Naughty week.

It is an universally known truth that once in a while all that may go wrong will do. 

Now, before you all get worried about it and start kindly asking me if I am OK and so on, I am totally fine. I am just referring to that type of week when every single little thing seems to delay or twist, causing not serious but annoying trouble. It is just like we all enjoy our own dose of Murphy´s Law now and then, and this time it was my turn.

It is a bit too complicated to explain it here, but long story short: I spent half of the week trying to sort a bureaucratic process without any result, lost a delivery parcel because of being home absent, and had a couple of little irritating domestic accidents due to anxiety making me even more clumsy than usual. Well, c´est la vie, I suppose! 

March wedding updates

These few months have been quite modest in terms of wedding preparations.

 Since I last posted about it in December, we have found difficult to succeed in making solid plans, as well as following a proper schedule.
The main reason is our December holiday in Spain was suppossed to constitute some extra spare time to work with, but by then I got the flu, and it spoilt the whole thing. After coming back to Bucharest, we managed to make very little advance, but I will tell you about it anyway.

Seasons don´t fear the reaper

When I was a kid, I used to think seasons were made up.

Well, as weird as this sounds, it is quite reasonable if you grow up on a land where it rains ten months

a year. The two months left are an irregular sequence of sunny and cloudy days, unexpected showers, and windy times, so the technical classification of Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall  was everything but real to me.

Taking that into account, you will understand why after a year living with continental Europe weather,  I am not still used to it.

I have no idea about falling walking on the snow, sudden Summer electric storms, proper Autumal landscapes AND (more importantly) what to wear for real Winter.

Because, Winter? What´s that?

Don´t try this at home

This week Sunday´s post (a.k.a yesterday´s post) had to be delayed due to some inconvenience.
Specifically, due to the consequences of a little accident I had on Saturday morning. Before you go all worried about me, I must reassert it was actually a minor event, although it could have been quite serious under the circumstances, which I will explain to you in a moment.

Well, first of all I should clarify this very event had nothing to do with my own clumsiness. I have told you about it repeteadly, so you know recognizing my lack of ability is not an issue. In this ocassion, the direct cause of misfortune was other people´s behaviour. Now I will put it on record.

Special ocassion outfit drama

 I´ve got a dramatic side, I always have had it but the good thing about it (or bad, it depends on your perspective, actually) is it just pops out once in a while, mostly during stressful situations. Once again the problem about stress is it totally depends on your perspective too: what a person considers an issue might not be necessarily a source of anxiety for another fellow.

For example, I am currently scheduling my holiday posts, as I won´t be around the internetz that much during the festive period. For many other bloggers that´s a source of stress, but to me is just ok, as long as I have proper time to plan.

The zombie diaries

I am quite sure you already noticed I had a hard month due to job reasons, as I would not stop complaining about it here, here and here.

Yes, I know, I can be a little very annoying when I am tired.

Specifically, I tend to become a small child even under the slightest sleep deprivation.

 And no, I am not exagerating.

I DO mean it.

Murphy´s law for everyone

When I was a school girl I found a bit difficult to understand abstract physical laws and concepts, unless practical exemplification was providen. To be exact, I would NOT believe in any kind of principle I couldn´t see with my own little eyes. I was a midget skeptical, if you please, and this frequently produced a good dose of fun in the family meetups.

The long hair axiom

Please, raise your hand if you have got or had got long hair at any point of the past and you do think hairdressers totally hate long hair.

Right, it wasn´t just my own impression then!

I had planned a lovely post here about the magnificent views of the lakes around during the early days of the Summer  (because ey, the warm weather is finally here!), as well as the ton of precious parks you can find in Bucharest (no worries, there will be more about that coming, anyway) when "The long hair axiom" stumbled upon me.

Small vices (and some afternoon tea)

First goes first, so Happy New Year everyone.
I hope you all had a memorable day accompanied by your beloved ones.
The last few days of the year have been a relaxing balm of happiness to me and my partner as long as we decided to leave stress behind a have a good time together.
These pictures are an illustrative example of it.

It was the radiance of an opium dream, an airy and spirit-lifting vision

It actually began like any other horror story.

