tielan

It smells delightfully sweet and marshmallowy in the imp, but when on my skin, it rapidly turns to plastic. Burned plastic.

L'Estate is a huge disappointment for me. Not because it's not a lovely scent: it is! Smooth and amber on my skin at first...and then it turns rashy. In less than 15 mins, I have a raised red splotch about the size of my two thumbs on my skin. It's gonna have to go, I'm afraid.

Signior Dildo was violets and herbal in the bottle, but five minutes after I put him on, he was gone! Violets, orris, narcissus, vanilla. All vanished in an instant! Signior Dildo gave me no pleasure at all.

Oh my gosh. This is a beeswaxy version of Fairy Wine, only it's not going all thin and sour the way Fairy Wine does on my skin. *inhales* Truly, I opened the bottle and fell in love with the scent. I could just pour this out all around my room and die happy. The roses provide the soprano, the wine is the alto, the frankincense the tenor and the beeswax the bass - an exquisite four-note harmony. Five minutes later: ARGH! What gives? Still some roses, still a dash of wine, but mostly the frankincense and beeswax. Still a nice scent, only not quite what I was expecting. I wonder if this would work better on me if I layered it with Whip.

This isn't just a whiff of the Orient like Black Lace - spices, incense, sandalwood - but a full-blown Indian temple crowded with worshippers to Shiva, their voices lifting in a constant babble of prayer. I get incense (probably the patchouli and sandalwood) and tobacco, and while the lime isn't distinct, I suspect it's what's anchoring this. The drydown is smoky and herbal, but a good, strong herbal - a branch of bay leaves being burned with a single tobacco leaf in the middle. I'll have to try this layered with Black Heart, which has incense-y fruity notes on me. Should prove interesting! I'd love to have a guy I could slather this on, and then jump!

