meaganola

This is another one of those weird oils where I love the scent, but it seems to make me strangely lightheaded and dizzy. I'm not sure whether it's the tangerine or musk, though (I'm not sure I'm getting any cypress, so I'm disregarding that as the potential culprit). I had this on my potential bottle list, but this dizzy thing is making me rethink that. I'm really sad about that because it's really a nice scent, but I'm clumsy enough as it is. I don't need my perfume making me loopy, too!

Ooh, if you're from Portland, then this will probably make perfect sense: It is the smell of walking through Laurelhurst Park in the afternoon in late October/early November. The decaying leaves, the dirt, the lingering patchouli, all still nice and gooshy from the heavy, heavy mist that isn't *quite* rain but will definitely mean you will need to hang your jacket up to dry.

The one that made me *kerthunk* was Falling Leaf Moon. Patchouli, wet leaves, rain -- it's bottled Portland Autumn for me. Alas, it's *so* autumny to me that it demands to be saved until October, so maybe this isn't the best recommendation right now!

Mad Hatter! Pennyroyal is a natural bug repellant, and there's just something about MH that is fantastic in the heat.

I have two bottles each of The Harp, The Traveller, and Little Bird. They're all the soft-green-with-knot-and-name-in-bright-green scheme (which almost caused some decanting horrors!). I have no photo-taking abilities, though, so I am unable to post any pictures.

LEATHER LEATHER LEATHER OH HAI DID I MENTION I AM LEATHER! Ahem. So, yeah, all I get is leather. *Strong* leather. And not dainty Wilson's Leather stuff. This makes me think of a tack store that has just received a brand new shipment of saddles. Unfortunately, leather is one of my headache notes. I can just barely tolerate it in I Married a Vampire from Planet X and Miller v California, and that's about it. I'm not even going to bother skin-testing it. I just hope I can scrub all traces it off my fingers now since I tend to sleep with my hands near my head, and having this scent near my nose all night will not make for a pleasant morning.

All the time. There's already a thread about this in the FAQ, though, so you might want to check that out for more detail.

Snow White is a recurring LE, but there's no guarantee it will be back any particular year. I believe there's a component in there that is only available during that time of the year, which is why it can't be a GC. I'm assuming it's plant-based since, well, pretty much all BPAL is plant-based. If that particular year's crop of Special Snow White Component is ruined, well, no Snow White that year. I believe that was the case in 2006. Werepuppy is a different matter. I don't think we have ever had a forum-only scent get resurrected. Once they're gone, they're gone. As for when to place your next order, well, I think I've placed multiple orders on the same *day*, and I know I'm not the only one, although nowadays, I tend to order only at updates, and, again, not the only one. But if you have the money, it's kind of fun to space them two to three weeks apart so you're always just a couple of weeks away from the arrival of your next order!

On one hand, I want to add another vote for Mme Moriarty. Even (especially!) if she tosses the bottle in a drawer unopened and forgets about it until next year, Mme will be *amazing*. On the other hand, the patchouli in there is nothing like anything I've ever encountered before, and if she's all about head shop patch, she's going to be disappointed. Or confused. But if she's adventurous, this would be a good bet, especially if she has any interest in dark and twisted takes on old school carnivals. I think you still get a pitch card and tarot card with every bottle, too (I got the ten of swords, which was freakishly on the nose for what I was going through at the time), which makes it a little more special. On the other hand, Mme Moriarty is the very oil that got me started on a very dangerous and very, *very* expensive LE obsession. ETA: Yeah, apparently, I'm posting as Kali tonight!

If you like spicy and can find any, Tanin'iver! To/on me, it's very similar to Phantom Calliope, although PC is a bit fruitier, and the cardamom makes it kind of pop. Tanin'iver is pretty much the only thing I handle myrrh and smoke in (Dragon's Hide makes me kind of queasy, although that may be the leather, another of my problem notes). I don't know how easy it is to find, though, because I got a bottle when the discontinuation was announced and haven't tried to find any more.

