"Nice scent"

The permits for parking in the lot behind my building at work costs something like $400 a year. Which to me, the girl who is constantly budgeting and re-budgeting, seems insane given that there is free, all-day street parking in the residential area that starts 1 block away. Of course I generally park more like 2 or 3 blocks away but... I'm a marathoner! How sad would it be if I couldn't walk 2 or 3 blocks to work... Especially given that in Palo Alto the weather is fantastic 350 days out of the year. (One positive about living in the Bay Area.)

So, most days I park my car and start wandering through the streets back to my office. And I generally pass all manner of people on the way which provides an interesting internal dialogue. This morning's musings went like this...

I wonder if we'll have ants (or worse) when I get home tonight (due to beer "incident").
I hope the beer is good...
Oh yeah, we leave early today to have happy hour with the Lizes!
Damn, what do I need to get done then since I only have til 2:30...
(Insert list of projects I need to work on)
Oh! That is a super cute jacket.
I wonder where she got it?
Hmmm... She looks familiar...
Right she works for the title company
(not that I figured this out in my pre-coffee state, cute jacket girl walked into the title office = triggering memory)
Oh look someone is having a first time home-buyers seminar.
I should call friend who works for bank hosting above seminar.
Etc...

So here I am lost in my own little world when all of a sudden I realize that the older gentleman who just walked past me has made a comment. Do I want to know what it is? Don't make eye-contact, just smile vaguely in his general direction...

"I said, nice scent"

Why is it that random compliments from strangers still have an ability to brighten your day?