SOTD: None, and loss of chocolate

I'm taking tomorrow off; the weekend is already here. That's the good news.

The bad news is today's realization that I need to reduce, perhaps eliminate, my consumption of chocolate. Yes, chocolate. This isn't about health - that probably wouldn't stop me. It's about happiness. Specifically, it's about caffeine.

Caffeine doesn't keep me awake, it keeps me nervous. It makes me into one of those people who checks to be sure that the faucet isn't dripping, when it's never dripped before. Who locks the door, checks the door, heads for the car, returns, and checks the door again. Who checks three times to be sure that the envelope is sealed, before putting it in the mailbox. Who wonders what the grocery clerk meant by that offhand remark. You know, those people.

I've always had a tendency to be one of those people, and keeping that tendency under firm control is a priority. Checking the front door lock twice would be tolerable if it stopped there, but I've never trusted that it would stop there.

So the caffeine had to go. Coke and Thai iced tea and other full-strength beverages went away first. Then I switched to decaf iced tea at home, while still drinking the regular stuff in restaurants. Now, the regular stuff has to be carefully rationed even in restaurants.

Yesterday I had two glasses of chocolate milk. Today, I can feel the nervous. Chocolate has to go.

Grumble. I've still got fried chicken, right?

Image: By Danielle Tsi. Wikimedia Commons.

UPDATED: Perfume: Ack! Serge Lutens discontinuations!

In the unlikely event that you read my blog and don't read Perfume Shrine (yeah, right), this is to point you to an article about four Serge Lutens discontinuations.

Douce Amere! I only have a decant! The budget forbids it! What do I do?

Update: Phew! It's not as bad as it sounded. See the Perfume Shrine update, but the summary is that they're just being taken off the export line - they'll be harder to get, but they aren't vanishing from the face of the earth. However, the list of fragrances has changed - replace Clair de Musc with Santal Blanc, on the list of those that will no longer be exported.

Image: Wikimedia Commons.

Compilation: Reformulation, Discontinuation, Perfume Hoarding, and Panic

So I just saw One More Good Article on the topic that I think of as perfume separation anxiety, and decided that I want to assemble a compilation.

This isn't remotely every good article on the subject, it's just the ones I found first, plus ones that I come across as I'm reading. Plus, I'm focusing more on loss than on the IFRA, because, well, as depressing as loss is, the IFRA is more depressing.

So:

• The Buyer of Backup Bottles, Strategist or Squirrel? from Bonkers About Perfume.
• On reformulations, or why your favorite perfume doesn't smell the way it used to from Now Smell This.
• Gloomy Sunday, from Perfume-Smellin' Things.
• Endangered Fragrances from 1000 Fragrances.
• The Lost Perfumes, a continuing theme on The Non Blonde. (I'm linking to just one of the posts.)
• Smells Like Joy, from OlfactaRama.
• Samples: The Addiction, from Feminine Things.
• The Allure of the Discontinued Scent, from Now Smell This.
• Perfumista tip: how to find out if a fragrance is discontinued from Now Smell This.
• Should An Old Fragrance Be Forgot, from The Wall Street Journal.
• My Favorite Fragrance is Discontinued...Now What? from Perfume Shrine.
• It's the end of the world as we know it from Perfume Shrine.

And for grieving for specific perfumes:

• Guerlain Attrape Coeur is Shot Through the Heart! from Perfume Shrine.
• Another Perfume Ruined: Harem by LR from Fragrance Bouquet.
• Serge Lutens multiple discontinuations: Oh My! from Perfume Shrine.
• Serge Lutens - Where Does He Go From Here? from The Non Blonde.

(Edited to add Harem. And the Wall Street Journal piece. And now the two about Lutens discontinuations.)


Photo: By Joadl. Wikimedia Commons. Click for details or license.

SOTD: Ava Luxe Moroccan Mint Tea

I love this.

It's no longer available in the form that I'm wearing. I don't know if it's available at all.

I failed to buy a full bottle when I had the chance.

Grumble.

Ava Luxe is the creation of Serena Ava Franco, a well-regarded independent perfumer whose wares are less available than they were a few months ago. Her storefront has changed and is selling only a selected group of perfume oils, instead of the large variety of perfumes that were once available. This has resulted in much whispering and hand-wringing about the future of a number of well-loved scents, including this one.

To me, this smells like Corsican mint, a scent that I love. The mint note is dominant and quite strong, making me think of essential oil of the herb, rather than watery refreshing visions of ice and mint leaves. And that's just fine with me, especially in winter where too much light freshness doesn't smell quite right. Some reviewers find that the tea note overtakes the mint as the fragrance develops, but this isn't true for me - for me, it's mint and more mint from beginning to end.

