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L’Air du Desert Marocain vs. Lonesome Rider

Posted on by elemonated

Took me long enough.

I’ve written about LADDM before:

Tauer L’Air Desert Du Marocain

  • Wet: oak, amber, vetiver, cedar, balsamic vinegar
  • Dry: vetiver, cedar, coriander, amber, jasmine, balsamic vinegar

Mr. Chokkattu’s first love, and the one he wears the most often, LADDM is a dark, woody, smoky, slightly sweet thing with a low voice and dark hair. It starts with a sharp balsamic over a dark base, and then evens out, and as per the name the resulting fragrance is dry, hot, and slightly sweet. I really like this one, and Mr. Chokkattu only let me borrow this one because he has another sample of it.

New impressions:

L’Air du Desert Marocain is still Mr. Chokkattu’s favorite (though A La Nuit is edging in), and fortunately I am not at his freezing place trying this on, but I still think this could benefit from a bit of heat, at least to give it context.

Sweet sun-dried grass and hay, powdery amber, hot, warm cardamom, basil, singed cedar and oak bark and ashes and incense, all on a bed of jasmine. Read More

Things I adored about Iceland

Posted on by elemonated

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A picture Mr. Chokkattu took of me while we were on a kayak.

This will be my last post explicitly about Iceland!

So we all know now that I adored the country of Iceland, and I want to go back some day really, really badly, with maybe a job long enough to support me for a few months or just some more cash in my pocket. And that the scenery is beautiful and the landscape breathtaking, etc. But I have to share some of the specifics I jotted down. Some of them are important, some of them are surprising, some are less about Iceland and more about trips in general, and some are pretty stupid but whatever they seemed important enough to write down at the time. This list is a little long, so let’s get started:

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Iceland Day 4

Posted on by elemonated

This was both the best and worst day of the trip. We started out wonderfully with a lot of time in my new favorite town, Seyðisfjörður, where I finished the Iceland Day 2.2 post in the Hotel Aldan restaurant and had my first taste of reindeer, which was delicious. We kayaked for a couple of hours and met Mr. Hlynur Oddsson, our guide (the kayak guy, as informed by a waitress at Hotel Aldan) who was as kind and as funny as he was educational. Mr. Chokkattu was also able to wash our car for free, which is good because our little 2×4 was definitely begging to get clean after being covered in mud and dust from our drive. We also got to sing in Tvisongur, which we were told means “Double song/singing” and Mr. Chokkattu lent his lovely bass to the environment and I pittered out my minimally trained alto as accompaniment.

Later on, we had a delicious dinner at the Skaftfell visitor’s center, which also housed some interesting local art I recommend checking out if you go.  Read More