A Favorite love poem? e e cummings Turkish delight? Oh yes! What's everyone's favorite semi-obscure (or underappreciated!) animal? I always liked the three-toed sloth myself. What is your favorite sign that spring is coming? The lack of need of two quilts on the bed. Are you a big Mardi Gras fan? What's your favorite part? Okay, here in Australia - or, at least, in Sydney - 'Mardi Gras' means the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, which happens in late February, early March around these parts. I don't really watch it, actually - I never hear when it's on until after it's happened. I have been knitting a lot lately, would something hand knit be nice for you? I love hand-knitted stuff: especially since we're going into winter down here in the southern hemisphere. What is your favourite kind of love story? Partners or equals growing into love over time and through experience, taking turns at being the leader, and supporting each other. both a contrast and a balance - a little of each. I like them to soothe the rough places in each other - to anchor each other and give each other wings to fly - the fixed star and the solid rock. Would anyone like receiving naughty/sexy things? No, thanks. who on the thread likes attending Ren Faires, SciFi/Comic Cons & the like? And do you dress up for them? Cons, yes. And I did some cosplay for the last one - I dressed up as Six from Battlestar Galactica. Do you need any accessories for your phone, computer, mp3 player, &c.? I have an iPod classic and I'm learning how to use it. I love music though - fanmixes, your favourite songs and artists, any style, any type. Used books/cds/dvds, etc? Definitely! For those of you with pets, would you like pet things? Toys, treats, etc? Only if they roll. My kitty isn't one for collars or catnip. She does like things that she can bat away and chase after, though. (The potential of a load of ping-pong balls...oh yes.) Interested in receiving gifts representative of Witch's country or culture? Absolutely! Anything you want to send is great. First five songs on the "Top 25 Most Played" list on iPod Top Five Most Played I Won't Say - from Disney's Hercules Anna Rose - Vienna Teng Horobushko - Bond Victory - Bond Explosive - Bond Top Five Most Played - not including Bond songs I Won't Say - from Disney's Hercules Anna Rose - Vienna Teng I'm A Fool - American Hi-Fi Blood Of CuChulain - The Boondock Saints Everyone Is Totally Insane - Dandy Warhols If you're a WoW player, do you have the Pandaren Monk and Lil' KT pets? Would you want them? Not a WoW player. I dodged that bullet. would you be interested in getting a mix CD from your witch? Oh yes! New music = love. What's your favourite candy? Fruity and sugary. I don't think I have any in particular. Think Geek plush microbes? Hee. I think they're cute as heck - but really, it would just gather dust. What about handmade sewn gifts? Any fabrics you wish to/need to avoid due to allergies, etc? I love sewn gifts - my last witch gave me an awesome cloth bag for carrying stuff around in! Kitchen gadgetry? Nah, don't need any. I can get it myself if need be. Nail polish? If you like - browns and dusky pinks are best for me. Do you like incense and/or scented candles, and are you able to burn them in your home? If so, what kinds of scents do you like? I can burn incense and scented candles, I just don't do very much of it. Boxes? For Bpal (bottles and/or imps) or otherwise Ooh, yes please! New question--I'm calling this "could never happen in a million years": Your Witch is perusing the wares at a local yard sale. S/he looks down and sees [insert impossibly rare item that you've always wanted but could never afford] with a $5-10 sticker on it. Sheepishly s/he takes it to the guy behind the folding table. "Do you know what this is?" s/he inquires. The gentleman states that it belonged to his mother/sister/grandmother/Great Aunt Beulah and he thinks it's for, like, hair or something. With a trembling hand, s/hes pays the man and heads home with the inconceivable riches. So, what is this unobtainable miracle your Witch found? A hand-operated mulcher - something that chops up leaves, twigs, stalks, etc. without chewing petrol. Toss it all in, turn the handle, and bingo! Mulch pieces for the garden! alcohol Don't think you'd get it past customs. Same with loose teas, or anything that might have seeds in it. bakery 1. chocolate eclair (evil evil evil) 2. green sugar and icing frog - look halfway down this page http://thebestjudge.com/2009/04/25/still-a-balfours-boy/ - I know, it looks disgusting, but it's the bestest thing EVER. 3. croissant (this is touch and go - some places have really amazing butter croissants, others just taste like they used the same dough mixture as the bread but made it puff pastry) 4. loaf of sourdough bread (I love good sourdough) 5. nenish tart (actually, I've only found one place that makes these really well - and by 'really well' I mean 'has a decent jam layer beneath the cream' - it was half a centimetre thick! steampunk? Love it, but don't have anything in it right now. recipes? Yes! Although I need to convert them to metric most of the time, that's okay. I love hearing about people's favourite foods. salted caramels Not sure I've tried them, but I'm perfectly happy to try anything you think I should try. coffee, tea, chocolate Would love any of the above! Just watch out with the tea - if it has seeds in it, Australian Customs will open it and inspect it - most chais I've been sent don't through Customs unmolested. Leaf teas are usually safe, though. Hair stuff? Sure! I'd love some new big comb-clips. My hair is thick and long and black and I snapped all my old http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:qTgsr_D...L500_AA280_.jpg hair clips except for one that's electric blue and goes with maybe two or three tops. Canned goods? Since I'm in Australia, probably not a good idea! OPI Alice? They look pretty cool, but I probably wouldn't use them all that much. Severed Finger? Can I specify whose severed finger? *looks innocent* Tiny things? Sure! I'd love a keychain! How do you feel about handmade stuffed animals? Anything handmade is awesome. I have a small collection of stuffed animals who are dotted around the landscape of my room, from Philly pandas to polar bears wearing pink hearts that say 'Australia Or Bust!' Are there any accessories you'd really like? Not that I can think of right now. What are your favorite animals? Cats. Without a doubt. So sleek and adorable and their little paddy paws and the way their ears swivel. Plus, they're fiercely independent, softly cuddly, and really cute to snuggle with on wet rainy days. If you were a student at Hogwarts, what house would you be in? Ravenclaw, I suspect. Astronomy? Actually, I've been looking for an astronomical map of the Southern Hemisphere for a while - we used to have this really neat 'star chart' that had a moving wheel to depict the stars and constellations visible from south-east Australia...don't know what happened to it. Star Trek? I love the nuTrek movie! Great story, great acting, great reboot, and I have a girl-crush on Uhura. Fave flowers: Oh this is tricky. Roses or Freesias for scent. Tulips for restrained elegance. Poppies for casual waywardness. Sunflowers or gerberas for cheerful charm. Eye color: Brown on brown. Dark brown. Stuff I collect other than BPAL: I used to collect stamps. I still collect book series I like... Otherwise, only little Swarovski crystal figurines, and, honestly, if my witch happens to find them cheap enough to fit in this round, she'd do better to resell them and make money for herself! Breakdown of spending: Not necessary. Unless my witch wishes to display her thriftiness, in which case, I shall be appropriately awed! If you like tea, what are your favorite kinds? Fruity, sweet, chai, plain, black, green, red, white? Chai. I love chai! Unfortunately, sending anything with seeds through Australian Customs is liable to either be confiscated or else opened and riffled through. Ever tried to drink apple cinnamon tea from tea-bags that have been stuck back together with yellow tape that says, "Australian Customs And Excise"? I wouldn't recommend it. The glue tastes awful. Patronus: A Chinese Dragon. Do you like gardening,growing vegetables, house plants? Need any small tools, seeds, labels? Dear witch, Much as I love gardening and growing things, unless you happen to be a fellow Australian (and possibly not even then - WA is under some fairly stringent interdictions in this area), anything you send me of a seedy nature is going to be confiscated by Australian Customs. Anything viable, anything that could be planted, anything they even think could be planted, anything that could carry pestilence, disease, or infection to these shores, is probably going to be taken away. As an example of the kind of obsessiveness of Australian Customs, a friend once sent me a box of cornbread mix from California. It got confiscated at Customs, we think because of the dried egg product that was listed as an ingredient in the mix. Now, exactly what danger dried egg products are going to be, I can't imagine, but it was 'no cornbread for T' which was very sad-making. So, uh, yeah. Nothing viable, green, seedy, or with eggs.

