As someone who lived through a couple of really awful winters and knowing about rolling blackouts not just in theory, I am deeply concerned about people who had to experience the recent winter storm that hit Texas. But I know that all over the world these last days or even weeks were quite challenging, being either too cold or too hot, thus affecting negatively a quality of life – as if the ongoing Covid situation wasn’t enough. So, while I’ll add on a lighter perfume-related question (this being a perfume blog and all that), the main question I want to ask is how you are doing.
Saturday Question #52:
How Is Your Winter?
Are/were you in any area that had serious weather anomalies or especially harsh days (even if it’s not something unheard of in your area)? And, just in case I don’t know that (or you want to share with others), tell us at least your approximate location (city, state or country – whatever you keep comfortable with). Were there any negative consequences related to weather? How are you dealing with your winter in general?
What was the “warmest” perfume you wore recently?
My Answer
I know that we will be crying the next fire season, but at this point I feel really lucky: if anything, the temperature in San Francisco Bay Area was pleasantly cool this winter, and we even got some rain (though, we’re still in the state between “abnormally dry” and “moderate drought” in areas around where I live and with even more severe conditions throughout the state of California). But we have power, water and gas to heat our houses. I must say, though, that to cause the same devastation as Texas is currently experiences, in my area all you would need is a week of 0C/32F (hopefully, it’s scientifically impossible).
As to perfumes, after 10 days on a rose kick, I suddenly caught a whiff of Amouage Ubar from one of my scarves in the closet… so I’m wearing and tremendously enjoying it today. It is so warm and soft and cozy. It smells like a nice cashmere sweater feels against my skin. Today it is definitely my #3, but at any time it is in the Top 10. BTW, have you heard anything about it being discontinued? I seem not to be able to find it at online stores. I still have half of my bottle (picture below is several years old), but it scares me that I might run out of it in my lifetime…
Undina's Looking Glass 
It has been cold here but Austria is totally geared up for it. But nothing like what has hit the US, especially Texas. Awful. Yeah as far as I know Ubar was discontinued quite some while ago. I have a bottle, also some years old, but plan on giving it to Portia. I reckon that will get him over here. Maybe I had better wear it again first, I totally went off of it. Hmmmmmm.
xxxxx
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Texas weather, as I understand, isn’t something unheard of for the US – it’s just that it’s not expected in Texas. Wasn’t it in Vienna a couple of years ago when an unusual amount of snow paralyzed the city for a while? But I’m not sure: every year now we hear about something abnormal from different parts of the world. I’m glad that everything’s fine where you live.
I think I found a bottle of Ubar! Let’s see now if it arrives, and if it’s actually what it says it is :)
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The winters here are still too warm, but at least this year we had solid frost for 3 weeks, it’s seems to be over now. Living in a temperate climate ( coast everywhere) we are usually fine, not too hot or too cold, but it worries me that that wet winters outnumber the snowy frosty ones.
As for perfumes, I tried some of my winterwarmers and felt ( together with testing of a few new samples, first in ages,) that I’ve gone off sweet. I mean I never liked gourmands, but now ever sweeter orientals don’t feel too comfortable. However, on the very cold days I find that Ambre Sultan is right for me. So that is my answer 😊
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Our winters aren’t cold enough for most of my favorite heavier ambers and orientals – but I still wear them :) Ambre Sultan… I still think it’s great and hope that my bottle will stay good for many more years because I don’t get to wear it often enough.
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I also heard about the snowstorms that caused blackouts in some states. Extreme weather seems to be more and more common.
In London we usually have relatively mild winters but we did have a very cold snap recently and it snowed twice which it doesn’t normally.
I don’t get on with warm perfumes. They seem to overwhelm me, but I do love Cuir de Lancome in winter.
I hope you can find some more Uber!
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I found it! I mean, I bought a bottle, but now I’ll wait and see if it’s delivered and if I think it’s authentic – I’m not too confident in the site I bought it from… I mean, I bought it from one of the market places that doesn’t really provide any support to buyers. But we’ll see :)
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Fingers crossed!
