schneagl

In the bottle: A bracing aquatic; sharp sea air. Wet on my skin and Drydown: Briny salt, the metallic part of blood - not the lab's "Blood" scent but, y'know, actual blood. And I love me all the dragon's blood scents, I'm just not picking any up here. So this is about as spot-on as a scent can get to the title! This is one of the least morphing BPALs I've tried - it stays a salty aquatic. The throw is above average and it lasted most of the day, so it's a great one if you like these notes.

In the bottle: Reminds me very much of Eclipse or Dana O'Shee, with more of a tang. Lots of almond and spices. Wet on my skin: This is one of the first scents I've tried where it seems to rotate through other BPALs I have. It starts out like Eclipse with more of a cologne feel, then adds a Snow White-like snow note, and the cologne note sharpens again. Drydown: The cologne stays around but lightens a bit. All the milky and snow notes fade fast. I like Uruk's notes a lot, though it doesn't last all that long - about 2 hours on me - and it has a lighter throw than I prefer. Haven't tried slathering it, but for me, layering Eclipse and Snow White would probably work just as well and last longer! I'll also ask the boy if he wants to try it.

In the bottle: Newly lit fire with smoke and something acrid, like lighter fluid. Wet on my skin: Embers and smoke, charcoal, and a plant note that I can't identify. Drydown: Sour ash, smoke, and coals, and charring wood. Later on: A sweet note, like smoky bubble gum. Really. This is a fun one! It has a light throw, and lasted for a few hours with a long turndown. I wasn't quite expecting the acrid part, but otherwise it's the life cycle of a fire. Haven't tried layering it yet with anything, but there's some interesting potential here.

In the bottle: Greenery with spices that make me think of aftershave. Wet on my skin: Waxy, still with a sharp green note, and it's also a little cleaner than before, but still a little plasticky…it's a hard set of notes for me to identify. Drydown: Still a sharp green note, with a plastic/aftershave base. It burns down to a straight incense. Overall, this is just a weird one on me. I didn't get any sense of lavender, and I'm not really sure what it was trying to be. The throw was light to average and the duration was a few hours.

2014 Version In the bottle: Sugary vanilla with spices in the background. Wet on my skin: Vanilla cakes, a bit of hops or nutty grain, and a tiny whiff of resins. This is incredibly spot on to the notes! Drydown: Sweet vanilla with spices. It burns down to almost a sweet vanilla floral. Wow, this one was interesting. It was a decant for the boy, to which I raised my eyebrows when he picked it out of the lot, mostly due to my distrust of the beer note…but it works strangely well in combination. The throw was pretty light and it lasted a few hours on me.

In the bottle: Honey, pumpkin, caramel. Very sweet, and heading to the cloying side for me. Wet on my skin: Sweet but NOT cloying now. Spicy notes start to come into play, and actually strike me as nutmeg more than frankincense. It's still a little on the *shudder* Yankee Candle side of the fence. Drydown: Nutmeg-y molasses. The burndown has the spicy resins much more present. Once again, I knew this one was risky for me but wanted to try it anyway! It's a little too overdone-candle mix for me, sadly. Both of the Pumpkins I tried this year are turning into molasses on me in the end. It appears to be working for the foodies, so hey, YMMV! The throw and duration were both average.

2014 Version In the bottle: Grasses, sap, maple-ish notes. Tobacco, almost? And a bit of citrus. Huh. Wet on my skin: Tobacco and hay? I think that's how I'm interpreting the gunpowder. Drydown: Pretty much the same, a little more light spices coming out. To be fair, this was a decant for the boy, who likes these notes a lot more than I do. The throw was light-to-average and lasted for a few hours, which was a lot lighter than I was expecting. It's a good mix for those who like these kinds of notes (though I oddly didn't pick up much patchouli).

2014 Version In the bottle: Sweet and spicy, then a rose floral. Wet on my skin: Airy, light rose, some resins in the back. Drydown: Rose. Which I amp, so not surprising, but I really would like more incense! I can barely pick it up, though the boy says he can make them out more. On him, I can pick up much more spice, so clearly a skin chemistry variance coming into play. The throw was average and stayed clearly discernible for hours. It lasted for most of the day, which is pretty good stats for me. Personally I want the spices and rose balance reversed, but I'm sure it will work out well for others.

In the bottle: Cologne, powder, a soft ash? Wet on my skin: Tobacco and diaper. Seriously. There's an astringent tone there that dries off fast, about 5 minutes, and then it's more like an aftershave. Drydown: Funky aftershave. Waxy, almost (candy wrappers?) Yes to smelling cat and ash. It burns down to an aftershave with spicy ash. I gotta say that the note descriptions hold up. I'm a huge Hellboy fan, and this is very evocatively accurate…though not a scent that I particularly want to smell like! The throw is light to average and the duration was pretty long, so it's got good staying power. I'll punt this one to the boy and see if it's more up his alley.

