shriekingviolet

As I'm sure many of you have noticed, the forum has been down since Saturday evening. No this wasn't planned downtime (I would have told you all about that if it were), we had some unexpected, major problems occur in the database that were either due to Mercury in retrograde or a failing hdd (or both). As a result, there were three major tables that had to be repaired and given their size, that took hours upon hours to run functions on. And then even that wasn't successful so we had to take even more time to restore week old copies of the compromised tables, which means a LOT of data was lost including a weeks worth of posts and affected topics. I greatly apologize for so many posts missing, but there was nothing to be done and at this point, no way to recover them. We are working on getting the database to back itself up much more frequently than weekly so in the future if something like this happens again, the data loss won't be so great. I know that's a great inconvenience for many of you, especially where reviews and swaps are concerned. It couldn't be helped.

So far, as far as I know *knocks on wood,* the only lost information is in topics and posts that have been created since Feb 26 and everyone's read/unread markers. Everyone's member accounts, reward points, pms, etc. should be unaffected. There might be a few error messages here and there, though I tried my best to find them. If you do run across one, copy down what it says, and then pm me with it and where it happened. Just give me some extra time to respond. Fixing the forum has been a small nightmare and I need a little rest time. It's amazing I didn't try to hang myself with the power cord sometime in the last 72 hours.

Anyway, on to the few tidbits of good news. I had a forum upgrade planned waiting in the wings which I took care of this afternoon as I figured it'd be easier to do it while the forum was down than schedule more downtime. There are a handful of new neat features (like a list of similar topics on the bottom of each topic page, a list of members who've viewed that topic that day, an icon with all members posts that allows you to easily search for all posts that member has made in that topic, among others) for your use.

Also we've reopened the forum raffle for the time being. We still don't have a concrete plan as to what will be done with any extra money because I haven't had a chance to discuss this with my accountant (been too busy working to get the forum back up!) about what the IRS is going to think about all this, but quantum spice and I have reassessed our forum budget and decided that as the money is coming in greater quantity than we thought, we might as well set a monetary goal that would cover the cost of all the little wishlist items we've always want for the forum but couldn't afford before (like chat, a good gallery, blog features, moving to a dedicated server early). The ticket sales are set to cap after another 555 tickets are sold, but provided the chat with my accountant goes well that cap will be lifted.

I think that's all for now. Welcome back guys!

I *think* the automatic reward points issuer is fixed (thanks to some help from allidavie! ) and we've issued back points to quite a few people and now it's just a matter of figuring out what and who we might have missed. If everyone can peek at their point total (which can be viewed with your posts) and contact me if you think it's less than it should be and by how much. I'll try to get the situation rectified ASAP.

Thanks!

I'm going to do some security updates (software wise) on the forum early next week, and will do a fresh install on the reward points script and hope that stops the stagnation on points. At which point, I'll go back and attempt to add missing points.

There was an error in the table that let people log in, not sure how it occured, but it happened. Was very easy to fix but unfortunately I didn't come online to notice anything was wrong until hours after the problem first appeared. Sorry guys! Guess I need a pager like an ER doctor, eh?

Initial Impression:

Good lord it's caramel! Smoky caramel with maybe a hint of berriness from the currant.

After Wearing It:

Wet this smells of caramel and tobacco goodness. The caramel is very rich and sweet without smelling toothachingly sweet, and the tobacco is just gorgeous. Smells sweet, deep and smoky, without a trace of any stale cigarette stench. There's a whiff of something like coffee too, that gives the caramel a bit of bite to it. For the first hour, Red Lantern is very foody, yet it's not quite dessert-like. It's like if the essence of food snobbery was condensed into a smell this would be it. It's the caramels that are too good to give to children or anyone who finds any satisfaction eating anything made by Kraft.

Very slowly, other notes start to show up to the party. The coconut is the first to join up and it's acclimated into the circle quickly. The tobacco, caramel, & coconut combination makes Red Lantern smell very reminiscent of Elegba, but it's far less boozy and much lighter. The next to come to play is amber, heating the scent and fuzzying it up. There's something like hazelnut next that's a wisp of a thing. Leaves an impression and a texture, but otherwise not much of a presense. The opium and the spice doesn't kick in until at least 2.5 hours into the life of the scent, but when they arrive they subtly turn the blend into a cloud of sweet incense smoke that's richly appealing.