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We had a cold spell here too, with a lot more snow than is usual. I just read parts of the Middle East (!) are blanketed by snow, Jordan, Lebanon, apparently in Israel (Jerusalem in snow), Syria and Saudi Arabia (I suppose parts of it). There was also snow in Athens.
I am glad that the spell was rather short here, I still can’t wear closed shoes because of a long lasting injury which makes snowy streets a challenge. Still, with everything still being uber lockdowned here, apparently we are having one of the strictest lockdowns in the world in spite of ever going down covid hospitalizations and positive tests, winter was a sort of relief. Ofcourse many Dutchmen wouldn’t be forbidden of their skates and frozen lakes, which I was glad to see.
It is very spring like here now, which is lovely. I am wearing Vivacious which really fits.
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How are you going outside in the cold/cool weather if you can’t wear proper shoes?
I read about your lockdown. I’m not exactly sure how a curfew can help to fight Covid though… Without that curfew, where would people go, in winter (!), if everything’s closed anyway? There must be some logical explanation, but it’s not obvious when looking from outside.
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The rationale is that most infections occur at home. Curfew means people won’t visit each other in the evening. There is already a restriction on visits, one person per day. But by that rationale shops and restaurant (and gyms, our business) should be safe but they (our gyms) have been closed since mid December. I think and worry the government (that officially resigned because of a horrible scandal where thousands of families have been driven deeply into debt by grave governmental mistakes and negligence) have lost all perspective where covid is concerned. I have lost any trust I had in our politicians. Many people here our losing their businesses and livelihoods, and young people are worryingly depressed (high-schools and universities still closed). I wouldn’t have believed a year ago that I ended up in a country whose that seems so self destructive. Elections soon but there is no one I feel comfortable voting for.
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Oh and I wear Sketchers slip on trainers with bare feet…but moving around was a challenge!
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Here in Pittsburgh we have had a week of snow, and cold enough temps to keep it around. (In the past few years every snow was followed by a melt a few days later). Not bitter cold. A lot of stress in our house as my teenage son struggles with remote schooling (they are in hybrid mode but he has only been in school a dozen days since September due to holidays, shutdowns, snow). It’s hard to watch your formerly straight-A kid skirt the edge of failing a class – he does ok with some subjects but others have been a disaster. Tensions are high as we try to figure out how to help. Needless to say none of that helps my mental health, but they are hopefully moving to 4 days in school in a couple of weeks which should help. Like everyone else I’m just tired.
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I’m sorry to read about the school struggles with remote learning; I work in post-secondary education and the struggle is real, even for grad students. No pat solutions here, just lots of sympathy for all of you!
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I’m sooo sorry your family is going through that. Teenagers might be difficult under a better circumstances, and this “new normal” can’t be helping. I really hope it’ll improve soon. Do whatever you need to help yourself in the first place: children are resilient, and they have many years ahead to make-up for whatever stupidity they might demonstrate in their earlier years. Your health and sanity are much more valuable than high school grades. As in a plane: take care of yourself first, so that you’re able to help others.
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I hope things get better for your son. My son always learned much of the info from school through listening in class. He would have done terribly with online learning as well. From what I hear many, many kids are having the same issues. I hope school can go back to normal very soon.
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Our winter seems to be ending; it is bright and sunny today. We never got any of the really bad weather; just lots of rain (more than usual) and more than the usual number of grey, damp, cold days. But those cold damp days did inspire in me a wish for “warm” fragrances; I’ve been wearing L’Ambre des Merveilles a lot in recent weeks. I’m moving back into my beloved florals, though; yesterday I wore Nirvana Amethyst, which is a light floriental. On sale at many brick-and-mortar discount stores for about $20, and a bargain beauty at that price!
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If you have any excess rain, please send it our way :) Though, last night, right after I published this post, I heard a very strong rain outside – and it was completely unexpected because it wasn’t in the forecast. But it was a pleasant surprise.