Again, fine with me - lovely mint, worth sniffing your wrist all day. If Ava Luxe brings it back, I'll correct my mistake and buy a bottle.

Review Roundup: Basenotes and MakeupAlley.

And posts about Ava Luxe on Perfume Smellin' Things and Indie Perfumes.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Grumble: Change Bad

So, I recently fell in love with Tom Ford Velvet Gardenia at Neiman Marcus. The normal sequence from here to purchase is:

• Go to Neiman Marcus and smell it again. A couple of times.
• Get a sample. Wear it until it's gone, probably two wearings.
• Get a decant. Wear it until it's gone, probably five to ten wearings.
• Look at the price of Velvet Gardenia. Stare at my credit card. Repeat every couple of months.
• Shuffle my list of I Really Want! fragrances.
• A year or two later, when Velvet Gardenia rises to the top of the list, or I'm hungry for lunch and staring at it on a pretty glass counter, finally buy it. Or I might have forgotten the whole thing by then.

This is my perfume buying process, for anything above the deeply discounted cheap thrills category. It's the way that I have managed to keep most of my shelves full of books instead of perfume. And avoided that whole perfume-induced bankruptcy thing.

I just read - and registered; I probably read it before - that Velvet Gardenia is being discontinued. If I want it, I have to accelerate the whole dance.

Not only is Velvet Gardenia being discontinued, but Robert Piguet Bandit is rumored to be in danger of reformulation. As is Chanel No. 5. Shiseido Feminite du Bois has already been reformulated but is still temporarily available in the old format.

Fendi Theorema, a legendary fragrance, has been discontinued but is still temporarily available from discounters. Cristalle, another legend, is rumored to be in reformulation, as is practically every oakmoss or jasmine perfume in existence, due to IFRA regulations.

Oh, and there are new regulations on percentage of citrus oils, so add every classic citrus perfume to that "probably about to be reformulated" list. And oakmoss - add the chypres.

Can't buy them all. Perfume-induced bankruptcy bad.

Grumble.

Photo: By Erin Silversmith. Wikimedia Commons

SOTD: Chanel No. 5 Parfum

Sound the alarm: Chanel No. 5 may be in danger of reformulation, due to IFRA regulations.

OK, many people have been sounding the alarm for months, so there's no need to push any buttons. Perfume wearers have expressed themselves vehemently at length, and are being ignored.

But this raises an important question that I've been trying to resolve for years: Do I like Chanel No. 5? Because if I do, or will, it's time to buy a bottle of the extrait. Preferably a bottle that's a year or two old, in case the reformulation has already happened.

To throw jargon around, Chanel No. 5 is the queen of abstract aldehydic florals. Not the matriarch - there were others before her - but definitely the long-time ruling queen.

I'm not so big on aldehydes. The people who like them say that they give fizz, or lift, or sparkle, to a fragrance. The people who don't like them tend to refer to them as "perfumey", with a Tone, and a wrinkled nose. There are times when I appreciate them - such as the opening of Ivoire - but that's an exception.

Abstract? Well, Chanel No. 19 is abstract - I can't point to a specific flower or other smelly thing and say "it smells like that" - and I love No. 19. So I guess abstract isn't a problem. Though in No. 19 I can get a grip on the galbanum as a stabilizer as I ride through the other notes; No. 5 doesn't have that same loved core note. It might be different if I adored jasmine the way that I do galbanum.

Floral? Meh. I tend to dislike sharp, "high pitched" florals, and No. 5 has its share.

And No. 5 is a classic, and smells like a classic. And, sadly, I haven't yet learned to love the classic pefumes. Mitsouko, L'Heure Bleue, Vol de Nuit, Shalimar, Arpege - my scale is still at "appreciate", at best, for all of these.

I'm wearing a few good dabs today, from my ittybitty bottle of the extrait. It started out sharp and, yes, "perfumey", and with that odd dark note that's common to so many of these perfumes, and I don't know what it is, since No. 5 doesn't list oakmoss as a note. By now, it's softened, but I'm just not feeling the love. Maybe I need to be wearing pearls?

Review Roundup: The Non-Blonde and Now Smell This and 1000 Fragrances and 1000 Fragrances again and Bois de Jasmin and Blogdorf Goodman and For The Love Of Perfume and Nathan Branch and The Perfume Heretic and Pink Manhattan and ScentsOfSelf and Yesterday's Perfume.

Link Roundup: A post and a poem from Feminine Things, and a post from Muses in Wooden Shoes and a reminiscence from The Scentimentalist.

Edited to add to the Review Roundup.

Photo: Copyright BrokenSphere / Wikimedia Commons