Dry, cold autumn wind. A rustle of red leaves, a touch of smoke and sap in the air. 2014 Version In the bottle: Vegetation at the end - husks, vines about to die - with airy notes mixed in. Wet on my skin: Deeper - night air, leaves, hay, almost a vegetable musk. Drydown: More musk and a very nice balance between all the notes. Almost a blackened tone, but not outright smoky/burned, or too heavy a feel. Reminds me of a muskier Scarecrow. I liked the balance on October a lot. The throw was pretty light on me and the duration was average. I wish it had a heavier presence; I like all the stages of this scent, but I have to sniff my wrists closely to pick up that I'm wearing it.

In the bottle: High notes, almost citrus-y. A bit like sap of very bright green grasses, and a bare touch of maple scent. It's hard for me to pick out individual notes. Wet on my skin: Still high and citrusy but with a smoky undertone. Still hard to tease apart the notes. Drydown: Similar, not much morphing going on: citrus is more prominent on my skin, whereas the little I put in my hair smells more smoky. It skims the border of smelling like a cleaning product, though it doesn't tip over. Later on: The burndown goes back more to earth and smoke, and what seems to be a bit of the snow-note in the background. The threw was average, the drydown came pretty fast, and it last a few hours total on me. The verbena generally won out with myrrh in the background, without a full-blown "floral" effect at any point…the total effect seems to be very dependent on which pieces of this blend you tend to amp.

In the bottle: Sugary pumpkin with nutty and spicy tones. Honestly, the phrase that came to mind was "snorting a pastry." Wet on my skin: Brown sugar, ginger, nutmeg, almost an anise base. Not what I usually get with the black tea note, but I suppose that's what's going on here? More the spices we associate with pumpkin scents than actual pumpkin smell. Drydown: Not much pumpkin, is my sad refrain. Black spices - more like a dark gingerbread made with molasses, or a dark caramel. I knew this one was a risk, since I'm not one for overly foodie scents, but I love all these notes, so was hoping for an outlier. It went too dreaded Yankee Candle for me overall, unfortunately. The throw was light to average, and the molasses burndown stuck around for most of the day. Really is unusually gingerbread-y for what the notes made me expect...

2014 Version: In the bottle: Leafy, a bit earthy, a bit airy. A sharp note of some kind cutting through the others. Wet on my skin: That sharp note is totally gone; the first thing I smell is ozone. The leafiness comes back, with a bit of sweet or floral background - that's the closest I'm getting to cocoa. It settles down to a sap smell. Drydown: Ozone (which is apparently how I'm interpreting the white musk here) plus dry leaf, and a hint of lingering fire or embers - I think that's where the amber incense is coming out most. This one's not quite what I was expecting, but still very nice. I like the individual notes, though they don't ever all blend together; they keep swapping places until the final burndown. The throw was fairly low for me, and lasted about average, a few hours. Didn't turn out to be my favorite of the Weenies like I was expecting, but glad I got a chance to try it.

This one was for the boy, and even though this isn't my kind of note list, I of course tested all the Weenie imps we got I didn't look back at the note list but just tried to write down what autumn-y smells I got: In the bottle: Maple-golden and a touch sweet, with incense spices. Wet on my skin: No sweetness now, an astringent maple with green vines. It's risking going to "cleaner" on me, but the notes in the back are keeping it together. Sort of a smell of plants ready to harvest, too. Drydown: Dark maple sap. Interesting thing to try for me. This is way out of the norm for tobacco or other notes; no idea how any of this became "maple", but I'm sticking to it. The throw was low on me, and stuck around for the average time, a good few hours. This is the first BPAL I can remember that smelled like a plant, even a green plant, but not wet or bright green - it really had the notes of picking squash or other late-season vegetables. Wish that complexity stuck around a little longer.

In the bottle: More notes than I could even try to collect, but here's an attempt. Gold and red leaves, sap. A little apple, a little bit of a leaf's decay. Grasses, cinnamon. Wet on my skin: More grasses/hay and earth than anything, then shifts more to apples and cinnamon, and a hint of smoke. Drydown: Smoky cinnamon and apples. Like a slightly sweet incense rather than a full fruit smell. Very nice effect on me. This was my favorite Weenie this year. It's so hard to nail down a profile for this scent, it's obviously a morpher - I started to wonder if my brain was just making up more notes each time I sniffed it. The throw was a little below average, but it lasts well, pretty much all day. It really is trying to be autumn in a bottle! Might or might not hit all of your favorite notes, but there's something in it for most anyone.