I was at home with The Gentle One a couple of nights ago. The previous evening it had started snowing and since then the white flakes continued falling. Indeed, it was pretty cold and windy, so we decided to stay indoors and dedicate some time to read and just having some nice relaxing time together.

 To this point everything was right.

I don´t have all my books here at the moment (unfortunately, they rest in many boxes at my parent´s place) and consequently I chose the gorgeous brand new volume waiting on my library. A friend of mine gave it to me during my recent visit to Spain this month as a late birthday present. This very beautiful copy of Tales of the Macabre is illustrated by Benjamin Lacombe and also so stunning that I spent the first half an hour looking at the pictures. But then I started reading (or re-reading, like most of you, gothic ladies, would probably do with Poe).

 Is in this point when things went weird.

Didn´t you realize?

Ok, I´ll help you a bit.

 It was a dark and stormy night, the wind was howling around the house, the snow was lashing against the window, and we were all alone in our new apartment.

So, recap: stormy night, new house and bizarre tales... we were totally in a horror movie!

In fact, I had been feeling kind of conscious about it the whole day, maybe because I am not used to the new apartment (you never know if it is haunted until, I don´t know, six months or so? At least that´s the quantity of time that I need to feel comfortable at a new place), maybe because I was reading Poe and partially because I had been watching The Conjuring the previous evening and by then I was totally horrified...

And then, it happened.

Tap, Tap... went the window.

"OMG!" I shouted, jumping from the couch. "Here they are!"

"It´s just the wind" said The Gentle One (who had totally jumped out of his seat too, and was now adopting a reasonable attitude in the hopes that I hadn´t noticed.) "And who’s ‘They’ anyway?"

"I don´t know," I answered hidding myself behind the sofa. "It could be ghosts, psychos or those evil Romanian spirits I have been reading about" (and, in point of fact, I had been reading a bit too much about Romanian folklore and the Vârcolac too, which actually didn´t help either). "I have watched too many horror movies, dude, I can recognize it when I´m in one!"

 

"I think YOU´ve watched too many of those movies now" he observed. "But seriously, it was just the wind. Now come out from behind the sofa, please"

And I was about to do it when, believe or not, lights went off.

"Oh, God!" I screamed into complete panic then. "You see? I was right!"

The Gentle One didn´t look too secure by then, but he heroically found the value to go outside (against my will, you don´t want your boyfriend to leave you in the hunted house after saying "I´ll be back in a minute") and check what was happening. Apparently, it was a general blackout affecting the whole street. And darlings, I can tell you I am not a big fan of them. I mean, I do love horror films, but just because I like to know they are not happening to me. 

The thing is that my noble fiancé was brave enough to turn some candles on and prepared a delicious dinner all byhimself (I was too busy by casting suspicious glances around) and when the electric power was restored, well, he prescribed to me a good dose of non-horror movies for a time.

 Fair enough, don´t you think?

P.S: By the way, I keep receiving so many questions about me for the next Give Away on my mail, that I just decided to open an Ask Fm account in order to make it a bit tidier. 
Remember that every question is an extra chance to participate.

This is the link: www.ask.fm/Violettebaudelaire 

Good luck!

There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it

Well, it looks like the boxaholic period has finally begun.

Just before last weekend we got some of these awful cardboard boxes and started packing to face our future. I´d like to say that we are making a wonderful job but actually, the ONLY things we´ve packed so far are The Gentle One´s books. Just his books, not mine. Didn´t even try.

'Why?', I can hear you intelligently asking.

And the reason is, to be completely honest, that I don´t want to do so.

Please, do not get me wrong.
I am dying to move to Romania and start this atonishing adventure, but if only we could wake up one fine morning in our new apartment without all the Last-time drama...

The idea of packing it´s truly hard to me because, as soon as I place the first book, dvd, or framed picture in a box, I´ll be saying goodbye home and I am not ready, not quite yet anyway.

I might get started to freak out a bit here. A little bit. OK, maybe a huge bit.

We are supposed to be moving in less than a month. A MONTH, do you understand? And by then I won´t be sitting in front of this desktop computer anymore, I won´t bake cupcakes on my old oven, I won´t read books by the window (here we go with all the Last-time drama again...). Indeed, in less than a month I´ll have left this house forever.