This is weird. Most of what I'm getting from Villain is an aniseedy kind of scent with a dash of musk. Very male. If this scent is truly a villain, he's the sexy, heartless kind that will seduce the heroine into bed against her better judgement (and for his own ends), and will get his come-uppance in the form of having to question his own motives at the end when she rescues the hero from him. Redeemable? Maybe. Possibly even a deeply flawed hero? A mustache-twirler, not a swashbuckler. Okay, now I'm getting the lavendar.

Intensely floral, turning thin at the end. Great throw, just not a scent I want to wear too much!

Osiris v4: I just tried this today while decanting, and on my skin, it's a more resinous Black Lace that fades very fast.

I'm not convinced there are "good people" in the world. Only people who make wise and stupid choices. Some people make many wise and some stupid choices. Some people make many stupid choices with only occasionally wise ones. Some people seem to make all-stupid choices. Of course, the standards of 'wise' and 'stupid' are variable according to the individual, their situation, background, ethics and morals, and the choices they've made in the past. Which means it's a whole lot of relativity and little absolutism. Then again, 'stupid' is not the same as 'evil', so maybe there's another layer in there. Is it evil to make self-centered choices? My sister would believe so. She's very oriented towards unselfish choices - to the point where she'll run herself into the ground rather than tell someone 'no'. That may be 'unselfish' but it's also 'stupid' - at least in my books. I believe if a little healthy selfishness - with the words 'little' and 'healthy' being key.

Persephone, Whip, Peacock Queen, Rose Moon, and Parliament Of Foules are my 'heavy' rose notes - I find that the rose doesn't go soapy on me when it's a heavier rose. Spellbound, Victoria, and Viola were good to start with, but they don't last very long. Helena and Harlot went soapy on me, though. I think it's the thinner rose notes - my chemistry needs notes that punch it in the face, and light, fresh rose doesn't do it so well...

