Waiting for Mrs. Peel (a long ride on the perfume and whiskey train of thought).

Where to begin with this story? Four years ago in India I spent $1.50 on a small bottle of scented oil. Something made me decide to wear it on my wedding day, but I didn't really wear it regularly till the first time I went to NYC. Suddenly "Kashmiri oil" only makes me think of Manhattan. Kind of funny. This bottle is dangerously close to be finished and I've been wondering for a while now if there's anything I can do to try to match it. I've looked up places specializing in scented oils and also custom perfume blenders. Nothing that I have managed to actually give a good effort to has paid off yet though. I had first read about CB I Hate Perfume while looking for customer blenders. This guy's studio is in Brooklyn. I wondered if I could make it out there last January, but it didn't happen.

What did happen in Brooklyn last January was the night on the town that would eventually result in the infamous hangover at a certain jewelry story on Fifth Avenue. The first round was a fabulous champagne cocktail at Dressler in Williamsburg. I absolutely adored the metalwork interior. CF and I have an agreement that someday we will have a date there. This cocktail was apparently the bartender's specialty. I can't remember the minor ingredients but it was mostly made up of champagne and whiskey! Delicious.

I had acquired the taste for whiskey during our month in Ireland. While visiting a distillery the options for sampling at the end of the tour were straight or mixed with cranberry juice, or ginger ale. I decided to go with the ginger ale... and while many of the ladies on the trip were handing their glasses over to certain eager-to-help-out fellows, I found myself a new favorite drink! I drank whiskey and ginger ales a good chunk of the rest of the trip. And it was our last round on the last night.

Somehow, I recently started thinking about the whiskey and champagne cocktail (please note, there are two different drinks we are talking about here), wondering if anyone online had ever talked about the delicious concoction. I did a Google search for "dressler whiskey" and the only special result I found was my own Yelp review of the place. But I did find an interesting tangent. The personal journal of CB, of CB I Hate Perfume, the very perfumer I had meant to go see a year ago!

this is a very casual perfume based on a cocktail i seem to have invented over the summer. i was sitting at the bar at "dressler" back in june waiting for some friends. when the barman asked me if i'd like a drink, i knew that i did but couldn't begin to figure out what. i'm not a huge cocktail fan, don't much care for basic wine and vodka seemed a little boring...

so after 10 minutes of hard thought, i thought i'd try a bit of whiskey, some gingerale and a slice of cucumber...

What's this? A perfume based on whiskey and ginger ale? Yes, please! His journal is quite a fun read. He talks about lots of different things but it always manages to relate back to scents. I suggest checking it out!
http://www.cbihateperfume.com/CBjournal.html

Today I tried to find a new perfume to help me get over the Kashmiri oil that will likely never be refilled. Aveda's new high end perfume that I've talked about before? I tried some on so I could see how I liked it on me over time. Turns out I just feel like I stink like a hippie when I wear it. Very earthy, not the fancy pick-me-up I was hoping fore. I'm sure it's great on some people. But not on me. I tried on a bunch of scents at Anthropologie as well, nothing was quite right either. So my failed perfume shopping experience made me wonder about CB and his cocktail scent.

I read up on what I could fine out online. He talks about this in the very next entry...

still i have been able to make some progress. i decided on what to call my cocktail scent. i'm going to name it after one of my very favorite women of all time. she fascinated me as a child and i always imagined i'd marry her when i grew up. i still wouldn't mind...

she's a woman i've always admired - smart, charming, beautiful and a snappy dresser. she knows exactly what to do in every possible situation & is also very adept at getting herself out of some pretty serious jams.

although she drinks largely champagne, i can still imagine that every now and then after a particularly trying day, she might curl up on her sofa & sip a bit of whiskey, gingerale with a slice of cucumber.

so in honor of her, i've decided to call my cocktail - Mrs Peel.

I love the champagne mention. Sort of ties this long train of thought all together. Looks like it was about to be released in the fall but now he's holding it until spring because it's a better scent to wear in warmer weather. There's a shop in Berkeley called Herringbone that sells his scents, I hope when the time comes I can find Mrs. Peel there. Nothing to do but wait and see.