I plan to use a few remaining cooler weeks to wear some of my “warm” fragrances again before they start feeling completely wrong for the weather. But then it’ll be a kingdom of florals :)
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Hi Undina, checking in from Texas! We stayed warm-ish in our house and had lots of fires the last week. In Fort Worth we weren’t quite as affected and I think our proximity to both college dorms and hospitals kept us “on the grid”. But EVERYONE I know in Houston experienced big issues. My son and his family had to eventually go to a friend’s who had a generator because they have a 4 month old they were worried about with no power and water. I have some good Danish friends that are living in Houston and have a one year old. They were not impressed that a couple of inche of snow has left them without power and water for five days. What a mess, and as usual, our politicians are busy looking for someone else to blame. I think today things are getting back to normal for most.
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I’m glad you were fine and your son’s family had where to go. I hope it will be getting back to the regular weather. But I saw some pictures my friends from Austin published: I’m afraid a lot of trees and plants won’t survive this storm :(
After the fact, it’s always easy to find who to blame and what should have been done differently. But, in my opinion, it’s more important to figure out how to quickly deal with the aftermath of whatever happened, then evaluate what (if anything) needs to be done/changed to minimize future issues and do it.
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It has been quite cold this year in North Florida and I’m loving it. I spent a number of years in cold snowy climates so I’ve dealt with power outages and extreme cold. One year in Washington, D.C. it got down to 20 below zero Fahrenheit. This was with the wind factor and I have never been so cold. I’ve never had any frozen indoor pipes anywhere we lived, even in Florida. That seems to be a matter of poor construction guidelines in Texas. We only had 1 pipe frozen that was to an outside faucet when we lived in D.C. Everything was properly buried and insulated.
I’ve been wearing F. Malle’s Eau de Hiver” recently as it reminds me of snowy weather and I just got a decant of Van Cleef & Arpels’ Bois d’Ore’ and it seems like a cold weather scent also. My favorite wintry scent is Enchanted Forest by Vagabond Prince. It’s beautiful with lots of cedar, fir and tart black currant.
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I don’t know… If we were to get that type of a cold snap here in California, I’m afraid we would have had hundreds (if nothing thousands) deaths: our buildings are not capable of withstanding anything below 40s F for a prolonged time, so without gas/electricity we would have frozen. But since that type of weather isn’t supposed to happen here, our houses are built the way they are, and nobody expects it to be different. So, I’m not sure if it’s fair to blame Texas for not being prepared to something that happens once in 70 years…
I like Enchanted Forest a lot. I hoped they would release it in a smaller bottle (it’s not a kind of perfume that I would wear too often, so 100 ml is just too much), but so far no luck.
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Being in southern California, we have no winter to speak of so I can’t complain. I feel for everyone who has lost power and water, terrible situation. We pay so much in taxes and the government fails us over and over, quite discouraging.
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Yeah… We’ll be complaining once the next PG&E-caused fire starts in 6 months :|. But now weather-wise it’s nice (and should be even better where you live).
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This has been a very nice winter here in the Yucatan. This morning it got down to 62F which is cool enough for me to bring out my flannel PJs :). Also, it gives me a chance to put on some of the few winter scents that are normally to heavy for this climate. Samsara was yesterday’s perfume and it was gorgeous in the cool air. I hope everyone stays safe with all of the craziness in the weather.
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Steve, how’s your COVID situation? What is closed/open? What has changed in how you live compared to a year ago?
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Hola U – they are very serious about it at least in the Yucatan. We still have our temperature taken wherever we go and if we do go out to eat which is rarely, we only eat outside. Getting the vaccine will be tricky because Mexico is slow for a roll out. If things don’t change, we may end up visiting family in the US for a month so that we can get our shots. At least it’s nice and temperate now. When it gets really hot, then I’m sure we’ll really go stir crazy.
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Cold and snowing here in the teens during the day and single digits at night. Normal for February. Finally. We haven’t had winter for the last few years where the ground actually froze for long periods. It’s been mud and rain. This feels normal. But the temps go up tomorrow for a few days above freezing (32 F). Not normal. So, we shall see. I’m in Ohio.
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It’s interesting how different the same temperature feels and affects life in areas where it is expected vs. unprepared places.
I remember that “in the previous life,” before issues with heating and electricity, cold and snowy winters were much more appreciated than muddy and wet ones.