Purrsnickety was lovely enough to get a bottle of this for me (among about a dozen others) and I agree - it's going to be a massive hit among the Cobwebs 3 Protos. I put this on and instantly had sandalwood headbutt me in the nose with the twin crowns of Egypt. Sandalwood is usually a bad thing on me - it amps-amps-amps leaving me smelling like a piece of old, musty furniture (at least in my head). This time, it's still there, but with a sweetness and creaminess to it. Edenssixthday was spot-on when she said it's got elements of Glowing Vulva about it - but on me, it takes on more of a woody aspect, possibly with a dash of something incense. I'm not getting the spiciness - but then, spices tend to go bland and flat on me, more's the pity. My brain just informed me that Osiris is the love-child of Glowing Vulva, Black Lace, and MB: Underpants with a little Indonesian handcrafted keepsake box thrown in. Lovely, but not really my scent, I think...

Alcohol and I are not the best of mates. He gives me a headache within an hour, I go red and blotchy, then I fall asleep on him, and he's nowhere to be found the next morning. Now speed this up to a matter of minutes, and this is Spiked Punch. Within five minutes of application, the alcohol has burned off, leaving me smelling like someone spilled their glass of fruit drink on me last night and I haven't changed clothing. *sniffs again* Actually, it's not as bad as I thought - in the last ten minutes it's transmuted to the kind of solid fruitiness that I look for from the usual fruity blends (and those always end up by going sour and stale on my skin after a few minutes).

I was sold this imp with a bunch of other rares thanks to a generous forumite (whose name I have sadly forgotten). This? Is like the best and tastiest parts of childhood junk food! It smells of hot popcorn with butter, creamy caramel thickshakes, and I want to say fairy floss, but that's probably just my imagination going back to days at the fairgrounds, pestering my dad for all the junk food we were never allowed to eat at home! One for the foodies, definitely, and smells divine, but I'm not sure that I'd wear this.

I bought this imp along with a bunch of other rares from a very generous forumite! This scent shows me what genius takes place in the lab! It's exactly what the label says - a pumpkin-flavoured cream-cheesecake filling in graham-cracker base! And it's really really delicious. That said, I'll probably never wear this. So I think it might go in the sales pile...

What styles of jewelry do you like? Bold and funky? Delicate and dainty? Short necklaces, long ones, chokers? Bracelets or anklets? Delicate and dainty rather than chunky and bold. But either is still good from my Witch! Does my witchee like hats, a floppy summer sun hat or something more stylish? Would you like a hand knit cap or hat? Australians all let us wear hats, the summer sun is hot! I never say no to a floppy summer sun hat. Don’t worry about being stylish - I can get a hat like that in any old shop! What kind of shopper are you? Do you make a budget? Planner, or compulsive? Do you like to buy what's new, special offers, only the usual? Compulsive, mostly, although when I’m trying to be more organised, I make a budget. Non-melting candies....what are your favorites? Someone I swapped with sent me a pack of Willy Wonka Nerds. Those were delish - I haven’t had them in years! But, yeah, fruit jellies most of the time - really anything fruity. What are you happiest about (besides SW)? What makes you feel good this summer? Any summer? For me, summer is the end of the year, Christmas, holidays, warm weather, and a growing garden - having summer in the middle of the year seems so strange to me! And, frankly, I’d be glad to be rid of this cold I’m presently down with. Do you like coffee and/or wine? Yes and yes. But I wouldn’t advise my Witch to send me any - the postage would be ridiculous. I’d love to send my Witchee a bottle of Australian red or white, but, again, ridiculous postage. What are your thought on World Market? Uh, what’s World Market? If you are a dog lover, or gigantic dog nerd like I am, would you like any breed-related items from this site? If so, which breed(s)? Alas! Cat person right here... A witch wants to cheer you up. What are we cheering you up from? In other words, what are the most pressing problems you're facing right now? Cold and flu, with accompanying exhaustion and despair. Who out there is equally challenged and would appreciate icons/banners as witchy gifts? No, but I can make icons/banners as witchy gifts... Have you read anything by China Mieville, Neil Gaiman or Charles de Lint? If so, what? Like/dislike...?? Nope. Nothing at all! Therefore no opinions at all.

