Yesterday, Julie and Steve took to the skies towards Bali for a few weeks vacation time. True to fashion, Julie’s head did not pause in its pondering – specifically, this time, about what can potentially go up her nose.

I know you’ll all join me in wishing her and Steve safe travels, fun, and adventure. I’ll reach into the vault for some Julie-posts while she’s away.

Below is her last live entry before hitting, no doubt, a potentially pungent JFK airport:
~Lois

Steve and I are en route to Bali, somewhere between Hong Kong and Jakarta. Luckily, we dodged Typhoon Usagi and our flight was not canceled. So while I am on my way of the country, it seems like a good time to discuss a pet peeve, a personal peccadillo, a piddling pimple of an insignificant annoyance.

I have a preternatural distaste for things that have been aromatized to make them theoretically “smell” better. Floor polish that conjures up a piney forest, detergents that are supposed to remind me of the ocean, and a city bus infused with a rose-scented room deodorizer wraps my nose in indignity. (And of course if the bus window is hermetically sealed so that I can’t even open it, I become outraged at the thought that I am a prisoner to a rose bomb!)

The greatest affront of all is being at a restaurant seated next to someone who has had the audacity to douse themselves in scent. I have waltzed in, anticipating a meal infused with roasted garlic and fresh herbs, and instead Brut is wafting up my nostrils. It is always a tad embarrassing for my dinner companion when I discreetly whisper to the waiter that we must change tables because I have a problem with the way the person sitting next to me smells.

I hope the plane I’m flying in isn’t a perfumed vehicle filled with perfumed people. It’s a pretty long flight.