Tag Fragrance

The Nose Knows

Michael 2 Comments

If this sounds familiar it is. I’ve asked this question before and nobody could supply a good answer so I’m putting it out there again.

What insanity has infested the minds of the people who name men’s toiletries and bath products?

This is important stuff! Forget pandemics, forget riots in the streets, turn all that social media energy aware from climate change and dictator of the week discussions. Arguing the merits of masks and vaccines mean nothing until somebody can adequately describe exactly what “hydrate” smells like!

AxeAnarchyAll this politically correct talk about gender neutrality and sexlessness and inclusivity hasn’t reached the men’s fragrance department. Women soaps, deodorants, shampoos, and other whatnots applied behind closed bathroom doors still make sense.  Who doesn’t know, or at least can reasonable imagine, what honeysuckle smells like? Women get rose oil, jasmine, green apple, and if you’re feeling a little adventurous, cucumber. Along with the aforementioned “hydrate,” men get “fresh,” ‘hi-def,” and “balance.” Women can relax under “waterfall mist” while men get stuck with “anarchy.” Not kidding.

There is a men’s deodorant fragrance “Strength.” My first thought is a bunch of sweaty guys in a gym lifting weights. And this is what I want to walk around all day smelling like? No thanks! There’s also a men’s deodorant called “Clean.” A little more to my liking, but as with its close cousin “Fresh,” aren’t those things that shouldn’t have a smell. I mean if it’s clean it doesn’t need a scent, right?

Whatever happened to the dye and fragrance free fad. Can’t we just have soap. Does everything have to enhance, isn’t it enough to just make ourselves clean and fresh without have to apply “clean” or “fresh” after washing?

Anarchy. Wow. Now there’s something I bet you won’t see a scratch and sniff sample of.

Cleaning Up

Michael 2 Comments
I hope there are some really clean people out in my neck of the woods. They must be because they have all the soap. Not just sanitizer and hand soap. Not just bleach and alcohol. Not just detergents and wipes. But the most critical of cleansers, body wash! Specifically, my body wash.
 
steam-300x336Years of prednisone use has thinned my skin so much that removing a bandaid usually means removing the top layer of skin with it. As a result I don’t use many bandaid but I do use a lot of moisturizers. Years ago I discovered a version of Dove body wash with a deep moisturizer that complements its cream moisturizing lotion and ever since I’ve been happy in my skin. Normally I have several containers or the stuff but I found my cupboard bare and on a recent attempt to restock all that was on the store shelf in its usual spot was dust. Not only was my cherished deep moisture version gone, so were the light moisture, sensitive skin, gentle exfoliating, and something called “cool moisture” varieties, and also missing were the store brand copies of all the ones apparently considered fit to copy including the decent copy of my deep moisture. What to do?
 
I needed something so I scanned the equally empty shelf locations of Dove’s competitors and found nothing except the odd designer wash priced to impress. (I wasn’t.) That left only one option…the men’s section.
 
I don’t know if any of you have ever tried to buy “men’s” soap. Where TV sitcoms would have you believe men typically shower with one all-purpose jug-o-clean combining soap, shampoo, conditioner, and deodorant, the reality is that the men’s toiletry section presents more options than the soft drinks and water aisle. It is possible to find a men’s soap that includes a decent moisturizer. What isn’t possible is to find a men’s body wash that isn’t scented. And they are all weird scents.
 
Men’s soaps and washes, along with the shampoos and conditioners that really do come in separate bottles, have scents not found in nature. To go along with the train of thought they have names that describe nothing. Clean. Fresh. Sport. Energizing. Invigorating. Active. Quench. Now what hell does “Quench” smell like. Actually it doesn’t matter. They all smell the same, menthol. Just different intensities of menthol.
 
It’s a good thing I keep bar soap in my socks and underwear drawer as my “men’s sachet.” It was either that or order some cedar and fir scented Spit and Polish (honest, look it up) which at least are two real things I might recognize when I smell them.
 
And don’t forget to wash your hands.
 
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Butter Me Up

Michael 9 Comments

While going though yesterday’s emails I skimmed past the one “What’s in Movie Theatre Popcorn Butter,” stopped, went back, and clicked. First, DON’T click on that if you like movie theater popcorn butter. And second, this post has nothing to do with movies, theaters, or popcorn. But that does leave butter. (Which apparently is more than you can say about movie theater popcorn butter.) (Ooops.)

