Nearly Busted Again!

The Spanish Inquisition ~ Source: Wikimedia Commons (Bernard Picart)

Almost a year to the day since I had my knuckles rapped by the Royal Mail for attempting to send consignments of perfume abroad, last week I came close to being busted again - or so I feared. Not all of the wrongdoing was my own, however, as you will see.

By way of background, I should explain that in tandem with the (not overly successful!) bottle sale on Bonkers the other week - which may of course be partly down to this fact that I cannot post abroad - I have been lobbing a few bottles on eBay, and letting them take their chances. The other day I was lucky enough to sell one of these, for a quite decent sum too. It was a not quite full 100ml bottle, so - mindful of the risks of leakage in transit - I parcelled the bottle up with elaborate care: first I put tape round its collar, then popped it into a gauze bag, which I placed inside a plastic mailer, before swaddling the plastic mailer in bubble wrap and laying the whole thing gently in a nest of tissue paper inside a gift box. I closed this box tightly with elastic bands, before wedging it inside a sturdy cardboard outer box lined with polystyrene chips and scrunched up bubble wrap. That box was then firmly sealed on all edges with parcel tape.

So far so good. Then, at my local post office, from the moment I asked for an ID8000 label everything started to unravel. The postmaster is used to my frequent shipments of perfume, and these days the most he ever asks me is: 'One bottle or two'. On that afternoon, however, his elderly mother was serving at the counter, and proved to be an absolute stickler for the rules. Anxious to create a good impression, he acted as her Greek chorus, chiming in with her ever more impossible stipulations. "Is it in the original packaging?" "Yes." I replied. "In its original box?" "Er...no, it's not in a box." "It must be in the original box with the cellophane still on." All of a sudden, the postmaster whipped out a blue demonstration bottle of a men's fragrance to show me what his mother meant by a perfume bottle. "This comes in a box, wrapped in cellophane. Is this what you are sending?" "Er...no, but to be honest, I am not sure it ever had cellophane - I am not even sure it had a box. It might have been a bag." "That's the only way you can send perfume...in the original box, in cellophane."

So that was me told. Browbeaten and crestfallen in equal measure, I slunk off to the next nearest post office, a little sub-branch inside a grocer's about half a mile away. Once again I asked for an ID8000 label, and this time hoped against hope there would be no grilling about boxes, let alone cellophane, or the small matter of the missing 15ml... The lady behind the counter looked at me as though I were an alien. "We don't have those. I have no idea what they are", adding in a peeved tone, as though I was trying to make her life inordinately difficult - at 4.45pm to boot: "I only work in the shop a couple of days a week - I don't normally deal with this side." In vain did I ask her to have a rummage in the drawer in case one of her colleagues had put some of the all-important labels by. "No, we don't have them. So do you want to post this then?" Suddenly, a Royal Mail delivery man hove into view, a huge, strapping hulk of a man, who wordlessly began humping big plastic sacks of parcels to his van, before returning and loitering with intent as I decided if I was going to post this package 'commando' or not. "You are my witness that I did ask for a label?" I piped up in a tone I had intended to sound cheerily upbeat, but which came out as wavering and doomed. "Hey, I don't have anything to do with postage and all that." Of course he doesn't - he is Royal Mail and she is a small outpost of Post Office Counters within a convenience store.

In desperation, I decided to chance the package with tracking, but without a hazard label. At least I hadn't been asked any awkward questions, but now the box had to take its chances in the Royal Mail's system, subject to random - or possibly even systematic! - scans and spot checks of its contents. I could so easily come a cropper, and what if it were a case of 'three strikes and you're out'? And straight into Stafford Gaol, as quickly as Rolf Harris was smuggled out the back at dawn the other month.

HM Prison Stafford ~ Source: Wikipedia (Stephen Pearce)

Cue a nailbiting 48 hours, which was the shortest timeframe in which a second class parcel could arrive. Meanwhile, I tried googling the scenarios under which Royal Mail parcels travelling within the UK are likely to be scanned. Could it be first class only? Special delivery? Ones going on a plane, even within the country? Tracked mail of any class? Some combination of the above - or even a completely different and more random set of criteria...

I also sought solace in a fragrance selling and swap site on Facebook. Members piled in to regale me with tales of their own daring and derring-do in dodging the authorities - many involving creative renaming of their parcels' contents as a  'statue', 'collector's toy', 'cosmetics samples', 'CDs', and 'books'. One comment in particular really helped allay my nerves:

"Ohhh don't sweat it. You'd probably get sooner taken for a ride by a dodgy buyer than have Royal Mail give you a headache with your parcel."