Heh. The thing about summers where I live is that we don't have three months of oppressive heat. Sure, we had a stretch last summer where it went into triple digits, but that only lasted about a week. Our average highs in July and August are right around 80. Which is still hot for me, but if you have one day that hits 95, you have to have a day that only gets up to 65, if I'm doing the math correctly. This is actually why I have a mix of patch/incense stuff and snowy stuff: On mild days, I can hit the heavy stuff, and on the hot days, I can go all snowy. The average high in Orlando in December are the same as our average June high. What you can deal with in the summer probably depends on where you live!

Summer for me means outdoor music and arts festivals (even though I rarely *go* to them, the mood is still there, and the mood is what drives scent selection for me), which in turn mean patchouli and incense, so Mme Moriarty is pretty much bottled summer. And Ravenous, which I actually had to put back the other day because it was *too* summery for me. And Masquerade, although there's enough other stuff in there that I can wear it year-round. Well, okay, by "year-round," I mean "any weekend," since I feel really weird wearing patchouli at work. If it was my old company, I wouldn't give a damn, but I'm temping now, and I have to be a little more restrained in my scent choices at work now. And then there's and added fun part: When it's super hot, I have problems with scents. Except, as I discovered last summer, snow. Season of the Inundation and Moon of Small Spirits got me through an extended period of triple-digit weather (hey, I'm a native Portlander! We don't get that kind of weather very often! And by "very often," I think we broke forty-year-old records for high temps, including the all-time high temp). This summer, I have a few new options to add to the mix: Snowball Fracas, Ded Moroz, and First Soft Snow, although that one may turn out to be a bit too heavy on the non-snow notes for my purpose. On the up side, these scents are all so not-traditional-perfume-smelling that I don't feel weird wearing them to work, so that helps balance not wearing my beloved patchouli at work. And then last summer, I went to see a certain band at a certain bar about once a month, and every single time, it was Snake Charmer, all the way. I heard a song by this band yesterday, and Pavlov would have been proud: All I could think about was slathering Snake Charmer, standing in the crowded dance floor an arm's length from the bar, and downing my third whiskey sour of the evening. And even though it's not summer yet, their shows are starting again in about a week and a half, so, yay, more Snake Charmer!

I think just about every single review of Gladdener of All Hearts is required by law to mention that it smells like Burt's Bees Apricot Baby Oil. Because, seriously, that's the only thing I can think of when I smell GoAH.

This one is all coconut milk and ylang ylang to my nose (wore it in my Clocket), which is not a combination I'm wild about. The annoying thing is that I *like* coconut milk and ylang ylang. Put them together, though, and it turns into tossing out the cotton pad after a couple of hours because it was just way too creamy-sweet for me. It reminded me of buying Japanese candy without knowing what it is since I don't actually speak Japanese. Most of the time, it turns out to be awesome, but every once in a while, I encounter something that just doesn't work for me. I ended up with two decants left over after filling decant circle requests, and I was very excited because I thought this was going to be my big winner since I love orange blossom and am going through a ylang ylang phase, but, well, I'm keeping one of the decants to remind myself why I didn't get a bottle or even keep the other one when everyone raves about this oil. *So* sad that it doesn't work for me!

In the bottle and as I was decanting, I had high hopes for this one. Woody, spicy honey. Perfect. This might be the one that gets upgraded to a bottle. Flash forward to this morning. I needed to empty a bottle for a decant circle. I had meant to empty Penis Admiration, but it turned out I had grabbed Ronin. I didn't realize this until I had slathered myself with the last couple of drops left in the dropper. I had been expecting a sweet-ish vanilla-y floral, which is the sort of scent I can apply with a heavy hand like that. The problems with slathering Ronin: Black pepper, white sandalwood, and six hours in a small room. I amp black pepper like you wouldn't believe, sandalwood can trigger a headache (fortunately, not this time) and both of these notes make me cough. Plus I kept getting dizzy, although I'm not sure whether it was due to the perfume or other issues like my lack of lunch. On the up side, it *was* the last bit of a bottle (about a decant plus a tester, if I recall correctly), so I'm not stuck with a full bottle of an oil I can't wear.

