Of Travel Sets, Rollerballs and Hoarding

This month seems to be a little lean for me in the wants of perfume. Not a whole lot of visiting E-Bay and Surrender to Chance. Just not interested right now, thanks a lot cellphone bill and activation fees. Yep, I switched cell carriers and the family and I got new phones, so there was some pearl clutching when I saw the first bill. But I was thinking and looking at my hoard of perfume.

With my collection, quite a number of it seems to be back ups. Back ups of discontinued and vintage finds but I'm still looking for that reasonably priced bottle of vintage L'Heure Bleue but coming up empty handed. So I keep looking. But after gazing at my collection filled with multiples and such, I asked myself on why I was hoarding some of this. Five bottles of Theorema, what the hell, I should be wearing this more often. A million bottles of vintage Bal, I am out of my mind, I need to wear this every night to bed just to finish one bottle of this. Nine bottles of vintage and new Mitsouko, I have to get that one bottle unstuck but I am starting on trying to finish one bottle of that. But there are a couple that I could mention but I have to get a move on.

Then after looking at all of that, my eyes landed on that Amouage Lyric travel set and that Tocca Florence rollerball. I like the idea of the travel sets and rollerballs. First off, they can be more economical than buying a full bottle. You might now get the equivalent of a full bottle but you can come pretty close. The Lyric travel set that I got came with 3 refills but had four total and it came to 1.32 ounces. So it was pretty close and with a FragranceNet discount, I had paid a shade over a $100, no joke. Now if the Epic set was a little cheaper, I would add that to my collection but I will stick to the two full bottles that I have and get the body butter. But the Tocca line has some decent offerings, perfume wise. What I have tried hasn't been earth shattering for me but it is a decent line. Not really niche but not exactly mainstream. The only brick and mortar store that I have seen them in is Sephora. Those that regularly shop/scout the perfume will have seen them already. But what I do like about the Tocca line is that they have created a rollerball version of their offerings. I like that because I don't really want a full bottle of Florence or pretty much any of them. I got the Florence due to the fact that Bath and Body Works wrongfully discontinued Gardenia Lily and Florence comes close but not quite enough to justify a full bottle.

But all in all, the fact remains that I must start to finish off a few bottles. My dresser is overflowing with perfume.

Is Light the New Term for Sweet?

Yesterday, this thought was floating around my mind when one of my guy friends commented on my wearing of Shalimar. I make every effort not to be heavy handed when I am applying perfume. But I was wondering how can Shalimar be considered light? Or is light the new term for sweet? I'm just thinking that he is confusing sweet with light. Now Shalimar is a lighter oriental but when over applied, it's not light, it's suffocating. Tocca Giulietta is light, Chanel no 19 is more of on the light side but I still wouldn't call Shalimar 'light' nor would I call Mitsouko 'light'. Then, I asked him how can he confuse light and sweet when he has been hanging around me for the past couple hours? Something that is loaded with vanilla is not light. I sprayed A Scent and gave him the blotter and said that it what you call light. But he really doesn't get it and this is the guy who buys his mother perfume at Christmas every year. Since his mother has no real sense of smell, she over applies everything.

I view perfume as an art form and should be smelled carefully before deeming them light, heavy, sweet. Sometimes the initial impression might be light but after a couple minutes, it actually may be sweet. But I'm not sure if most people just don't know how to use their sense of smell or they are too used to these your skin but better perfumes.

Tocca Florence Review

Ever since Bath and Body Works discontinued Gardenia Lily, I have been kind of looking for a replacement for it. It can be difficult to find a gardenia perfume because the tuberose aspect kind of dominates the whole gardenia aspect. More often than not, I don't much care for tuberose because tuberose is overwhelming to my nose. Hence, why I have a hard time with Fracas and Carnal Flower.

Then I came across my Tocca Florence mini. Let's just say that Florence comes pretty close to Gardenia Lilly. But I've noticed that there is a fair amount of tuberose after the top notes have calmed down. It seems as soon as I really start to enjoy Florence, it's poof! gone. That seems to be my biggest complaint with Florence and the Tocca line, there is no longevity. It's always the 3 hours max of skin time before it flees. The bottles are really cute but I really can't see myself really really getting the more of the Tocca line for the bad lasting power and they are kind of boring.

Tocca Giulietta Review

I can now believe that it is spring and it is time to start wearing spring/summer perfumes. It as nearly 70 degrees here and I went for Tocca's Giulietta perfume. It's a skin scent, so there isn't a whole lot of sillage going on. It's nice for a change of pace to have a skin scent. There is an extremely faint fruitiness that is only detected when first coming into contact with skin. The rest is the gentlest floral scent. I do find myself reapplying Giulietta every 5 hours since it does seem to disappear quite quickly for a perfume. The bottle itself is quite heavy and well built, so there is not much of a stand out to make me reach for it at least once a month. At the end of the day, Giulietta is an airy, inoffensive perfume. But it is one of the few airy, inoffensive perfume that I do really like. After I finish my bottle will I get another? Maybe, it might grow on me to the point of loving it.