Christmas is coming and shortly we’ll start seeing the television commercials they only trot out at holidays. Among these are the commercials for fragrances. You would think the only time anybody bought perfume for their feminine others is at Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and Mother’s Day. Come to think of it, you’d probably be right. Equally right would be the only time anybody buys colognes for dads is at Christmas and Father’s Day. (I’m specifying dads here because other than dads and granddads, the chance of having a male fragrance bought for any male without guilt ridden children with no idea what to get him is basically nonexistent even at these times of year.)

Something that has changed in the last few years is that men’s fragrances now don’t stop at what one splashes on one’s face. Today the fragrance world also includes men’s favorites for room freshening.

Leather, cedar, barbecue, and bacon scented air fresheners will also be heavily advertised in print, on line, and on air next month. These are the smells men like. One fragrancier boasts air fresheners named “Hunting Lodge,” “Distillery,” and “European Sports Car.” A major chain ‘mart’ has pizza scented freshener hanging next to the dangly pine trees. You can buy candles scented as gunpowder and pipe tobacco. Turkey leg and corn dog car scents threaten to replace “new car” and “ocean breeze” for on the road freshairness.

Hot dogs and pizza, even bourbon and tobacco are good smells. Nobody can argue against the ability of the smell of bacon crisping on the stove to stimulate the salivary glands. But do you want to smell that all day. Ok, maybe you do, but I don’t. I don’t want to smell bacon or bourbon, pizza or pipes, or heather or hotdogs everywhere I go. At the same time, even though I enjoy hanging out with my sensitive side, I don’t want lavender and chamomile following me around all day either. So what do I want my living room to be to my nose? Where can in turn for some smelly inspiration?

I spent almost 40 years working in hospitals, nursing homes, and colleges. All have their own unique … um … smells yet they’re all the same. Whether outside a patient room, a dorm room, or the C-Suite conference room, there will be a mix of bad coffee, sweat, fear, and a bodily function gone wrong. No, not there.

I love to be outside. In the summer I don’t really need a house. I’ll be at the pool, on the patio or on the road. In the winter I am very happy walking through snowflakes falling from the sky on a crisp morning. In between those seasons it can be rainy and windy and ugly but it’s also the best times to put the top down and test the limits of lateral suspension cruising down a country road speeding by the new colors of spring or the waning colors of fall. The sights of the seasons may be remarkable but the olfactory memories are of chlorine, charcoal, gasoline, road salt, and abused tires and clutches. Pass.

My personal favorite scents come from the kitchen. Starting with breakfast and sizzling sausage and brewing coffee. Ripe apples cut into super thin slices stirred into yogurt dusted with fresh grated nutmeg at lunch. Dinner with fresh lemon juice and balsamic dancing in the ripping hot pan around a perfectly cooked salmon. Now here are some a-list aromas. But no. They are special. They belong in the kitchen and the dining room. Not hung from the rear view mirror.

ButterSo what manly smell would I want hanging around me all day? Remember that movie theater popcorn butter that started this meandering missive? Yeah, that one. No, not that. But it’s close. It’s butter. Real butter, but the real butter melted in a hot pan when it just hits that perfect spot after the water has sizzled out of it but the browning hasn’t started and it gives off that unexpected nuttiness that lasts just a handful of seconds. That butter.

Take that scent and put it in a candle, hang it from a mirror, or spray it all around. Heck, do all three. Even the manliest of men will stop and sniff the air and know this is the way the world is supposed to smell.

And if that doesn’t work, well there’s always the popcorn.

No Friends in Close Places

Michael Leave a comment

About a week ago we went to the movies. We hadn’t been there for a while, there was a movie playing that we wanted to see, and it was showing at a time we were able to see it. We got there in time for the coming attractions (we’re never sure why but we almost always do) and thus had plenty of time to pick out some good seats. So we thought.

There were already quite a few taken, or to put it another way, there weren’t all that many left to choose from. But choose we did and over the half hour that the upcoming trailers took we watched as many couples filed their way past us and the remaining two inside seats on our row. All of those many couples found other seats for them to park their seats and we breathed that sigh of relief that we could leave our popcorn and soft drinks and jackets as they were. Until the opening credits of the movie. That’s when the two old ladies ambled up the aisle, squinted in the darkness, pointed beyond us and started moving in. They weren’t even going to wait for us to make passage room for them. The movie was starting and they wanted to sit down!