That reminds me of the time in 2008 when I was working for a film festival that was showing a French/British/Lebanese movie called _Under the Bomb_ about the aftermath of Israel's 2006 bombing of Lebanon. Customs seized it because the canisters had the word "Bomb" on them, and we had to either cancel or move one of the screenings. I ended up with quite a few partial bottles after decanting, and I'm pondering decanting the rest for sales/swaps and keeping the bottles just for the labels instead of putting the partials up. I don't usually do this, but some of them are too awesome to at least not seriously consider it.

Ick. It wasn't much upon application. Then I started getting tiny wafts of absinthe and orange blossom as the day progressed, but they were buried under this weird feeling of having the back of my throat coated with guy-friendly soap. And this doesn't *smell* like soap, but that's the feeling I end up with. I can practically *taste* it. This feeling/taste is just something I can't get past to even put it in the oil burner like I usually do with scents that I don't feel like wearing again but think would be nice as a room scent. Do not want to cross paths with this one again.

Somebody on LJ said (after talking on the phone to the museum shop) that they will be getting a new stock in soon! w00t! Evidently, they'd never experienced such a rush of interest in anything they sell, LOL! Welcome to BPAL fandom! Oh, I hope so! I was one of the internet orders that got an email an hour later that they had sold out from phone orders. Hopefully Ü will be winging its way to all of us very soon. Per wickedgoddess on Twitter:

Dang it. I was hoping for nice, soothing lavender with some extra added goodness. My skin instantly converts it to fairly generic aftershave. *Nice* generic aftershave, but, still, aftershave. Very much not for me.

I don't get plastic, I don't get nasty vanilla, I don't get almond, and I don't get Play-Doh. I just get soft, creamy (vanilla, yeah, but not candle vanilla), light florals with a teeny tiny hint of coconut. It's very lovely and girlie. Unfortunately, I don't do lovely and girlie. This might smell to me exactly what it smells like to Snow White-lovers, but it's just not my thing, much like I have zero interest in French manicures. I thought this might be my reaction, though, so I'm not disappointed. I'm actually relieved that I was finally able to correctly predict this for a change. ETA: It's still going strong the morning after, and this is even after a shower. I like it less and less the longer it sticks around. I'm hoping I can smother it because I am fortunately in the mood for something heavy.

Um. So. This reminds me of a certain sex toy cleanser I encountered a few years ago. It;s a pleasant scent, but I keep wondering how many other people smell it and think it smells familiar. So very glad I have the Spell of Amorous Love for future cherry blossom needs.

I got a bottle of Tanin'iver when it was DC'd in July-ish (so about six months ago), and it had the dragon label, so if they *were* changed to the GC labels, I'm thinking it happened after that.

The dry, glorious warmth of the Savannah. A golden, spiced amber, proud, regal and ferocious. I don't know how long I've had this one in my collection (probably a couple of years. I think this was a Lab frimp, so I'm not sure when I got it since it's not in my order history file), but I finally got around to trying it today as part of my Mad Tea Party month. Wet, I get a spicy woody thing. Nice, but not really my speed. After about an hour or so, it goes all powdery, as amber pretty much always does on me. *Really* not my speed. I'm really glad I put this on in the evening so I'm not being forced to live with it all day.

Sunbird. It's got some brown in it, but I get a hell of a lot of purple, too. Maybe raisin, but as a color, not a scent, if that makes sense. I actually don't smell raisins in there at all even though I seem to recall that they're in there.

Ooh, I had to dig out my decant of this after your post and do the same! I really like fresh-new-start things like that. And since I'm just hanging out at home today, the fact that this is just minty dirt on me isn't going to freak anyone out! And speaking of fresh new starts, for my birthday in twenty days, I will be wearing Queen Alice. Last year and the year before, it was just plain Alice, but I needed a change for multiple reasons, and Queen Alice will fit the bill nicely (chances are high this is going to be the only way in which my birthday is observed other than maybe a text message from my kid brother, so I really had to think this one over to make sure I picked the right perfume).