Loligo

MABON 2010 The Autumnal Equinox. The Second Harvest of the witches: a celebration of rest after labor, and repose after the rigors of Initiation. This is the mark of the completion of the Harvest and giving thanks for the previous season's abundance. In ceremonial magick, this is a time to begin the search for one's Higher Self anew, to celebrate rebirth and new life, and to revitalize the spirit. It is an Osirian time, contractive and catabolic. At this time, the Eleusinian mysteries were observed, celebrating the drama of Kore and Demeter. Blackberry wine and apple with hops, English ivy, rosemary, hazel, sage, chamomile, sweetgrass, oak bark, wild nuts, and myrrh. I've never been first to review a scent before -- hope I do this right! I am thoroughly in love with this. LOVE. When wet, there's a burst of fruity-winy juiciness that almost tips over into Kool-aid territory, but luckily that tames down pretty quickly. It becomes the dry, aromatic blackberry scent that I love in Glasgow. Blackberry is somehow... spacious. It has a lot of throw on me, that's part of it, but also, it just feels somehow vast and airy in my nose. Anyway, I'm a blackberry fan. The nuts provide a richness in the background, and the herbs are so well-blended that I can't pick any of them out individually. (Maybe some other time when it's not allergy season?) The overall effect is fruits and nuts and incense-y sun-warmed hay, and it is gorgeous.

Gloss Deep brown-red: the color of dried blood. I can't believe I'm the first to review something! Wow! (Have I missed this topic somewhere?) Lady Macbeth surprises me by being quite a bit cooler in tone than either the description or the color swatch. Instead of a rusty brick-red, it's more a burgundy or maroon when it's on my fingers. It's also quite changeable depending on the light -- sunlight brings out the red (including minuscule flecks of red shimmer), while fluorescent brings out the purplish-brown aspects. It's quite nice, although I was hoping for something rustier. The glossiness is smooth and gorgeous.

Oh, boo. I've grown cempoalxochitl in my garden before, and they are glorious. Even though florals usually don't work on me, I had to try a decant of this to see if it captured that incredible scent. There's definitely a fresh/spicy marigold-like tang to this scent in the beginning, but it quickly turns to dryer sheets and soap on me.

It's like The Unicorn crossed with Johnson & Johnson's Baby Shampoo. Which is not a bad way to smell, but not something I'm going to reach for very often.

I'm so glad this works on me! I would have hated to trade away that fantastic title, and the little pink crawdads on the label art. It started out as cooked blueberries (yeah, I'd go with canned pie filling), along with a bitter note almost like grapefruit, and I was very scared at first, but pretty soon it mellowed into currant ginger tea, with a hint of vanilla musk smoothness. Lovely! I've only had it on for around two hours, so I don't know how long it lasts yet.

The initial fruit notes are strong and sweet, but then I get something dusty and bitter that grows and grows, until the overall effect is melon and grapefruit plus sawdust and dry rot.

Oh, this came *so* close. For the first hour or two it was a beautiful, light, fresh, sweet scent -- so well-blended that I couldn't pick out the notes. It's very rare for a light scent not to go all harsh and fake on me, so I was so, SO happy to have finally found one... until later in drydown, when the peach went sour and rotten. So sad! Oddly, I never picked up more than a tiny wisp of either patchouli or cocoa.

For the first half hour this is pure pencil shavings (cedar does that on me), but it eventually settles down into the warmest, darkest vanilla you can imagine, like if you could make a mink coat out of vanilla.

For the first two hours, this scent is WHOA ORRIS. It's like a drier, dustier version of Numb. Finally. several hours after application, I am starting to pick up some amber and vanilla, but the dusty floral powder is still there, too.

I love Absinthe, I love all kinds of sugar notes, I'm okay with opium... but all I get after the first few minutes is stinky rose water with a hint of plastic-y smoke. ::weeps::

It smells like Pez. Yes, Pez candy. Why, WHY?? How can something with rosemary in it smell like Pez? I'm going to keep this for a while and see if it smells different once my allergies have died down.