Kittens assuaged, I did take the precaution of alerting the buyer to my postal problems, and reassured her that I would issue a full refund in the event of the parcel being intercepted and confiscated. She was most understanding, and said she'd keep her fingers crossed for - and with - me. We sat tight for two days. Then on Day 3 at 11am I received an email from her saying the parcel had landed safely, without any sign of misadventures en route. She thanked me for packing it so securely, and for the free sample, while I thanked her for her patience. Then I thanked the members of the fragrance site, as their stories from the coal face of perilous perfume posting had been a comfort at a worrying time.

Source: Nestle

It was some days before I ventured out to my local post office again - with two big parcels this time. The postmaster was there, with his wife serving, and the mother nowhere to be seen. The wife weighed each package and made no comment - not even to ask me which service I wanted it to go by(!), so I chipped in to specify second class. The fact that they asked no questions is less significant than you might think, a) because the parcels were both returns - one to an Amazon supplier, the other to Nestle (two defective boxes of Cheerios, since you asked ;) ) - and b) because they didn't feel or look remotely like the sort of package that could contain perfume. Though I could so easily have lost a decant or two in one of the Cheerios boxes. But nevertheless, the near silence was in complete and utter contrast to last week's Spanish Inquisition.

I don't know if this marks a turning point in my relations with my local post office...I cannot be sure the postmaster will revert to his laissez-faire self on a future occasion, even if the mother is not on his case. So I think I should find a post office that is in possession of ID8000 labels, but which displays at best a cursory interest in the contents of my package.

And someone needs to tell the Royal Mail that not all new perfumes come wrapped in cellophane...


Do you have any perfume posting war stories - from either side of the pond? Do tell! (I might feel a little less beleaguered. ;) )

'Love the one you're given': a tale of Grand Amour no more and my dual Goutal windfall

Seriously luxe packaging for an eBay buy

I would like to start this post by apologising to Suzy Nightingale (aka 'Disappointed of Tunbridge Wells') for the complete lack of Sindy dolls in this post. I will write that one very shortly, but it got bumped by a recent fragrant haul. For Thursday's post brought a duo of Annick Goutals - Grand Amour and Myrrhe Ardente - which I got for a steal on eBay. Actually, that day's mail very nearly didn't bring my package: the postman pulled one of those 'knock and run' stunts, and stuck a red card through my door telling me I was out when he called and to collect my parcel from the sorting office. I doubt whether he even knocked, to be honest, for I would have heard all but a very light tap. To add insult to injury, he had written the time on the card as 10am, then crossed it off and put 11am instead. It was 10.50am when I found it, so both 10 and 11 looked like pretty arbitrary choices on his part.

Incensed at the thought of having to leg it over to the sorting office that afternoon, I pulled on my dirty clothes from the day before and ran out the door in search of a tell-tale figure dressed in red. In a matter of moments I spotted the offending postie delivering to houses at the far end of the street. I challenged him about the failure to knock, but he insisted that he had. I challenged him about the phony time and he said he didn't have a watch, so was obliged to estimate it. Hmm, based on the number of people likely to be out at work while he is doing his rounds, he must do a lot of estimating of the time in a typical shift. Anyway, I remained calm and polite and he promised to come back and deliver the package when he had finished at that end.

Sure enough, he was as good as his word, helped by a little note I had affixed to the door, pointing to the (admittedly rather archaic style of) doorbell that you twist to operate, and enjoining him to ring it vigorously. Parcel signed for - which, despite containing some 130ml of perfume across the two bottles, arrived refreshingly devoid of hazchem warning label - I spent a very satisfying few minutes unpacking it. The seller had not skimped on the bubble wrap and tape, and both bottles were tightly swathed like mummies, nestling in a beautiful silk lined box.

My Edwardian doorbell

I should point out that this was a partial blind buy on my part: Grand Amour I am familiar with, and very much agree with Elena of Perfumeshrine and Victoria of Bois de Jasmin, who both detect similarities to Chamade. Yet Grand Amour is more complex and ambivalent than that analogy implies, as both go on to explain. I love this quote in particular from Perfumeshrine:

"The atmosphere of Grand Amour is one of sustained uncertainty, poised as it is between the unctuous base of its resinous orientalia and the grassy, sappy, almost refreshing floral top."