From the onset, Red Lantern gave me an impression of an intimate gathering in an opulent setting. Hushed voices whispering together, heads bent close, enthralling each other with their knowledge and wit. It has a feel of a intellectual salon for sensualists rather than a brothel. Information and secrets are the aphrodisiac here, the intoxicant, and not the promise of flesh. It's sensual in that it's luxurious and langourous, with its dim lighting and the plush velvet cushions. It's even sexy, but in a more intellectual sort of way. Like being attracted to a plain looking stranger for the depth of knowledge he carries, and can share with you if you can entice him. But it's not carnal and it's not bawdy, it's... deeply promising.

Final Thoughts:

I love this so much! Very tempted to go snag another bottle of it right now. Quite possibly one of my favorite scents ever. A must buy!

Initial Impression:

Sweet booziness with a background of dirty musk.

After Wearing It:

Wet this smells really dirty and gritty. I definitely can smell a similarity to the opening moments of Smut to Sed No Satiata, which in its first hour was giving me mental images of being in the front row watching angry women mud wrestle in a seedy bar. Smut doesn't smell quite so dirty/muddy, it's more musky and sweaty. The musk is heavy and almost bestial and there seems to be a dirtier vein of patchouli here. I smell a little booze but not much. If I had to guess on what type I'd say it was something darker like bourbon, because there's not much sweetness at all. Definitely cannot smell the sugar.

For the first hour or so, Smut is very, well, smutty. It's sex but not sex with affection or even much sensuality. Not sex that's about seduction or mutual pleasure, but blind hunger and a good amount of selfishness. It's dirty, raw, and somewhat mindless. The scratching, pushing, taking and panting parts of sex that seem to serve as a reminder of how much genetic information we have have in common with hairier species. It's the kind of sex that would be more alarming than embarrassing or arousing to walk in on because it might even look nonconsensual until you notice both are definitely participating. The scent is definitely more than a little disconcerting as it ravages my chemistry.

Ahhh but then the afterglow kicks in, the happy, sweet relief that comes in when you've finally satiated that hunger, that craving. It's like that immediate alleviation you feel after you start eating after starving all day even though the food hasn't have a chance to nourish your cells yet. The sugar finally kicks in and it has a vanilla tinge to it. It smooths and soothes the strained heat that smut had been for the past 90 minutes or so. It brings in a surprising amount of care and cuddling with it, providing the calm after the initial storm of desire. It's still sexy and sensual, but it's not as powerful, its needs are not immediate. And yes it does smell a little like Snake Oil, but softer, muted like it's been wrapped in flannel sheets. Very gorgeous and I love it!

Final Thoughts:

Wonderful scent! Perfect embodiment of smut, great job Beth! Couldn't have captured the essence better. And doesn't smell at all like Devil's Night to me, that was sweeter overall and more boozy.

Wow this is my first review in ages. I haven't had time to give a scent enough proper attention so that I felt comfortable reviewing it in a while, but I felt compelled to do it for the people still on the fence!

I meant to post about this on our actual anniversary date which was Monday the 16th, but I was still working on the new skin sets I wanted to release as something new to mark our milestone. I finished working on them earlier tonight (you can switch skins using the dropbox in the bottom lefthand corner, it's one new design available in 4 different color schemes), so I'm finally going ahead and break out the streamers and the confetti and saying "Happy Anniversary guys!"

We've gone through a lot in the past two years. We've survived a quick change in management (those who've been around since the beginning will remember that I did not have a hand in the founding of the forum, but took over a month later), been at three different internet addresses, lived on four different servers, suffered through three major upgrades in software, had a handful of major outbreaks of drama, and experienced major life changes that we've helped each other through. We've witnessed major growth for the company our forum revolves around, friendships formed, and regional gatherings organized. Later this spring, we may even see a miniconvention of sorts of forumites as dozens of us make the journey to New Orleans to visit the Lab while they participate in Convergence 12. May it be the first of many!

We've had over 3,000 members come to join our ranks, made over 400,000 posts in over 16,000 topics. Our bandwidth (which was the main reason that the founder gave the forum up in the first place) has grown from about 6 gb a month to 60-70 gb a month. Those numbers are quite reflective of our success as a community, but I think my favorite forum statistic is that of the 88 people who joined the forum during that first week of being open, 52 of them still visit the forum. That's 59% which I think is pretty amazing given the transient nature of internet communities and the short attention span of many consumers. I think that speaks volumes for the sense of community people experience here.