Yes, I know this house is old (older than Matusalem, actually), and we (well, that´s The Gentle One) spend a lot of our spare time fixing up ruined supplies, but the thing is that we´ve been living here for the last seven years and a half. This house was our first house, the place where we first moved when we started our relationship. 

This shabby house is our home. And now we must leave. OMG.

Ok, I´ll keep breathing, I promise.

[Uses the asthma medicine again]

So, I decided to start documenting the little things that make me happy all around the apartment.
Like my summer reading refuge by the window, the light in my boudoir, or the glowing purple colour we painted the walls many years ago. Because someday I won´t probably remeber the place clearly, and then I´ll have my pictures at least.

The fine art of impersonating Violette

 Can you recognize the girl in the picture?

 She´s Violette, right? 

This friendly little bookworm who loves tea, cats and sometimes might be a bit hypocondriac.

That´s the girl, the original one.

If you know her well enough then you are already conscious of her limitated tolerance to deal with strangers on the net, plus she´s not a big fan of huge social networks.

Alright, that´s in theory.

All of a sudden, she has developed a brand new personality (maybe as a consequence of a spider bite, who knows!) and now is playing to open dozens of online profiles all through the web.

 Yes, you guessed: I´ve been impersonated. 

I know what you´re about to say. 

Being impersonated is totally cool, indeed it is the mark of the social  success. And normally I wouldn´t be so upset, but the thing is that this person not only stole tons of pictures from this blog (among them these, these, or these) but also used my nickname, real age, current location, profession and real name to found a net of lies in order to flirt with the first candid person unlucky enough to cross her path (it looks like she is a woman, and even more scary, one of my FB contacts).

And that´s exactly what happened: one of her victims encountered this site and after some logical questions told me all the story and showed me some important information, such as the fake profiles created by this person. 

The worst part (if you ignore my real name and basic information merrily given away) is that she even stole pictures of my beloved ones, including portraits like this, or (OH, God!) pictures of me with my thirteen years old sister. 

And you know what, people? 

For me that´s the limit!

I have serious suspects about the identity of this hussy girl, plus a couple of hackers who can work totally free for me and the serious determination to smash this person with an oficial complaint in the police.

So I beg you to forgive me if, for a while, my pictures contain an awful watermark.

Oh! And if one day I start to make silly posts about, I don´t know, low fat recipes, or cheap trips to Miami, or my last pair of Manolos, well, you may be reading the fake Violette here.

It was you who poisoned my mind

Do you remeber when I mentioned I had one entire holiday week and how much I wanted to enjoy it?

Well, the faerie of the bad luck was obviously listening, because as soon as I announced my fantastic plans I got sick. Without notice I woke up on Tuesday morning and looked myself in the mirror just to find that I had been converted into a red-eyes-congested-nose cartoon (it looks like the fairy had been working really hard all night).

So yes, I had lo leave all my spectacular holiday ideas involving shopping, dressing to kill extra time, writing and studying as long as there was no energy left for those activities and fever is not friends with fun.

Here I am, after three days of complete home quarantine (bio-hazard alarm ringing) doing nothing but little and boring reading for seminars, listening the same CD´s in a never ending loop, cuddling cats, and playing to organize my shoes a little bit (shoes that should be worn, not organized).

But The Gentle One is so sweet that has been looking after me all this time with a good dose of soup, cuddles and Harry Potter films, that looks like the definitive therapy for ill-timed flu, just because he´s so nice, and maybe a little bit because I can be a total hypocondriac.

But ey, once you overcome the continuous 

OMG I AM SURE I AM GOING TO DIE THIS TIME 

you can act like a normal person again (even pretending that panic attack didn´t happen) and keep going with your life, or at least with the recovery routine.

Anyway, I hope you are all having a great Easter darlings.

Lots of love!

Creep in, said the witch, and see if it is properly heated, so that we can shut the bread in

 Just in case you are wondering: yes, we celebrated the great Carnival season here in Spain last week.

 It is kind of a great event in the whole country but, in this little northern corner, it is something truly special.

We have our own traditional celebrations which include four days of non-stopping party with lots of food and crazy regional costumes. 