Things like that happen. We’re usually ok with them when they do. It wasn’t until these two worked their bulks past us and plopped into the seats next to She that we realized they weren’t just a couple of old ladies. They were a couple of old ladies wearing old lady perfume. Now this was a somewhat quirky movie which means it required just a little thought to keep all of the characters and subplots tied together. That’s where the popcorn comes in. Popcorn ties thoughts, but that’s a post for a different day. One thing popcorn does not do is provide a fragrance free zone safe from old lady perfume. So for two hours and some-odd minutes we lost bits and pieces of the movie because our brains were too intent on a) figuring out why these two old ladies would venture out drenched in old lady perfume knowing they would be in close quarters; and b) what was that scent anyway? It even drove us out before we could read the entire closing credit crawl which often times is the best part of the movie, particularly quirky ones, particularly when one is distracted by old lady perfume.

For a few dollars more we could have had the reserved seating in this theater. We rarely do because there is rarely a need. We’ve discovered the need. A quick glance behind us revealed many seats were available in the high rollers section. So that did it for us. Next time and every time, that’s where our seats will be seated.

Although we couldn’t confirm it, we’ve been wondering if perhaps the two old ladies might have been working for the theater, creating the demand for those seats while the supply was amply available. Probably not. Even in a big corporation like the one running those screens we just couldn’t see how the local manager would be able to justify that much old lady perfume when the end of the month bills came in. Nor find a couple of old ladies to sit through two-plus hours of a quirky movie. Old ladies don’t do quirk. They do musings. Probably about perfume.

Now, that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

Do You Smell What I Smell

Michael Leave a comment

It all started innocently enough.  All we did was go shopping.  It was then that we wandered into the fragrance aisle.  Not fragrances as in perfumes and colognes but fragrances as in room deodorizers and air fresheners.

Do you know what they’ve done with air fresheners lately?  They look like rocks, they have cunning sniffer inlets, they take oils and liquids, and they’ve turned some into mini-sprayers that plug in or work on batteries.  Electric powered air fresheners, imagine that.

We made our choices and continued our shopping, barely able to contain our anticipation over our new air fresheners.  Well, perhaps not that unable to contain it, but we were looking forward to them.  She of We selected a battery operated one that promised to neutralize bad smells whenever they were detected.  He of We went for esthetics over utility and chose a unit that would go with the décor of his bathroom.  Unfortunately the scent was not the one he really wanted.  He wanted the scent that came with the aforementioned “rock” but looks won out.  Besides, he figured he could correct that when it came time to purchase the refill.

Ah, the refills.  We were so intent on exploring these crafty little units that we didn’t start looking for refills until we had made our selections.  We searched the shelves but couldn’t locate refills for either of our units.  He of We recalled that Child of He had a plug in unit and a refill for that style also eluded them.  There seemed to be no refills at all; that could be why Child’s unit was sitting on her bathroom counter, empty and unplugged.  She of We remembered seeing lots of them in another store and there would be plenty of time to worry about refills.  First we had to get them home and get them freshening! 

And eventually home is where we got them.  First to She of We’s where we finally extricated her new bad smell controller from the hermetically sealed plastic packaging.  Why is everything is now packaged in those devious plastic boxes that only open with the aid of a very sharp pair of scissors?   It wasn’t too many years ago that manufacturers were taken to task because they had too many layers of packaging.  Cellophane wrappers inside cardboard boxes inside plastic over-wraps.  We can see where packaging like that was the absolute antithesis of being green.  But is this new wave of sealed from all evil really the way to go?  Are there that many people wanting to steal a $4.00 air freshener out of its box off a store’s shelf that the shopkeepers have put up the challenge to the manufacturers to make it impossible to get to without first stealing a pocket knife?

But we digress.  Eventually we got them home and eventually we got them out of their packages.  She of We read through the 12 page user guide to her unit while He of We fiddled with the battery case cover and slipped in the required 3 AAA cells.  Within minutes it was perched on the table waiting for a bad smell to counter.  That might not have been when we first thought of it but it was when She of We first put it out there in spoken words.  How does it tell?

Equally eventually He of We got his new freshener unpackaged, loaded with his not so favorite fragrance and settled it onto a bathroom shelf, looking quite like it belong there, part of the ensemble in black.  And not smelling at all like the printed description.  But that was ok since He of We liked that better than what it was supposed to smell like.

And so, Both of We are battling bad smells with the new high tech gadgetry that has become room air fresheners.  And to them we say bring back the Lysol in a spray can.

Now, that’s what we think.  Really.  How ‘bout you?