"Orientalia" is a splendid - and ever so slightly suggestive- term for the base of Grand Amour...

Victoria also captures the contrasting facets of Grand Amour with her usual eloquent lyricism:

"While Chamade plays up the radiant green crispness, the sweetness of Grand Amour conveys a certain disarming tenderness. In an unexpected twist that makes Grand Amour such a fascinating fragrance, a ribbon of myrrh resurfaces under the floral opulence of the heart. Its somber incantation provides a brilliant counterpoint to the headiness of the composition, suggesting that even great love always retains an air of mystery."

My bottle is the edt, but nevertheless, the natural ageing process has lent it the colour of the edp. I have two samples of Songes edt that are also at opposite ends of the colour spectrum, which again I put down to their respective ages. Grand Amour was one of the very first niche fragrances I smelt after the onset of perfume mania, and I remember how close I came to buying a bottle. It feels fitting to have finally done so, especially for under £20.

Myrrh crystals donated by my friend Gillie

Myrrhe Ardente, on the other hand, was new to me, but the two bottles came as a job lot, so I scrutinised the reviews to determine whether I might like it. Katie Puckrik of Katie Puckrik Smells had likened it to 'mushroom-flavoured root beer', which didn't initially fill me with confidence, while numerous other reviewers on Makeupalley and Fragrantica alluded to a 'cherry soda' or 'cola' note going in. They are all right, but the cola / root beer note soon settles into a generalised subtle sweetness that is seamlessly blended with myrrh and benzoin. The incense registers as the softest of tingles, a nuzzling, comforting prickle that is far removed from the flagstone-y or medicinal facets of the note. In the end, it was Victoria's review that tipped me over the edge, for she is one of several bloggers with whom my own taste is broadly aligned. She had me at the 'alluring softness' and 'sensual warmth', which perfectly sums up the character of Myrrhe Ardente now that my bottle is here!

Then in a bid to extend my repertoire of myrrh experiencing MOs, I have just ordered some charcoal discs off eBay so that I can burn the resin at home - for the in-home combustion equivalent of Dolby surround sound.

Charcoal discs doing an excellent impression of black pudding ~ Source: bakhoor.info

Yes, I am delighted with this semi-blind buy, and as I was writing my glowing feedback on eBay, I remembered that the seller had included an explanation in her listing as to why the owner was divesting herself of these two bottles.

"I am selling them for a friend who has now found her 'perfect perfume' -- given to her by her new true love -- and is renouncing all others in a dramatic gesture!"

So on a whim, I wrote to the seller, thanking her profusely for her extremely conscientious wrapping of the parcel, and inquiring what was the perfume her friend now considers "perfect".

Source: dior.com

This was her reply: "As for my friend's new fragrance, it is J'Adore by Dior, and I suspect the name has something to do with her preference, since it was given to her by her new love, and of course she loves his giving her something that says he adores her..."

Well, you can't argue with that. Plus it has a pretty top, in a 'National Geographic-tribeswomen-wearing-ten-gold-necklaces-at-once' kind of a way.  As for the extra emotive charge / aptness of the name, the name Grand Amour is a perfectly good contender, come to think of it, however, that is a fragrance the owner had presumably bought for herself - or been given by a relative, perhaps - so it wouldn't have done at all.

Source: unconfirmedbreakingnews.com

This little story got me thinking - would a perfume given to me by a Significant Other have instant superior status to others in my collection, whatever it was? Hmm...And would a perfume name that alluded to the donor's love directly or in some other oblique way further enhance its appeal?  Say, if they gave you "Enchanted Forest", and you had had your first clinch on a woodland walk.  Or is it more the case that if the juice is not to your taste, nothing could redeem a perfume in your eyes, and confer merit upon it through the transformative power of love....?

For myself, I reckon that if the scent were half way passable, sentimentality could well fill in the gaps. But mostly I prefer to 'love the one I've chosen' rather than 'love the one you're with' - or given, as in the present case.

Perfume decanting supplies - the UK perspective revisited

Every perfumista reaches a point when they wish to share their collection with a fellow fumehead. This may be in the form of a so-called 'care package' or a swap - whether private or via the lively swap board on Makeupalley.  I have racked up some 75+ swaps on MUA, and have sent perfume as a gift (I narrowly stopped myself there from saying 'I have gifted'!) to many of my friends, both corporeal and virtual.  To this end, I have bought and rebought decanting supplies (atomisers and small stoppered vials mostly) many times over the past five years.  In a recent post on Bois de Jasmin, Victoria takes an in-depth look at the whole business of decanting.  I gazed in awe and wonder at the photographs of her spraying 'commando' (ie straight from the nozzle, without the safety net of a funnel) into a perfectly behaved receptacle.

