things in my mailbox

I love to get mail. I mean, I love it an unreasonable amount. My mom would order catalogs for me just so I’d be happy. (And also because I have an unhealthy attachment to flipping through catalogs and marking things I want but will never have.) The sad part to that is that I very rarely actually get mail. My bills are primarily taken care of online and I don’t have all that many people who send me things. Okay, fine, no one sends me mail, ya happy? Jeez.

So when stars align and I get a week of LOTS of mail, I get scarily excited. Because I’m terrible at saving money, I’d ordered several things last month. To be fair, 90% was necessity to not freeze to death in the coming winter. My two fun purchases were placing an order for tasty awesomeness via Jenna and Mark of Whimsy & Spice and buying a few books (the last batch until I read all these, I swear). And so, I waited for my winter stuff and my cookies.

But lo! I was also rewarded with books! And a shirt! I won a contest that Britney hosted on her book blog Taking Friday. And on top of that, my amazing friend Canadian Sara (whose name is just Sara, but a decade ago, I had to make the distinction between School Sara and Canadian Sara to my mother, and now I have no idea how to just say Sara) sent me a package o’ books as well! Additionally, my beloved Mari sent me a sample shirt from her kpop shop, along with a hand mirror. THE BACK OF MY SHIRT SAYS KEY, YOU GUYS. I LOVE KEY. /fangirl

Anyway. For a brief stretch in October, I felt really special to have so much mail. So thanks for sending me things, guys!

P.S. Buy things from Whimsy & Spice. DO IT NOW. Hocrap, tasty. I am now cookie-free.

this is halloween: black phoenix alchemy lab

I love Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab. I love them a lot. I love their site design, I love their product names and descriptions, I love their scents. I love the fan community that goes along with BPAL because who ever heard of such a thing just for fancy smells? There’s one well-known forum for swapping, gifting and purchasing scents on the cheap, and countless other exchanges on sites like Livejournal. But why?

BPAL is something like Bath and Body Works for the misfits of the world. Confession – I’m kind of a goth kid at heart. So finding BPAL thanks to my dear Kat made me very very happy. A bunch of smell-goods! With goth-y themes! And names like Harlot and Fire For Thy Stepmother’s Daughters! AMAZING! The concept spoke to me in a way that most fancy girly things tend not to (except shoes). I wanted – NEEDED – to own all the things.

I currently only have two full-size bottles, Jailbait and The White Lady of Durand-Eastman Park. Jailbait was one of my first imps (the tiny sample sizes) and I fell in love with it. It was fitting that it should become my first full-size, along with White Lady. I got them at Comic-Con in NYC, along with the imps in the picture above that are attached to cards. Added bonus to the Comic-Con free imp samples? They were the Alice in Wonderland scents. I love Alice in Wonderland an absurd amount, so imagine how happy that made me.

My wish is to have all the scents, at least in imp form. Sadly, I don’t have the budget for that kind of thing right now. I’ve not gotten any new scents since Comic-Con, but maybe it’ll happen this Christmas.

october book haul

Yes, yes, I know; I haven’t read most of the books I bought last time, or my library books, but…You shut your face, I’ll do what I want! This trip to The Book Loft wasn’t as successful as the first time, but I’m still pretty pleased. I mean look! I got Adam Richman’s book! You know I’m in love with him! I think out of these (excluding my future husband’s book), I’m most excited to read Does My Head Look Big in This?. I’ve never read any books with a Muslim main character, so this’ll be interesting.

And! Bonus! I went to a thrift store and look what I snagged:

You have no idea how excited I got upon seeing When the Dolls Woke sitting on the shelf. I actually had to retrain myself from squealing and doing a little happy wiggle. When I was younger, I used to love Apple chiller paperbacks. They were sort of my gateway drug into RL Stine and Christopher Pike. My mom would buy me loads of them from the Scholastic Weekly Reader and I would read them almost as soon as I got them. My new goal in life is to collect them all again, especially anything by Mary Downing Hahn.

In any case, I’m about halfway through Possess so hopefully I can get it done before October comes and goes.