And the reason why it is so different from the rest of the country is that we (and I am very proud of it) have Celtic roots. 

Maybe that´s what makes me get dress as a witch every year, our folklore is deeply coloured by beldam stories. 

And when I say every year I really mean it. 

As time goes by, I collected more than a dozen witch hats. Believe or not, my parents have a fitted cabinet in my room that they call The Wicked Witch of the East cupboard and I suspect that:

1. They are going to sell them all as soon as I move to the UK to recover the ridiculously huge space the hats occupy.

2. If I try to keep the hats in there it will constitute a solid evidence of my mania.

3. I will finish my days at Arkham Asylum, where I´ll be known as The Dark Witch Hat Lady or something like that.

  

Going back to the party itself and, unfortunately for us this time,  

The Great God of Rain decided to spoil the fun.

We had a wet weekend and just one day of sunlight (well, indeed I am trying to keep the positive tone because calling sunlight to that sinister bunch of clouds we had all over the week is a little otherwordly).

The Gentle One and I really did our best to mantain the festive spirit considering the circumstances.

We went out for a walk in our costumes and even tried to go and see the parade, but it became pretty much like a nightmare with all the windy, cold and wet atmosphere. After a while we had to acknowledge our defeat and, as good soldiers, we retired into the warm and charming nineteenth century club, when one can simply spend hours by drinking tea and eating chocolate cake (which of course we did).

I think I didn´t have enough of masks, but I am happy I will have the chance to repeat it next month:

Some wonderful people is organizing a victorian-inspired masquerade for March in one of the most beautiful baroque palaces of my city. So if you are planning to visit Spain this Spring, that can be definitely the opportunity to step aside from crowded beaches and doing something memorable.

The Aurum Masquerade

Tell me, do you celebrate the carnival season in your country?

You can´t trust water: Even a straight stick turns crooked in it.

 

As any other human being on Earth who needs a proper job to survive, I love weekends. 

They are full of all kind of promises: never ending catnaps, romantic walks under the moonlight, tons of good movies waiting to be watched in a sofa & pop corn session... 

Weekends are so nice because they represent a small portion of time in which we can be who we really are, and do what we truly want to.

Usually, my weekends (which thanks to providence last from Friday to Sunday, as long as I don´t have to attend university seminars or work) consist on a relaxing and healthy diet of good books, quiet conversations with my fiancé, and some eventual wine night at home with friends. 

Nothing out of the ordinary.

But this Saturday the impossible came about: it wasn´t raining!

Yes, yes, I know what you are thinking. Not that special, huh? Well, you´re wrong.

Do you know that song from Jane Siberry called "It Can´t Rain all the Time"? I am sure she didn´t know about the north of Spain. In this corner of the world it does rain every winter, ALL winter. We don´t have snow or killing low temperatures, that´s right, but it rains. A lot. There are days in which I think I could go to work by swimming. And I am not the only one who has this kind of feelings about water here. 

But you learn how to live with it because, well, we are the water people. 

Even the rest of Spanish think that about us.

But on Saturday there was no raining prediction, so I inmediately asked to The Gentle One about going out for a while. No umbrella? Where must I sign, sir?

And there we went.

Although there were some clouds in the sky (fine, it was very cloudy), we had a walk ad took some pictures.

I wanted to wear that beautiful coat that my mother-in-law gave me for Christmas because there was no water that could ruin it this time.

But we run out of camera battery soon (we were so excited about the lack of water that totally forgot about recharging batteries). As a consequence we strolled a little bit more and went for a good cup of coffee to our favourite place ♥

And then the second unexpected thing of the day took place.

It was so warm up there, and the music was so soft, and the sofa so comfy, and the delicious vanilla and almond tea was so relaxing... that I fell asleep. 

It was just for a second and It had never happened to me before, but for an instant I was totally asleep.  

I think I was truly tired after a long week at work, I have no other theory, (unless the charming waitress put some drugs on my tea to steal my pretty new coat, but I can not prove it and I don´t want you to think I am a little crazy paranoid lady). Yes, that was a joke.

So I had to stand my man laughing at me for a while.