I want to thank my mod staff, to whom I will be forever in debt for their advice and aid in keeping the forum in order. I want to thank the Lab for encouraging the forum the way they have through their interaction and the offers of special perks like forum exclusive scents to our members. But most of all I want to thank everyone who has posted here other the past 24 months, as the forum could not have grown to what it has become without all of you. A product line alone, even one as extensive and wonderful as the Lab's, could not has driven a forum to become this large. It takes a lively community full of fun and friendly people to create an environment which makes people want to spend their time and share their thoughts in ways that keeps people coming. You guys have been great and have made the occasional frustrations worth bearing through. And for that I am grateful!

Happy anniversary everyone!

Yes, I'm aware of the issues with the reward points calculator. I haven't figured out exactly what the issue is as it hasn't broken down completely (which be easier to find errors on ). I may not be quick to find a solution as I just went back to school last week and time has been a little cramped, but don't worry, points for rewards and reports made while your points were stuck will be granted retroactively when we get a handle on it.

If in the meantime you wish to use your points and have been keeping track of your own, just submit a request to me with such information.

Thanks!

My tinkering around tonight caused a few problems with may or may not be noticable for mods. I'm about ready to pass out so I'm heading to bed without trying to figure them out. I'm no good for thought right now! So please excuse the mess. I'll deal with it tomorrow.

Ah, and if everyone could lay off the report button for today as that's one of the things that needs fixing, I'd appreciate it.

The board will be down at around midnight CST tonight while I get some work done. It hopefully won't take *too* long.

I'm using my fall break to visit Sarah (retail therapy mod) in D.C. so I'm going to be gone from tomorrow to next Monday night. I will have internet access, but I wouldn't count on me being around to answer any emails or pms, so please either wait until I get back or pm quantum spice instead.

I trust you'll all do just fine without me.

zenvodunista is talking about Lynx, I think. Don't remember if there's more to her name or not.

Miss Lynx perhaps?

hahaha and so that is a cat on her avatar! for some reason, it kept looking like a seal to my eyes. I think it's because the whiskers are so long and with the cat's head bent and out of sight, the neck looks like a muzzle!

Ah! and there's now a spellcheck option for the quick reply form and the standard editor reply. We're working on getting it to work in the rich text editor!

Welcome back everyone! The upgrade went fairly smoothly. No major problems encountered apart from lethargy on my part. There's still a little work I'll be doing in the next few days on this, so don't be alarmed if things seem to change a bit while you're surfing.

As last upgrade (for those of you who were with us a year ago) for the next month, I'd prefer all questions/comments regarding the new software or possible bug reports to be submitted to me via pm and not on the forum at large. Just easier for me and I'd appreciate your cooperation.

Now on to known bug listings, missing features, moved items and new features lists:

Bugs:

• Previously read topics marked as unread. This is a temporary problem, the way cookies are handled by the board changed from 2.0 to 2.1, so things were reset. As you use the forum, that will fix itself over the next week or so. Using the "mark forum as read" option will help this!
  
• Rich-text editor doesn't always work properly for Mac user, especialy those who browse with safari. (see new features)
  
• Reward Points are now public as the new mod doesn't have an option to make them private. Also it will look like you have 2 points levels. I'm in the process of moving your old (higher) counts to the new system, but it'll take a few days. Once I'm done, we'll dump the old field.
  

Missing Features (i.e. previously installed code mods that were here before, but aren't now):

• Topic View History
  
• Favorite Topic Sorting Option
  
• Go invisible/visible option on the member bar (you can still change your visibility status if you relog in)
  
• More feature-rich fast reply panel
  
• pre-set pm preferences as to whether you want the "Add a copy of this message to my sent items folder" and "Track this message?" boxes checked automatically.
  

Those are just the ones I remember offhand, and as I said in the last announcement, I'll reinstall those as the code for them is rewritten to be made compatible for 2.1.

Moved Features:

• Mark as Read and Subscribe to This Forum/Topic links are now apart of a drop down menu on at the top of the forum/topic that you can get to by clicking the link marked "options."
  