Bizarre -- I don't pick up any wintergreen/mint at ALL. I would never have expected to see that crop up in so many reviews! This is a very straightforward scent on me: vanilla, cream, and the ever-so-slightly sour and musky spiciness of saffron. If I pulled those ingredients out of my cupboard and fridge, I'd get exactly this.

Cream accord, amber, teak, and lotus blossom. Outstanding and absolutely unique. The way the sweet cream plays off the dry, spicy wood is unexpected and wonderful. I pick up very little amber and lotus here -- they just add sweetnees and smoothness.

I am in love with this! It's the most evocative Christmas smell ever -- spicy and fruity with lighter rose and evergreen notes. It makes me think of a Victorian Christmas, somehow. I haven't actually tried it in the bath yet, just rubbed it all over myself in the shower, but it's lovely and moisturizing that way.

The opening is just generic "perfume", but after about half an hour it becomes something amazing that keeps my nose glued to my wrist. If I had to describe it (which I guess I do now ), I'd call it a cool, floral vanilla; looking at the note list, I think it's probably a magical combination of the amber, carnation, lemon balm and peony.

Absolutely gorgeous! It reminds me a lot of Queen of Clubs, even though it doesn't share that many notes with it. I mostly get plum, ylang ylang, beeswax, and incense, but there's also something that smells really earthy -- but not typically musky -- and that's what binds it all together and makes it work for me. I have a pretty crappy hit rate with BPAL, and so I'm always so delighted to find something that truly works for me!

This is really nice. It's like a sister to Buck Moon: on me they both have a dusty, sun-warmed musk base, but whereas Buck Moon is rounded out with grasses and trees, this one has herbs and flowers. (And a teeny bit of fruit, but I get very little citrus from this, thank goodness, and what I do get is more the bitter scent of peel rather than the sour fruit smell that can go bad on me.) I wish there were a bit less musk and bit more of the other stuff, but still, it's a keeper.

I quite like this. It reminds me of something they sell at the local health food store, called "energy nuggets": dense cubes of cocoa/carob, dried fruits, and sunflower seeds. This blend is smoky, spicy, and earthy, while still having fruit/food notes in it.

Musky dill pickles -- that's all I get from this, start to finish. Alas!

It starts out pure chocolate mint -- not mint chocolate the food item, but chocolate mint the herb. (If you have an herb garden you must plant this! It's amazing stuff! I like to go weed the chocolate mint bed just for the amazing scent it gives off when you brush up against it, and it tastes pretty good, too.) Over the first hour the clove note grows until it's a clove/spice/herbal blend with just a touch of chocolate sweetness. It doesn't last quite as long as I would like, but it's not one of those instant evaporators, either.

Man, I wish I had waited to read reviews before ordering this. I bought it for the apricot, and there's not a lick of it, that I can smell. In fact, this blend has the biggest disconnect between listed notes and actual smell of anything I can think of. You know what it smells like? Chinese medicinal herbs. And I don't just mean vaguely reminiscent, I mean I have a bottle of K'An Herbals "Curing Formula" in my cupboard that smells almost identical to this. It's not a bad smell -- an interesting combination of sweet, pungent, dusty, and green -- but it's just not perfume to me, it's medicine.

Blech! There's a weird note in here, something musky, almost spoiled or rancid. I had to wash it off. ::sigh:: When BPAL foody scents work on me, they're amazing, but many of them smell off on me, in unusual ways (like the rotting celery in Spooky...).

Very subtle and elegant -- not something I ever thought I would say about a vanilla perfume! It's warm and rich, but not particularly sweet, and the warmth combines with the opening aquatic notes to create something that kind of reminds me of the beach. I do wish it lasted longer on me, though.

For me, this is generic BPAL, but not in a bad way. It's the smell of my BPAL box. It combines a sweet fruity floral with incense and resins and vanilla and spices -- all the scents that work on me, in one. However, this leaves Temple Viper feeling kind of... undistinguished.

At first this scent is all tart, juicy berry, but it soon turns to nasty air freshener, like in a gas station restroom. After 3-4 hours that fades away, and I get a nice smoky, spicy vanilla throw from it, but if I stick my nose close, I can still catch traces of the foul chemical note. ::sigh:: Scratch another Snake Pit blend.