When I first started my perfume and health journey with my Gila Lizard Powers (GLP-1) I was amazed at how many pagan indie perfume houses there were. Later I became amazed at how pagan-friendly the Fragrantica forum was, and at how many pagan mythology inspired fragrances there were from mainstream niche houses. It's been about a half a year and I have dug into the database enough to find out that Lancome was openly working Magie Noire in 1978.

On March 28 the front page of Fragrantica carried an article in which a perfume reviewer expressed a desire to give a blood sacrifice to Artemis. Link here: https://www.fragrantica.com/news/Hellenist-A-French-House-Greek-Myths-22332.html

I inadvertantly started a new phrase.  I've come to really appreciate vintages as a category, and there are a whole lot of other perfume enthusiasts who do as well. One of the hallmarks of a vintage is that it loses its top notes, usually florals or citrus notes. Not all of them do, though, and I'm impressed with those that still have them. Recently I noticed one of my bottles is starting to go vintage, and it's a not even that old, a Bath & Body Works perfume. We didn't have that brand when I was young. I still like it though, since I like vintage ambers, and I can always put more floral notes with it by layering on an additional fragrance if I desire. It's OK for things to change as they get older. They're still great.

So, when I was discussing some vintages and said maybe I'm also going vintage and losing my top notes, I originally meant that I'm going to appreciate my body and mind even they can no longer do all the things I used to be able to do, just like I appreciate a vintage perfume that has lost its top notes. But everyone took it to mean I have no fucks left to give. And several people said they were going to adopt the phrase. I'm getting a kick out of it. This is even better. I have lost my top notes, have no fucks left to give, and am living the way I want to from now on. 

One of the reasons I enjoy that forum so much is because it's a positive community, in a good way (I have to clarify the word positive now, because it's so often used to mean attempts to discuss illness or natural disasters get censored. People have discussed those things on the perfume forum and everyone is supportive, as a real positive community should be.)

There's another positive corner of the internet, literally called the positive corner of the internet, which is the Arnold Schwarzenegger health and fitness newsletter. I started reading his twitter for his anti-Nazi statements but signed up for his fitness advice newsletter because why not. I was not sure it would have anything relevant for me since I gave up lifting weights when I was about 40 due to arthritis, and switched to swimming. But it has given me lots of great, useful info. Some of it is applicable beyond working out, too. One bit of advice that really seems applicable to a lot of things in my life is to forget perfect, just start, and if you get 1 out of 10 that's still better than 0. 

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I shared mini bottles of some of my fragrances with a friend from the perfume forum, as part of a swap that was otherwise about vintages. The image that accompanies this post is of the bottles I put in her box for her. I also loaded that photo on Fragram. Someone there commented that it was a photo of "the secret laboratory of a perfumer."

I'm making another post with a full list of the stories behind my perfumes and the notes that comprise them, but that's going to be official statements, and here I'm just sharing some informal information about them that came up while we were chatting about her plans to wear them. We happened to talk about my inspirations and influences from other perfumes and perfumes lines, so I'd like to share that here.

Terrifying Bog Witch is a custom fragrance I made for my housemate, whose business name is Tarot by Willow. I knew the fragrance would need notes of water, wood, and flowers appropriate to a fen environment. But I also asked her what she would like it to smell like, and she said, "Like Tom Oud Wood but better."

That's a tall order for a new indie perfumer. Did she know what she was asking? I think perhaps she did. She used to sell Tom Ford from the fragrance counter at Saks 5th Avenue. She remains a huge Tom Ford fan.

The first thing I knew, if I was going to structure my 3 act play of a perfume somewhat on that one, mine must absolutely not contain any oud. It had to be radically different. I did borrow the cardamom note, though. That was just the perfect thing to add to my composition as a top note, and I did get the idea for it from the Tom Ford one.

"Influence" has become somewhat of a dirty word, but I don't think it's inherently bad to be influenced by great or traditional recipes, any more than it's inherently bad to somewhat structure my carrot cake recipe after my mom's, even though I changed the wheat flour to almond flour, the sugar to stevia, the eggs to egg replacer, and the margarine to butter. Structures that work are a great starting place even if I change almost everything as I go.

The Erin's Garden Collection was somewhat inspired by Gucci's The Alchemist's Garden Collection. Only one of the fragrances in the Erin's Garden Collection resembles a fragrance in The Alchemist's Garden Collection. Gucci's A Midnight Stroll strongly reminded me of the way it smells when I burn garden waste from my garden, especially when I cut the rosemary hedge and have fresh rosemary sap on my hands. I wanted to capture that experience in one of my fragrances, so I looked up the note the pyramid of A Midnight Stroll and borrowed the cade oil note for my Midnight Bonfire.