New Features

• Drastically different posting screen. Especially if you decide to use the rich text editor option (which you can select under 'board settings' in your control panel)
  
• Rich text editor option for non-quick reply posting which acts as a WYSIWYG editor. I realize that description may not make much sense to non-geeks, but just play around with it and you'll get the idea. This feature seems to have shaky Mac support (though the forum software was written and tested on a Mac, so it must work somehow), and two of the mods have told me it doesn't work with Safari. I can't test or tweak that since I have no access to a MAC, so I'll take their word for it. The standard editor still works fine for you guys though!
  
• New poll and new topic screens merged. If you intend to start a poll, you'll click "new topic" and underneath the area where you input the title and subtitle, there's a link that reads: manage poll options. Click it and go from there.
  
• Multiple question polls
  
• Quicker editing options for posts.
  
• Re-designed my assistant that doesn't involve a separate pop-up window
  
• New method of new pm alerts!
  
• New reward point counter in the review area which I'm in the process of updating so that all of your points are in that counter rather than the older one. This spells out for MUCH less work for me and means you get points for each review as soon as you write them.
  
• New calendar system. It's isn't finished yet, but there will be 4 separate calendar views: the birthday/holiday calendar, the lab's calendar, the mod forum calendar (where we'll leave notes regarding downtime and mod vacations, etc.), and the member calendar where you all can add your own events!
  

That's all I can think of off the top of my head. I'm sure I'll add to the list as I think of them or I'm reminded when people ask! I didn't bother listing all of the new features on the administration end as they're of no benefit to you, but there are many that will make it easier for us to run things.

Thanks for your patience when things have been done and for your patience in learning the new software!

After I get settled after to work tomorrow night (which will be about 8 Central, 6 Pacific, 7 Mountain, 9 Eastern, 2 am Tuesday in the UK, and Tuesday morning for our ladies in Australia), I'll shut down the forum and start the upgrade process which should take 12-24 hours (that figure does include meal and sleep breaks for me, btw), so hopefully the board should be up and running by mid Tuesday evening. If for whatever reason it takes longer, I'll leave a note on the index page explaining the delay.

As I said, while I don't project that this should take larger than a day, please save any information you might need if the board is down for an extended period of time on your computer.

The new forum won't have a few of the features this one does as they're ones I installed myself (e.g. the favorite topic filter, the topic view history) and there haven't been new releases of those code modifications and there are enough differences in the files and structure that I can't easily adapt them myself. I didn't want to wait until updates for these mods were released because there's no telling when that will happen, and a few of the new forum features will save me a LOT of time. Plus, I will be going on vacation in mid October and I'd like people to be pretty settled with the new features before I leave to minimize the confusion. But rest assured, those mods will be installed as soon as they're released as I liked them and used them a lot myself.

That all said, if there's any reason you absolutely need to get a hold of me during the downtime, you can reach me at shriekingviolet [at] bpal [dot] org.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it's that time of year again! A major update has been released for our forum software and I will be upgrading it sometime in the next few weeks. I expect there will be at least 12 hours of downtime, but I do want to stress that is on the low end of estimations. Since it is a major upgrade that involves a lot of changes to the database, there is a high possibility of hitting a snag along the way that would hold up the process. Gods know when we upgraded to 2.0 last October, what I was hoping would be a long evening of work turned out to be a two day nightmare. So I'm determined to not jinx things with too much optimism, but I am doing as much to prepare for the upgrade so that I can minimize the time to forum is closed. Hopefully it'll be enough to make sure that things are down for no longer than a day.

I don't have a hard date yet as to when the upgrade will happen, but I'm aiming for the middle of next week (say, Tuesday?) or the week after that. When I'm sure that things are as ready as I can get them, I'll let you know and give you all at least a day's warning. In the meantime though, I'd like you all to gather up any information (for swaps, etc.) that you'd need if the forum was down for longer than planned so that way no one is caught unaware.

Thanks!

It should also be noted that "Best Price" is essentially a silent auction, and we don't do forum auctions here anymore.

