On the plus side, yoga classes have started again (ohmmmmmm...). As my classmates get progressively younger with each semester, and Tom gets more insane with the routines, my hips and my back and my knees hurt more and more. The great thing about yoga is you don’t feel the pain while you are doing the routine. In fact, you are really in synch with your body during the session. Try getting out of bed two days later, and you’ll hear everything creak. I was able to do a headstand after being bullied constantly by a good friend, but only for a couple of seconds. I NEED TO DO A HEADSTAND AWAY FROM THE WALL!
A couple of highlights from the past week. A few days ago, I posted my review on my new HG fragrance Tabac Blond, and I just wanted to share my experience at the Caron boutique. One can obtain les Carons at other upscale department stores, but there is only ONE Caron Boutique in the US. Many fragrance lovers make pilgrimages to NYC, hoping to be sanctified by a whiff of Parfum Sacre (okay, I suck at purple prose). I’ve never been to the new location, but I was able to visit the old boutique once, and though I didn’t buy a fragrance then, I was overwhelmed by the sight of the Baccarat urns used to store the extraits.
So when roomie and I arrived at the address, my heart sank at the smallness of the space, and the non-existence of the urns. I stammered to the man who was at the reception, stammering incoherently about the urns. He smiled kindly and pressed a button to open the elevator, and said that he would tell the ladies upstairs to expect us. When the doors opened, I thought I saw heaven, and it looked a little something like this...
Then finally, the moment of truth. I already knew what I was going to get, and I told the lovely lady who was helping us that I needed the Tabac Blond extrait. I watched attentively as she decanted the golden liquid from the urn into the cut crystal bottle. She then pressed the label unto the bottle, and nestled it into its own lovely box, before presenting it to me. It was mine, all mine!
The second highlight of my week was more stressful, although it gave me as much pleasure as my new fragrance. Sunday night, I received an email from the Metropolitan Opera, reminding me of the open house on Thursday. Open house is such an unassuming term. What the Met means when it says open house is a free performance of the opera that will be shown during the gala opening (Lucia di Lammermoor). It is technically the final dress rehearsal, but what I found out from last year was that the press is also invited, and I got a lot of insight from the critics who were seated RIGHT BEHIND ME. There is a light lunch served in the lobbies, where opera lovers could compare notes during the intermission. In the afternoon, the audience gets to meet the artists and the production crew as they talk about the preparations for the opera. Last year, Anthony Minghella, who directed Madama Butterfly (and more famously, The English Patient and Cold Mountain).
Instead of lining up at the crack of dawn, the Met distributed the free tickets online and over the phone. After numbing my fingertips at keyboard and keypad, I finally got into the Met hotline. Then was put on hold for 30 minutes. I begun humming voi che sapete over and over. Finally, the voice of an angel came to my rescue, telling me that the ticket has been reserved, but that I had to get my ass to Lincoln Center right away in order to pick up good seats. Damn. Should have come to the Met, then dialed the trunkline while I was there. Still I got good orchestra tickets, although not as good as last years. Did I mention that as soon as I put down the phone, I ran to the RamVan, missed it, waited for the next one, got on it, arrived at the Lincoln Center campus in 30 minutes, fell in line at the Met for 15 minutes, picked up my ticket, ran back to the RamVan in time for the next trip. If you read that last sentence out loud without breathing, that’s how I felt when I got back to the Bronx. Did I mention I had yoga after that, too?
How has your week been?
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