Questions by my witch (who has been very busy!): Nail polish, yes or no? And if yes, what are your color preferences? Yes! Caramels and dusky pinks. Natural colours rather than bright ones, though. Who is your favorite book character from a book? Oh, this is a tough one - there are so many! Um... Okay, I'll narrow it down to three: 1. Phedre no Delaunay from Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel sextet: sexy, sub, and strong, with a thirst for knowledge and the wisdom to know when to use it. 2. Esmay Suiza from Elizabeth Moon's Serrano Legacy series: competent, conservative, and clever - I love that she grows into herself through the course of the last four books of the series. 3. Mara of the Acoma from Janny Wurtz/Raymond E Feist's Daughter of the Empire series: intelligent, political, and innovative - taking her House from the verge of extinction to the highest honour in the Empire. What is your biggest pet peeve? I have many. Uh, people who enter a debate, but don't bother running their posts through spellcheck. If you want people at a high standard to listen to your words, then you have to aim for their standard of writing and arguing. Someone might have an IQ of 163, but if they can't be bothered to use the basics of language and grammar in communication, then they might as well not be in the debate at all... And the general ones! Honey? Love it. All types and kinds. It would have to be vacuum-sealed though, and quite obviously clear, because I’m not sure if there are customs requirements that forbid honeys and stuff coming through to Australia. Coffee? I do love coffee, but it would have to be pre-ground; we don’t have a grinder, and short of tipping a whole bag of beans into the hopper at work, there’s no point in me getting smaller bags. Tarot art? Not really. The art might be interesting if it was in a style I liked - say, art nouveau - but divination is not my thing. Is your abode a palace covered in fur, a disaster area, or a neat freaks delight? A disaster area. The fur is incidental. My kitty, she is tabby and each individual fur is striped black and white and brown. No matter what I wear, I’m fairly certain to be doomed to have fur show up on it... Mailbox sitch? Uh, the way it works down here is that letters and most padded mailers go in the mailbox. If there’s a box that’s too big to fit in, then the local post office slips you a card to say, ‘come pick up your stuff’. If it’s a registered post, or something you have to sign for, then, again, the local post office slips you a card to say ‘come sign for your stuff’. BPAL storage? I could do with a box to keep my bottles in! The GC imps I keep in a partitioned toolbox by alphabetical name, with separate ones for the LEs and rares. It doesn’t look very elegant, but it’s functional and easy to carry along to M’nSs! I left my heart in... I've travelled a lot, but I've never left my heart anywhere. The cities of the world are great to visit and the wonders off the beaten track are beautiful to behold, but the only place that calls me back each time is home. I’m always travelling - I love being free! And so I keep leaving the sun and the sea. But my heart lies waiting over the foam... I still call Australia home!

For Witches, Sneaky Swap Fairies, and on the off-chance someone is looking for a gift for me! cosmetics, scents, creams, and unguents I am actually a very non-cosmetic person. BPAL is an addiction as much for the community and fun of it as it is for the lovely scents. That said, I do love scented/oiled bath bombs and will use them quite happily. Hand- and foot-creams likewise, but I always forget about body butters. My adored BPAL scents tend to be the expensive and rare ones, alas! However, some of my GC favourites include Persephone, Centzon Totochin, Bon Vivant, Salon II: Arrival At The Sabbath, and Whip. My Carnivale Diabolique favourites so far are Ashultum, Inez, Wulric Wolfman, and Priala The Human Phoenix. crafty things I would love knitted socks if you're a knitting kind of person. I would adore spun wool if you're a spinning kind of person. I do some quilting, mostly for friends and family - weddings and significant birthdays. I have a Dollfie, but she sits on the shelf and gets little-to-no love from me. I have a plethora of ponies (My Little Ponies) that I've always planned to do up, but have never actually worked on. Card-making, ATCs, and scrapbooking are things I enjoy doing, but don't actually do that much of. I ought to work more on it...in all the free time I don't have! books, reading, writing, art I do a fair amount of reading - mostly fantasy, sci-fi, and romance, although I’m also a sucker for a good mystery. I write a little - mostly fanfiction, although I've written some spec fic pieces before. If you write fanfiction, I would adore, pimp, and bless you for years for an action-adventure/drama Stargate Atlantis fic about John Sheppard and Teyla Emmagan. Art is a subjective thing, but I love a whole bunch of types and kinds, from the beautifully detailed paintings of the Romantics, to the fluid lines of Art Nouveau furniture and jewellery, to the lovely clean lines of cartoons, comics, and anime/manga. In the end, though, I'm reasonably 'mainstream' in my interests, so you shouldn't have trouble finding anything for me! I'm easy, honestly!