She also canvassed opinions about the best place to buy decanting tackle in different parts of the world.  Undina of Undina's Looking Glass has also compiled a very useful post on this subject, which Victoria referenced in her feature.  Undina's top choice is BestBottles, which has a superb selection of atomisers at very reasonable unit costs.  BestBottles is appreciably cheaper than Accessories for Fragrance, also based in the USA, with a pretty good range and ultra-friendly service.

But here's the thing - last night I had a jolly good trawl of the top perfume bottle websites and UK Ebay.  I placed dummy orders on both BestBottles and SKS Bottle & Packaging, another site that was mentioned in Victoria's post.  Hey, they would have been actual orders, were it not for the fact that the shipping in both cases - for a $50 minimum order approximately - topped out at $148 via UPS!!!  And there did not seem to be any other postal option.

Accessories for Fragrance, meanwhile, has international shipping costs that are vastly more proportionate, albeit its unit product costs are a lot higher.  So I ended up buying a large quantity of plastic atomisers from them in a selection of sizes - I really can't afford more than the occasional purchase of the glass ones on there (beyond the 1ml stoppered vial kind, that is) - and my shipping total was something like $22, ie much more in the ballpark.

I had never investigated the BestBottles site before, though I recognised many, many of the glass atomisers pictured!, which American swappers have sent to me over the years.

For a small-scale decanter like me, the only other overseas site I clocked with reasonable prices and decent international delivery rates - as in included in the price! - is Proud Style, which also gets a name check in Victoria's post, and which (sadly) I only explored after I had placed my Accessories for Fragrance order...however, I may venture there next time.

It is a while since I last looked on UK Ebay, which is a near total desert where cost-effective glass or plastic atomisers in the 2 - 5ml range are concerned.  Where it does score is in knock-off Travalos, ie refillable atomisers of the Travalo style but very much cheaper.  I even saw one seller called Max Trading offering them at £1.99!, compared to a normal retail of about £8 for the branded version.

Source: Ebay

Ebay also sells a lot of those burnished metal purse spray atomisers - some quite cheaply - but having had a bad experience with a seller in the Far East (where many of the cheaper ones hail from), I would be a bit wary again, tempting as their candy colours may be.

Lovely but leaky!

Ebay is also good for these odd little graduated snap top vials to which Freddie of Smellythoughts introduced me.  They hold about 1.5ml or so, and though the lid is very secure when snapped shut, and they are easy as anything to fill commando, I do get splashback issues with them ie as the vial fills up - the impact of perfume hitting what is already in there causes the next squirt to ricochet out again.  So unless my technique is totally to cock, I'd say these are only good in practice for a 1ml fill level at most.

So my assessment today would be: if I was an American I would use BestBottles in a heartbeat.  As a UK-based decanter, I will try Proud Style next time, with Accessories for Fragrance as an expensive but faithful fallback - for plastic anyway, and for 1ml glass vials, which don't strike me as being all that expensive from them for a big bag.  And then Ebay comes into its own for one-off fancier items such as Travalo-type atomisers.

Now I know there is a general preference for glass over plastic in the perfume community - partly for reasons of longevity, and partly on aesthetic grounds - but whilst I have had a few plastic atomisers turn in the past four years or so, it has only been the odd one.  To be honest, I much prefer the look and feel of glass myself and would only ever use glass for decants of 8 or 10ml, say, because it is a much nicer way to present a larger decant, but up till now I hadn't figured out anywhere cost-effective to buy glass atomisers in any quantity (as in 12, for example!).

1ml glass vials with plastic stoppers (somewhere in this bag!)

I mention this fact about my plastic decants not going off because I have got...ahem...about 100 of the things on their way to me as I blog!, so anyone receiving a small decant from me between now and the foreseeable, is likely to cop for one or two of this less desirable variety... ;-) ;-)

Bvlgari Off-Black, Balenciaga Le Dix Blue And DKNY Rectory Red Delicious: Perfume, Farrow & Ball Paint And The Obsessive Gene

My choco-nemesis - Source: Wikimedia Commons via ed g2s

The other night I ate a whole box of Maltesers.  For no good reason at all.  At best it was due to an overdeveloped sense of order - an 'I've started so I'll finish' moment, if you will; at worst my malted meltdown is a sign that I am on the cusp of an eating disorder.  I can hear my mother's voice intoning the familiar refrain: 'You won't be happy till they're all gone!'.  Well, happy doesn't quite cover it.  Bloated and remorseful maybe.  Teeth on edge and body speeding on sugar.  Whatever the cause, doing the whole box is certainly an example of a type of compulsion, which got me thinking about other manifestations of obsessive behaviour in my life.

