Only a Sip

[Soupy Twist]

Shadow began to feel headachy. There was a pounding quality to the starlight, something that resonated with the pulse in his temples and his chest. At the bottom of the next hill he stumbled, opened his mouth to say something and, without warning, he vomited.

Wednesday reached into an inside pocket, and produced a small hip flask. "Take a sip of this," he said. "Only a sip."

The liquid was pungent, and it evaporated in his mouth like a good brandy, although it did not taste like alcohol. Wednesday took the flask away, and pocketed it. "It's not good for the audience to find themselves walking about backstage. That's why you're feeling sick. We need to hurry to get you out of here."

Orange peel, rosemary oil, peppermint, and cloves.

 

Lots of fresh lovely orange peel and clove in the bottle, with the wee burn of peppermint somewhere without any actual peppermint note, but it just turns into Tang. No rosemary at all. Very little throw.

 

Okay, decades before the golf dude tried to claim he invented the idea of combining lemonade and iced tea, my mother used to combine drink mix powders and put them in pretty jars to give as Christmas gifts. So she'd add Tang (orange) or lemonade to iced tea mix and call it Spiced Tea.

 

That's exactly what this smells like: My mother's Tang spiced tea. So thank you for that lovely scent memory, Beth. I miss my mother a great deal.

[zankoku_zen]

Orange, rosemary, peppermint and cloves. This smells cozy and like healing medicine. Sadly, my skin eats it within an hour.

[Dark Alice]

The rosemary doesn't go funky on me! The peppermint and clove are subtle with a nice blast of orange that my skin eats up. Mainly rosemary, mint, and clove. It's simply lovely.

[torikitty]

I get only orange peel. It smells like a lovely old-fashioned, minus the booze. I wish I could pick up on the rosemary, but alas, nothing. I would recommend this for someone who wants something orange, and knows they wouldn't amp the other notes.

[Little Bird]

This is too medicinal for me. The hint of mint mixed with powdery, tart orange just makes me think of vitamin tablets and cough syrup. I don't get the rosemary, but I can pick out a bit of bitter clove in the drydown.

[whisperstilled]

It does have an unfortunate cough syrup quality after aging. Initially the peppermint was strong enough to overwhelm it, but six months on the orange is too syrupy sweet.

[Lucchesa]

Only a Sip feels more like aromatherapy to me than perfume, which is appropriate given the inspiration: it's an instant pick-me-up. It's also the longest-lasting BPAL orange note I have encountered on my skin. I'm not getting any clove, and the mint and rosemary are present but subdued. I might need a bottle of this to sniff when I need a little power or courage or when I just can't.

[agirlnamedfury]

This is like orange hard candy with a hint of mint. Maybe like orange cough drops? That sounds unappealing but I actually really like it. Great fun summer scent. Unfortunately my decant leaked and so I have only a tiny amount of this.

[Kytha]

'Orange cough drops' is pretty dead on accurate for Only A Sip, at least for the first 30 minutes or so -- it has that sharp, faintly medicinal quality of a newly opened package of Tang, if you've ever smelled that. Once that fades away, a gently minty rosemary comes to the fore, the orange becoming more of a lingering spritz in the air. Clove is largely a supporting actor in this scent, lending some of the depth and vibrancy to the orange. I have a limited experience of the orange scents in BPAL's repertoire, but I can say this is perhaps one of the more unique (and certainly invigorating) scents I've tried. Summer in a bottle.

 

It's a bit too strong for me to enjoy using it on myself, I think, BUT ... putting it into a scent atomizer really softens the intensity of that orange. This one is more of a scent locket/essential oil diffuser kind of scent for me.

Edited March 24, 2020 by Kytha

[doomsday_disco]

The orange is the main player throughout wear on me, although it goes from a pomander type of orange (as it is backed by the peppermint and clove) to a more powdery type (like the Tang that Soupy Twist got when she tried it). Peppermint and clove are typically powerhouses, but both are very soft here, and I only get a smidge of rosemary towards the end of the day (I was beginning to think it wouldn't show up at all). I guess I lucked out in this not smelling medicinal on me at all!

 

I like this enough to keep the decant around as a nice pick-me-up and to try layering with Sweet Clove LN for more orange and clove goodness.

Edited October 7, 2021 by doomsday_disco

[a_bear]

Smells like Christmas potpourri, and I mean that in the nicest way possible. Lasts less than 1/2 an hour on me, though.