Just wanted to put this out there since I get at least one email every two weeks or so that was never intended to be sent to me:

When you reply to email notifications, be they pm notifications or topic reply notifications, your message does not go to anyone but me. This email doesn't have any connection to the forum software once it's sent out so your replies go to the email connected to the forum software which is mine. Replying to a pm notification won't get a message to the person who pmed you and replying to a topic notification won't add a post to the topic it's sending you alerts about. They just go to me! Which isn't necessarily that big of a deal for a response to a topic, but I would imagine you may not want me to be the recipient to all of your pms! I try not to read them, but it's not always apparent until I'm halfway through the message that it wasn't intended for me!

So please keep this in mind when you read emails sent to you by the board. There's no reason to ever reply to one.

A week huh? I'm planning I downing ballz and yellow jackets so I can finish it this weekend.

But to reinterate how to use the spoiler tags it's:

[sp]
OMG Voldemort was bludgeoned to death very slowly with wiffle bats and Snape and Flitwick eloped.  BEST BOOK EVER!!!
[/sp]

which will produce:

Initial Impression:

A strong coffee note with a hint of hazelnut and whiskey.

After Wearing It:

Wet this smells like hazelnut coffee. Strong, black and freshly brewed. Pleasant, but not especially so as I don't like coffee much. Don't drink it, don't really like the smell of it in the air unless it's flavored/scented sufficiently so it's not so rough. The hazelnut note keeps this from being a little too much though so it's wearable.

As it dries I can smell the dusty notes come in and it makes it smell better somehow. I wouldn't say Barnes and Noble as that evokes too clean and polished an image for me. This is a funky but slightly dirty coffee shop somewhere. The kind where the staff is questionable and you'd be afraid to see the report a health inspector would write up if he ever made a visit, but there's something about the place whether it's the ambience or its great pastries that makes it a popular spot for people to begin their day. This is the perfect scent of a crowded neighborhood coffee shop at 8 am, the scent of brewing coffee thick in the air, the smell of damp and musty newspaper, of well worn paperback books.

After about an hour or so, Miskatonic University loses its coffee shop feel and it sweetens immensely. The coffee backs off quite a bit and the dust note all but disappears. The new scent? BAILEYS!! It's very creamy, with a slight coffee/chocolate/mint tang, very boozy but with little to no burn. Very smooth and lovely. The boozy note doesn't smell much like whiskey. It smells more like the rum note in Egg Nog, which works very well. I keep wanting to eat my arm!

Final Thoughts:

I was kind of iffy about ordering this one as I'm not wild about coffee scent, but I'm utterly enamored with M.U. The last few hours of the scent were completely perfect and I wish I had ordered more of it. It'd make a fab room scent!

Oh and since I forgot to say so before, I added a dozen or so more avatars for public comsumption. Here's hoping a few of you using the kitty/meow avatar will switch over and I'll quit thinking you're all the same gal.

I've finally finished fine-tweaking the third version of the forum guidelines and they are up and ready to go!

I'm not requiring a 'ratification' this time as I've learned it's months of trouble to make sure that everyone has read them. So there's no need to pm me and let me know you've read them (unless you want to), but everyone will still be responsible for knowing and understanding the new content.

Plenty of what's in there should be no news to anyone. With the exception for important changes that are being made to the swap area (of which we started discussing here last week), most of the new content is simply putting in writing policies we were already employing but weren't in the guidelines or things we had thought were intuitive/just common sense for most people, but found that we should probably have it down in the guidelines just to be clear. There's also some elaboration in sections that were already there, to make the guidelines even more clear than they previously were.

I recommend that everyone read the whole guidelines all the way through again, just to refresh your mind over our policies as well as to read the new content. But as I do know they are pretty long, below is a list of new and edited sections. Sections that are completely new are in red.

• Moderators and How (and Who?) to Contact Them
  
• Posting Guidelines
  
• Warnings
  
• Member Abuse
  
• Swap Guidelines (part of which are on a separate, linked page btw)
  
• Rules and Guidelines for E-tailers
  
• Regarding Questionable Content Concerning Your Company on the Forums
  
• Rewards System
  
• Forum Descriptions
  

If you have any comments or questions about the new guidelines, feel free to send them to quantum spice or me.

Now go read!

Initial Impression:

Slightly tangy/sour smell of warm milk.