Fair enough. I would also laugh at him in that situation.

Did you ever experienced a so funny and ridiculous moment in a public place?

My life lately (and giveaway winner)

This is a very vague testimony of my few last days this week.

As they were full with lots of twists I just could capture a couple of little impressions.

Be sure you fasten your seat belt! 

♥Last week has been kind of a madness since many changes burst into my life. 

The plans that I had built around a new job position collapsed, but a new (and unexpected) project showed up. 

Tarot is always a lighthouse in those ocassions.

 Well, I don´t trust it like an infallible orable; however, it always help to meditate about all my options.

♥As a consequence of those crazy news, now I have to deal with a narrower schedule 

which basically means a series of racing all through the city to be on time both at job and university seminars.

 On a practical level this means less time for lunch, so I try to ensure I have vitamins enough in my diet.

♥My seminars have already started but I refuse to admit that summer is over, so I keep

 reading child books just for pleasure.  

The Wind in the Willows is one of my favourite children´s literature classics ever.

Someday I´ll make an entire post about it! 

 ♥Beside all this, this week I started my pre-Halloween annual research.

 What does it consist on? Good question!

Every year at the beginning of the month I put my comfy shoes on and wander around the city

 in the want of cute stuff that I can use as Halloween stuff. 

At the moment I have been sneaking a peek at candy stores.

                 ♥I also tried to improve my origami skills with no success (the beautiful butteflies above are 

my friend Elisa´s old creations), and made lots of smothies for an extra energy dose. The smoothie in the picture was made of frozen blueberries and raspberries (no chance to get them fresh here). 

 ♥ And finally: the very expected winner of the Giveaway event.

Corresponding with the original order of participants the lucky lady is (drumroll, please):

Aoife

Congratulations, dear!

And to the rest of you, Thank you so much for participating.

I am sure you´ll have more opportunities in the future.

Blue eyes say, Love me or I die; black eyes say, Love me or I kill thee

After a couple of weeks that I only can describe as killing, I am free again. 

Well, quite free as long as I had to go back to my classes and seminars, which started on Wednesday.

I hardly survived to my September exams and it could be said that I did it pretty unharmed considering the circumstances. 

Do you know that kind of annoying period when you seem touched by the faerie of bad luck? Oh, I am sure you are laughing, but don´t think I am joking. The faerie of bad luck is somewhere out there, and I won´t stop until I catch her (or until I can take a good picture of her to demonstrate her physical existence to the whole world, at least).

What happenned to me for speaking like a lunatic?

Get ready to smile (or cry, not even sure indeed):

• Little day-to-day tragedy #1: I made a mistake with one of my exams by thinking it was a different day. Inmediate consequence: yes, I missed it! However, the teacher was very comprehensive and let me make it three days later. But I had lots of linden tea in between. And when I say lots I really mean it. I think some linden tea maker is really rich right now.

• Little day-to-day tragedy #2:  To step aside from all the hard stress produced by the little day-to-day tragedy #1, The Gentle One and I accepted the invitation of our friends to spend last weekend at their place. They live in a pretty small place by the sea (literally, their house almost touches the sand of the beach), so I decided to get rid off my sun aversion and put my bathing suit in the case. Right, exactly as you think: on Sunday morning we had the coldest day this month.

•  Little day-to-day tragedy #3: In the top of all this I was clumsy enough to rip three pairs of tights. Besides I lose one entire pack of hairpins, spilled coffee on my favourite skirt and an entire bottle of eau de toilette on my bed (I have to admit that now it smells like heaven. Like having a too big piece of heaven at home).

 Shirt : Zara  / Skirt : H&M  / Tie : Random shop/ 
 Brooch : Handmade/  Tights : Calcedonia/  Boots : Gift from The Gentle One /
 Handbag : Gift form my sister (bought in Tokyo)

As you can imagine, at the end of the past week I was a pale-shaking-tiny-thing that only prayed for no more accidents. But ey, better halves are true heroes in that kind of occasions. They always know how to make fun of gloomy days and take you out for having some tasty white tea with mandarin and a funny photoshoot.

God blesses anonymous heroes! 

Oh, the winner of the give away will be announced very soon!

Be sure to enter the event.