Well, it took me all of two seconds to think back to the start of my perfume hobby, and how I would stalk eBay, Makeupalley and The Perfumed Court website for hours on end, agonising over which samples to bid on / swap for / buy.  Four or five years ago I was totally consumed by the acquisitive urge, and was forever scouting around for my next 'fix' of samples.  There was that reliably heady rush as I would open a swap package or a little gauze bag from The Perfumed Court, accompanied by the ubiquitous boiled sweet.  It almost didn't matter whether you liked the perfumes or not - it was like buying a Lucky Dip bag as a kid or its adult equivalent of a lottery ticket or scratchcard - so much of the 'reward' is the thrill of the chase and the anticipation of gratification, even if the reality disappoints.

I mentioned in my recent blogging anniversary post that my interest in perfume has peaked, and the fragrant lemmings are mostly slain.  Though it has taken a good five years, eventually the law of diminishing returns - (the one principle I retained from a year of Economics at college albeit it was explained to us in the context of lemon barley water) - kicks in, and the adrenaline high turns to feelings of low level anxiety at the mounting stocks of samples to test and wear.  However, the acquisitive urge itself may not in fact have been quelled, but may simply have regrouped before finding a new outlet, like some kind of 'body hopping' demon.

And as readers who are also Facebook friends will know, my latest obsession appears to be with choosing paint - for rooms I don't even have imminent plans to decorate, for the bathroom really needs doing first.  The last time I mentioned my embryonic tester pot collection was around the time of my move last summer - I think I had about a dozen back then.  Well, we are talking over 40 now, a good 15 of them purchased in the last few days in a series of sudden death raids on Homebase.  It is only a matter of time before I shan't need to go to Homebase to buy paint pots, because the entire colour palette of Farrow & Ball will be based in my own home.  I paint a square on lining paper, then place it strategically near something in the room I am trying to match - a cushion, a headboard, a wardrobe or whatever.  The famous geode has been deployed as a paper weight, ditto the koala.

And I am finding that I get exactly the same surge of excitement as I prise off the lid of a tester pot - (with all paint brands, the actual colour never looks anything like the label, which may be a cunning ruse to get you to buy the thing!).  This thrill lasts during the process of application, through to the drying stage and late into the evening in fact, for you have to keep checking the colour at regular intervals for subtle tonal shifts.  Obviously, if the colour is hopelessly wrong from the word go - the paint equivalent of a perfume 'scrubber', if you will - then my F & B 'fix' is curtailed to a matter of seconds, but the buzz you get even from opening the pot is well worth £3.99 a pop in my view.

Walls: White Tie, woodwork & ceiling: Pointing ;-)

Now with the help of fellow blogger Lucy of Indieperfumes and a couple of other friends, I have whittled the choice for the guest room down to one or three shades (Vert de Terre, Ball Green or Mizzle), and am already starting to eye up my own bedroom.  Lime White is a glaring omission from my stockpile, I note, which will doubtless propel me storewards in the next day or so.  Meanwhile, speaking of piles, I now understand why the Egyptians felt moved to build the pyramids...

And finally, while researching 'body hopping' in Wikipedia, I came upon this intriguing custom amongst the Digo people of Kenya.

'Spirit possession occurs among the women of the Digo people of Kenya.  The Digo refer to the spirits in question as shaitani. These shaitani typically demand luxury items to make the patient well again.'

Luxury items, eh?  I am hanging on these paint pots - you never know when you just might fancy a Cabbage White wall or a cupboard interior in Incarnadine - but I might just have a few samples of perfume going spare... ;-).

So...has anyone else abandoned scent squirrelling in favour of a new 'habit'?  

Do share it with the group - the more obsessive the better!  

NB All of the fictitious perfume names in the title are based around current Farrow & Ball shades.  I might also have mentioned Nandebary Ball Green, Miller Harris Citron or D & G Light Blue.  Hold on - that one is an actual perfume!