, I have helped with wome of the smaller tasks and also it’s me and two men with a plan they are continuously developing and speaking mostly in Dutch so I find it easier, safer, and most likely more convenient for them if I just make myself scarce while they do their thing)and headed off to The Body Shop. Granted I rarely shopped there in the States, preferring Bath and Body Works instead, but when I went inside The Body Shop I noticed two things. First, they don’t test on animals (niether does Bath and Body Works but hold on a second here) and second, they support free trade. This means that the Brazilian natives who are harvesting the nuts for the body cream I bought (which, by the way, is fantastic and smells very humpable) are paid a fair wage for their labor, rather than being exploited by a sweat shop and/or screwed over by a middle man. Not only that, but I found a lot of stuff I like there. The only thing I didn’t see that I like to get from Bath and Body Works is anti-bacterial gel and hand lotion. There was plenty of soap, but maybe I just overlooked the other stuff. Just means I have to go back and look another time. Muahahaha.

Afterwards I looked for vacuum bags for CB and grabbed a few small groceries at the Contact GB in town before going to Exki, a newer, organic to-go style restaurant in the Korenmarkt. I got a sandwich (mozzerella, tomato, basil, tapenade, light vinaigrette-yum) and a bottle of botanic water from Carpe Diem. Check out the website folks, really, I got home and clicked around on it for almost a half hour, plus I feel much more zen oriented now. I took my lunch down next to the canal and ate in the sun before jotting some things down for a writing contest I want to enter.

So it was a fun day shopping and smelling new smells and tasting good tastes and feeling some sun and some fresh air on my face. Tonight CB and I will go to his friends’ house to feed the cats and probably spend the night in. All in all a very nice Saturday.

Oh, and VERY IMPORTANT thing here: The blogger site no longer redirects you to this site. We’re having a lot of issues with the search function on this blog malfunctioning as well as any links in this blog that refer to my blogger pages misguiding and being linked wrong so we got rid of the redirection. I’ll end up having to go through every single entry and relinking any links that lead back to my other posts. The important thing for you guys is to know that you have to make sure you’ve updated to my current location at www.lilacspecs.com.