Beer? Not so much. Microbrews, etc. = interesting, but small amounts. I'm more of a wine/spirits girl. Actually, I'm more of a tea girl. Hot and strong, with plenty of milk and sugar! (And sometimes a dash of cream.) I kinda hope I get a witchee who likes hot tea! Favourite animals? Cats and felines, generally. Historical Art Styles? Art Nouveau, Art Deco, Steampunk, illuminated manuscripts of the Mediaeval times, Egyptian images/heiroglyphs, and Chinese scrolls. Scent currently wearing? I tried Baghdad this morning, but didn't like the muskiness. So I dabbed on some Butter Rum Cookie, and now I smell like boozy bakehouse. Mmm... Book collections? Cookbooks, definitely. Other than that...only the occasional cloth-covered book of poetry, prose, or 'wisdom'. And what I want to read, of course. Chips? Kettle chips (as a type, not the brand) - I like flavours such as 'sour cream and chilli' or 'sweet onion' or 'honey soy' - but plain is good, too! Posters: Would be lovely! Nature or art, large or small - whatever suits your fancy and I'll find somewhere to put it up! Hey, we have Nat'l Geog posters up on our walls, so anything goes in our house! Wood: Anything natural, polished, or oiled. I love all types and kinds of wood-crafting.

A record for my Switch Witch, June 2009! Single Notes? Any and all, but especially the 'odd' ones like tonka bean, opoponax, champaca, the various musks, honey, etc. Net Flix? No, thanks. Not in the US to appreciate and I wouldn't use it anyway. Lovely thought and brilliant idea, though! Coraline? Nah. I'd watch it in the cinemas, and if I liked it enough, I'd buy the DVD proper. Hello Kitty? Letter paper/envelopes; yes. Toys and keychains and stuff; not so much. Seasonal MP3 mix? It would be a Winter mix for me, and I'd call it: I Can't Stand The Rain! Because it's been raining something dreadful around here for the last month, our courtyard is beginning to grow moss... Recycle/Upcycle craft products? Yes please! Cotton shirts in particular - I could use them for patchwork quilting. But, really, any papercraft, beadwork, or pretty/unusual/textured materials would be lovely! I also collect Christmas card fronts with pictures that I can reuse. Of course, this assumes that I have the time to actually put them together come Christmas - which I rarely seem to do. TV show burning? Scarecrow and Mrs. King anyone? I've never seen it and I have a friend who loves it, so I'm curious. But it would be good to have it playable on my computer instead of videotapes (which I'd never end up watching, to tell you the truth.) Bath Bombs? Love bath bombs! My Shotgun Witch, LunaLiquid, sent me a beautifully scented bath bomb and I luxuriated in the fizz and the fumes for hours! Online Gaming? No, thank heavens. The extent of any online 'gaming' of mine is limited to Lexulous (online scrabble). Non US Witch? Yup. And my Witchee will be TimTammed. (Unless she doesn't want to.) If my Witch is in California, if you could hunt up some Dulce du Leche M&Ms - I know a friend had them back in 2006 when I stayed with her, and the M&M site said they were available in CA with a planned rollout to the rest of the US. If you can't find them...uh...I'll take more Hershey's Caramel Kisses! (*smooches hepkitten, who sent her a big pack along with a lovely mass sale*) IPod/MP3 Player? Nope. But I'm thinking about getting an SD card for my Palm Treo (or upgrading to the Palm Pro) so I can store music on my phone. I'm a 'convergent technologies' kinda gal: I want to carry around one item that's phone and organiser and MP3 player all in one! Shawl or wrap? Oh yes. Those knitted shawls look beautiful! I would love something like that if my Witch could make it. (If you're not crafty, don't worry about it, honest!) Hand-knit socks? Again, I'd love some hand-knit socks. I'm going to try to knit some of my own, but I suspect my attempts will be laughable for some time yet. Crafts to make/get? Collectables? I don't really collect anything to tell you the truth. Other than BPAL. I make stuff, yeah, but that's pretty much a case of 'whatever's available to make Soaps made from animal oils? The emu-oil lady and her methods sound pretty awesome, actually. I'm okay with animal products in my gifts, although I'd prefer they were responsibly farmed. Decanting equipment? Would be loved. I've been having trouble procuring vials and pipettes from the US - they don't seem to make them in Australia. I've bought a whole bunch off Ebay, but, yeah, more are always good! Favourite Carnivale Diabolique? Ashultum. Madame Moriarty, Misfortune Teller. Priala, the Human Phoenix. Wulric, the Wolfman. Anaconda! BJD dolls? I have a BJD, but she's very basic - I haven't gotten around to doing her up yet. Don't know if I ever will! But accessories would be great for her. I think she's a 12" standard Dollfie, IIRC. Kitty likes catnip? I think she does. Food products: buns, jellies, canning stuff. I would LOVE to receive jars of homemade stuff; however it is unfortunately quite inadvisable to send to Australia, especially anything that has seeds in it. Our Customs and Quarantine department is very restrictive. (Understandable, but still frustrating.) You might be able to get away with jellies and canned foods if they're small and vacuum sealed and very obviously cooked like mad, but no guarantees. Other things: Twilight - No. Steampunk - Yes! Etsy - Haven't really looked around that much.