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Agreed. Also in areas that are normally very cold people are prepared for it with warm down parkas, heavy blankets, gloves, mittens, fur lined boots, etc. When we first moved to Washington D.C. in 1980 we almost froze to death not being prepared for the weather. The day we moved into our newly purchased home the power went out and there was about 4 feet of snow. Fortunately we did have blankets, lots of blankets, a fireplace, and we were in a townhome, with units on either side of us, so we survived the power outage, but dressing for the weather required a number of purchases, heavy overcoats, gloves, hats, wool scarves, heavy boots, etc. Those poor folks in Texas didn’t have any of those clothing items because they never needed them, and I’m sure that contributed to the deaths.
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The entire month of February has been cold and nonstop snow. I’m tired of shoveling. Spring can’t get here soon enough.
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I think, I shoveled snow just a couple of times in my life, both here, in the US, when we were on winter vacations in Tahoe. “In the previous life” we had no cars and lived in a big city, so that part of the winter reality passed me by. And when we moved to the US, we came to California. But it’s not something I would enjoy, I’m sure :) I hope the snow stops soon in your area.
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We’ve had our fair share of snow in the Boston area, and some frozen ponds. I don’t have any “winter perfumes” or warm perfumes per se, but find it easier to tolerate more powdery perfumes in this weather.
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Can you clarify: there are no perfumes that you would classify as warm in your wardrobe? Or do you not think of any perfumes as such in general?
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I guess I didn’t think of any as particularly “warm,” but looking again, I would say some are: 4160Tuesdays Red Queen, Tauer Perfumes Une Rose Chyprée, Jeroboam Vespero. Strangely enough, I haven’t been wearing those recently in the colder weather (maybe partly because I’ve been back in “trying to use up samples” mode).
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We only got two weeks of snow and freezing temperatures, but we live in a wine region in Germany, so it never gets too cold. The last days were so warm and sunny, so I sat on the balcony inthe sun the first time this year. Put on Fan di Fendi Eau Fraiche today, a nice and fresh green tea scent for the spring feeling
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Joys of upcoming Spring and Spring itself is a reward for living through cold of Winter. As much as I enjoy our weather, I miss those “demi-seasons” – Spring and Autumn.
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We’ve had tons of snow here, but I’m in Nova scotia, so what else could we expect? We can still have yoga here, and while you’re on your mat you can remove your mask. I love seeing people’s faces-seems like such a luxury these days. I’ve been wearing Dzing! a lot, and Eau d’hadrian. Like I’ve gone back to my perfumed roots:) And Ive been looking through my collection to see what hidden gems I have. Yesterday’s scent was Pamplelune, and it was perfect. But my collection as it stands will outlive me-wondering if it’s the right time to cull a few fragrances. How do you know if you’ll regret it later?
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I think that regrets from parting with something you once liked would be a much stronger emotion than the satisfaction from downsizing. Especially considering that most of perfumes in your current collection cannot be repurchased in the formulation you have them.
You should get rid of anything you thought you would grow to appreciate but never did. You can let go of those perfumes where you’re ready to acknowledge that it was a mistake to buy them (usually those are “cheap thrills,” blind buys or swaps). But any perfumes that you bought because you thought you liked them, I would keep, but do the following:
Get yourself a nice storage box (or several, if necessary) and put there those perfumes that you don’t want to wear now. Make yourself a list of those perfumes not to turn everything upside down if later you’ll try to find one of them (taking pictures and saving them online – Drive, Box or any other easily accessible place – would also work. If in the next several years you won’t need any of perfumes you put away now, then you can think of what to do with them :)
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Thank you so much for the sage advice! I did pack some away-those are the ones I think I can let go of. Let someone else enjoy them. I think I have 75 bottles or so, and I live alone, so I love the thought of being more organized. And I don’t want to be a hoarder. That’s my overwhelming desire.
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We have had all the weathers here, from icy cold with biting winds, to heavy rain, snow, and milder spells. I love how people call cold weather ‘frigid’ in the US, which is not a word we would use in a weather context. ;) Oh, and did I mention ice? That’s something I’d rather forget from this winter…
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Sorry, but I can’t help laughing about the ice. I hope you’re feeling better.
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