After Wearing It:

Wet this smells a lot like yogurt. Thick, sour and slightly yeasty. Not very pleasant at all. Thankfully this doesn't last. The strong yogurt smell wanes and thins, starting the smell more like true warm milk. It's a very light scent which has almost no throw. It smells like baby formula or breast milk rather than cow's milk. It's very room temp and there's a powderiness about it that starts to morph into what I can only describe as that classic baby scent. A cross between what a baby straight from the bath smells like and what toy manufactures scent dolls with. Pleasant, but blends a little too well with a normal scent scent so that I can only smell the scent if I really concentrate and if I press my nose to the point of application.

Occasionally the sour note comes back which makes Milk Moon smell really "off." It will only last a few minutes at a time and then the light mint note comes by and makes it smell fresher and sweeter. I never smell any honey though, which was disappointing. I was really hoping it'd take a strong stand here.

Overall this scent does a good job conveying the feel of the symbolism of Milk Moon, it captures the kind of awe you feel after seeing a baby of a loved one (or your own) for the first time. It just seems so remarkably perfect, somehow. It's so tiny and vulnerable, but such a powerful statement about the cycle of life.

Final Thoughts:

Good scent overall though it has its share of its unpleasant moments. Even at its best though it's not really for me. Way too light and completely unobtrusive. It's a scent you can forget you ever put on, which is very contrary to why I love to wear fragrances. Will probably pass this one on.

Initial Impression:

Clean fruity scent. Slightly tart.

After Wearing It:

This is the perfect spring/early summer scent! I don't often catagorize scents in terms of seasonal wear and usually as likely to wear a heavier "winter" scent in August as I am in January. But Mi-go just smacked me hard in the forehand with it's natural affinity for warming temperatures and obscene amounts of sunshine. It's a fresh and cheery scent that begs to be worn with sandals and tanktops. Its clean fruit notes would feel stifled by a sweater. A winter coat would cramp its style.

It's funny, I wasn't sure how much I'd like Mi-go. I do really enjoy pomegranate scents, but I'm rather iffy about fruity scents in general. Particularly tropical ones. And the notes I was hoping would make the fragrance for me (the musks, the pink pepper and the ginger) never seemed to show up. But somehow Mi-go really worked anyway. The smell of pineapple can makes me nauseated, yet I rather enjoyed it mixed with the kiwi, pomegranate, and mango. It made mi-go smell like a sweet yet tangy fruit punch that was incredibly sensually refreshing. It felt satisfying the way a cool breeze on a hot day is satisfying, or the way ice water can taste as wonderful as wine after a long, sweaty afternoon. It's very energizing and delightful, and I find myself reaching for it a lot as the days get hotter even though I still have lots of new things to try. What a great surprise!

Final Thoughts:

If I didn't think I'd stop reaching for it much after September ends, I'd try to hunt myself down another bottle. But as I think I'll only be in the mood to wear this when it's warm, sticky and sunny, one will do. Very glad I took a chance with this.

Initial Impression:

Bright red and round. Slightly syrupy.

After Wearing It:

Wet, the pomegranate and red currant notes really jump out of this one. Very sweet, strong and juicy. After it dries on my skin, notes of fresh turned soil pop up as well, and oddly enough they smell quite good meshed with the red fruit notes. There's a bit of booziness to it too which I think might be the myrrh but I'm not sure. Overall though it doesn't smell as smooky as I would have thought from the description. Just a very odd yet pleasing mix of juicy/earthy.

As time goes on, this Queen keeps confusing me. After an hour and a half and for the rest of the fragrance I keep smelling chocolate. Not cheapy chocolate, or even the nice chocolate notes I've experienced in other lab blends before. It smells like gourmet chocolate filled with cherry cordial. It's very sweet, yet dark and dense. I keep thinking I smell a bit of german chocolate cake thrown in there too, or at least that what it feels like as the last of the soil notes from the opening stage of the fragrance leave their last impression. There's just a texture I associate with cake crumbs, that I smell here. It's very strange, in that it was completely not what I was expecting from the description or the reviews. And I've worn it three times just to make sure I wasn't just having a weird day, but I had the same experience each time. But it's yummy, so I wont complain. There are worse things to smell of, especially since I do like foody scents! And I can't smell a drop of rose during any stage of Queen of Clubs so that makes me even more grateful for how things turned out.

Final Thoughts:

Very nice! Completely not what I was expecting, but what does that matter? It's a nice rich red scent that would be perfect for fall. I'm keeping my bottle of QoC!