Chemical strawberries, with dandelion leaves, sugar-sweet. It's not bad, actually - it's not going sour or bitter on me, the way a lot of the fruity scents do. Don't know that I'd wear this one around - I smell like strawberry candy and I'm not so hot about strangers lickin' on me! - but it's not a bad scent.

Babylonian musk, vanilla tea, tonka, tobacco, coconut, hyssop, and lilac. Okay, if I needed any confirmation that I am weird, I guess I have it in Ashultum! I was expecting to like it - light musk, vanilla, and tobacco are all usually big winners on me, although coconut is a win-some, lose-some note (eg. it was a lose note in Tiki Queen), and I wasn't so sure about the tonka, hyssop, and lilac. But then I put it on and the musk bloomed, the vanilla rounded out, and the tobacco note gave it just a hint of gravitas with the tonka, while the hyssop stopped it from going too heavy, and the coconut smoothed everything out. It was absolutely beautiful! And the scent doesn't morph too much in the drydown, which is also excellent! Either I have an imp where they completely forgot the lilac, or lilac just doesn't last on my skin. (High, sharp florals tend to go thin and soapy on me.) I love it when a scent I love is still available. Must order at least one bottle!

Oh, and this I know only too well! I've been forced to discard perfectly good stuff because I forgot that I had my Swiss Army knife, or my manicure set with me. *grr* I've done lots of travelling in the US and internationally in the last five years, so I know all about the TSA 3-1-1 policy. I simply wasn't sure about the qualification of 'essential oils' vs. perfume. Thanks for the info, though, R!

They won't? I checked the TSA site and it says "Air travelers may now carry liquids, gels and aerosols in their carry-on bag when going through security checkpoints" (with size limits), so if anything they seem to be getting less strict. There was no reference at all to limits on checked baggage, unless the liquid is flammable. So I don't think you need to worry. Does BPAL count as flammable? Airport Security tends to vary from airport to airport. Some of them will wave you by, others will get iffy about it. :/ OH well, I guess I'll find out on the way back from LA...

I was thinking more flying and airport security. It's getting so they won't allow you to have any liquids in your baggage.