Any well-traveled trekker | overnighter of the urban landscape knows the feeling well:
Having happened upon life, as such, as that sleep becomes unfortunately inevitable, at an inopportune time, in an inappropriate locale; that is, might seem as though it’s somewhat the sufferer’s own fault, for grazing in unfamiliar territory.
Even so, don’t be afraid, and don’t be discriminatory in where you set foot, about town; simply go about life as a well-prepared individual, well-resourced, well-packed, and you’ll do just fine.
I’d not done so well, in previous years, but I’m nearing upon age 40, and I’d say that I’d experienced the vast majority of life experiences that I’d possibly come across, in my time, and there’s not much that could be done to me that I hadn’t experienced, previously, as a well-heeled trekker of the Los Angeles urban landscape. Just this past week, in fact, I thwarted a so-called (nicknamed via my own predilections) ether faucet, which is a classic simple petty theft’s criminal’s doing, or perhaps they’d do worse, to a lady, or something like that.
It happens as misfortunately as described, just prior: a sudden need to fall asleep at an inopportune time, in an inappropriate place; perhaps a poor part of town, infested with tents, cockroaches, trash, rioting going on - that sort of thing. The police are on top of it, or something like that. People have to rest, sometimes, and letting loose an ether faucet will put the freeze on things, so to speak.
What is ether?
I don’t really know what, or which - (ether) is the particular ether in question, and I’m not going to look it up, either. For my purposes, ether could potentially be a fragrance chemistry industry solvent, (… eh, I won’t elaborate on it - I don’t own any, myself), and ethers are a particular class of chemical compound, aside from that. It’s the sort of thing that could get somebody some unfortunate attention, perhaps, from the authorities, that is. My purpose here isn’t to educate the reader about ether, the drug: the primitive anesthetic that it is, as a basis. I had first learned about it from the drug-lore film, “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” in which one of the guys was playing around with it, and look how Johnny Depp ended up - handsome heartthrob, early on, and well in to his later career, yet he’d been beset with tabloid scandal, in his later years, for living out his acting career roles (ostensibly) to a real-life pitch, in the behind-the-scenes sort of lifestyle that inevitably becomes the duty of the actor, playing the part. The other guy, Guillermo Del Toro, (or something like that; this is all off the top of my head, here), ate more food, throughout life. A bit more innocent, as far as analysis goes. I hadn’t caught wind of any poor press about him. Johnny Depp, on the other hand, had recently hit the scandal headlines, with his breakup from Amber Heard, a model, etc. etc.
Anyways…
An ether faucet. A scum bag tweaker’s crude weapon in assailing a targeted victim who stays out too late, or who ventures off in to an unseemly part of town, without imbibing in drug use (breaking bread) with the locals, who’d like to rob or rape the person being targeted, or perhaps it’s some measure of riot and crowd control, implemented by the authorities, following an outbreak of acute societal unrest, in the civic center area, about town. This was somewhat my experience of things, as I woke myself up, out of the narcoleptic, deadening slumber, which happens to accompany an uncharacteristic chill, to the limbs and body; a noticeably chill wind about the air, and an incapable self, as for getting up, waking up, and getting out of the area, for that criminals could easily thwart the individuals defenses, and gain access to their valuables, or possibly kidnap the person, and commit foul things, for a ransom; for example.
Fortunately, I was well-equipped with an orange flower absolute spray bottle,
just large enough to hold several dozen sprays, and yet, orange flower absolute: complex enough, to thwart an aerosol-based attack as crude as an ether faucet. I sprayed one spray, after coming to realize that I ought not sleep it off, and be content, and the tiredness was immediately swept away.
There were intimations of a mockery of me, coming about, in my misfortune, of “some girl” sitting down, in front of me, where I lay, on the sidewalk, saying stuff like “hey, how’s it going?” 😘
That was my opportunity to get up, and get about, on my way, to my standard haunt, which I won’t disclose. The tiredness came and went, intermittently, throughout various parts of town, but my orange flower absolute reconstitution did the job quite well. I used Poucher’s formulation (Poucher was a noted armed forces scholar, in literature and in photography). Here’s his recipe for orange flower absolute, which can also be further researched through Google Books online.
An ether faucet is a horrible thing to burden, but hey, maybe it averted a worser societal outcome, all in all. Being properly prepared, with a complex aromatic aerosol compound is simply part of the technique in appropriately surviving the threat, coming through, with all valuables and reputation intact. It smells great, for that matter, and it’s a unisex sort of fragrance. Take heed, though, certain formulations of an orange flower absolute could be overly simplistic, or detrimental, in the sort of chemistry involved in what ether is, which I don’t quite know, myself, and I don’t really care to investigate it, online, for that matter. Just order some ingredients, and make the stuff yourself. It’ll assist you in embodying a more outgoing and adventurous self, as the cold months to come, ahead, accommodate the sort of robbery tactic that succumbing to an ether faucet would entail.