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I'm working on Swimming in Silk, the flanker to Swimming in Perfume, which I made for the Me as a Perfume Challenge. I'm intentionally holding off placing an order for my ingredients until after my product introduction party on the last Sunday in March, because I might have orders for more things or be out of more things after that. 

The Me as a Perfume Challenge started on Fragram. You can read about it on these links:

Fragram Me as a Perfume Challenge: 

Original challenge:

#measafragrance challenge by Tiwali: Tiwalii ~ ✨New Challenge✨ #measafragrance If you were a fragrance, what notes would you be ... 300470 

Tiwali's Challenge entry: Tiwalii ~ I had to make a #measaperfume with actual perfume notes as well. Dear Bhavna ins ... 300731 

My first Challenge entry: erinlale ~ For the Me As a Perfume challenge! You don't know what you started lol. I am act ... 301230 

My second Challenge entry: erinlale ~ Me as a perfume challenge flanker 1 Swimming in Silk. The first one was Swimming ... 301347  

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 My brother's blog post about his perfume collection, garden, and philosophy: https://jaylale.substack.com/p/march-23-2025-the-idea-of-a-garden

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My appearance on The Bard's Archive talking about perfumes and my Monster Powers may have been lost when the interviewer had hard drive problems. If the episode is salvageable and eventually goes live I'll post the link. 

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If I had enough physical ability, I would start selling my Magical Perfumes and Products from a booth at Sin City Witches events. But I don't. I'm hoping to make some wholesale deals to supply people who want to sell things at a booth and need to include some additional products. Fragrances would make a good second line for a jewelry maker, for example. 

If I started with local events like that, the next local events I would do would be craft fairs, Pagan Pride Day in the fall, and eventually the Renfaire, but Renfaire is super expensive and a multi-person, multi-shift enterprise so that wouldn't go unless I either went in with other crafters like I used to do or had a staff. I no longer have the abillity level to even attend Renfaire though, let alone operate a booth. Someone else is going to have to do the selling there.

I am able enough to sell on the internet but so far only people who know me on the forum and are interested in a larger swap are trying my products. It's a start. From there I can generate word of mouth.

Another thing I'm able to do is have a short event at my house, a few hours at a time, a product party that's no longer or more difficult to do than a regular party. I have a lot of practice planning an event at my house and leading people through it, because that's what I did for years as the leader of a kindred. It's time I put my skill to use making a living so I can keep on living.

My first Perfumes and Products Party was just for my personal friends and neighbors. it was held on the last Sunday in March. Leading up to it, I was making things, cleaning the house, and planning the menu nonstop for weeks. Exactly like I would have been doing if I was hosting a kindred holiday celebration. I am amazed and slightly horrified by the realization of how much of my time, energy, and ability levels I devoted to serving a small community through priestly services to the point where I had nothing left of myself to devote to working for a living. I'm done with that. I have lost my top notes. It is time for me to make a living, while I can still do anything. 

The Perfumes and Products Party was the same weekend that I would have been holding the Ostara Ritual in previous years. I felt weird about not hosting Ostara this year even though 1. I'm allergic to eggs now 2. Ostara was the one ritual that another kindred member hosted one year and no one ever volunteered to host another ritual after that 3. the kindred already drifted apart 4. the only people who were still interested in doing any pagan type rituals were not even heathen, they were other types of pagans who could go to regular pagan events and there were regular pagan events regularly in the local area. 5. I have limited energy and really really need to do some sort of paying work or business with it. 6. I never had kids and all that egg dyeing and related activities had been for kindred kids.

I didn't have to chuck all my Ostara traditons though, I still set out some Ostara / Easter type decorations, including a basket and a stuffed bunny and of course the Ostara Egg Quilt. And of course, looking all the way back to my start in the heathen community, I could bring forward the one part of the old Ostara campouts I used to go to in California that has increased in relevance in my life recently: celebrating Loki's Day on April 1st. I already have a Loki's Day post written for my social media and also for the April Project Perfume Tray, which I'm hosting. I will write more about that in my April blog, so tune in next time.

As with most things I become completely obsessed with, it was only a few weeks between when I started collecting perfumes and when I wanted to start making perfumes. I always want to participate. I love sf books, therefore I wanted to write sf books. I loved using hand dyed fabrics in my crafts, therefore I made hand dyed fabrics (which was a great home business for a while until it became too physically difficult for me.) I don't want to watch sports, I want to play them. Since October I've dropped 8 sizes and launched a new home business. I just had my first product party yesterday and it was a great success.