Etat Libre d'Orange - Putain des Palaces

Unlike the rice-powdered-anis-de-Flavigny-sucking courtesan imagined in the copy, this smells like a hennaed West German prostitute, c. 1975. All I get from this overly-cloying concoction is baby oil - maybe its name should be Happy Ending or Queen of the Jack Shacks.
This is what they douche and de-spunk with.

Mont Blanc - Presence d'une femme

Men's aftershave mixed with the toothrotting syrup from tinned pineapple. Strong and dated - like opening a scent strip from a magazine from 1986.

Etat Libre d'Orange - Vraie Blonde

Fizzy, sherbet-powder effervescence. Champagne baths in valentine-heart-shaped tubs, poodles dyed magenta and turquoise, hot pink boudoirs decorated in marabou and foams of lace. I was skeptical of ELdO at first, with their admittedly tacky marketing/packaging, but Vraie Blonde smells exactly like the copy says - Marilyn and Jayne, boop-oop-ee-doo innocence and a continually kissy-pursey mouth. Oh, if only I had a suitable chest for a merry widow! This should come in dusting powder and bath oil forms. Very fun and sweet - 7.5/10

Jo Malone - Black Vetyver Cafe

My sister has a certain word, "stenchomatic," for things that appall her with an especial funk. The first spray of this is stenchomatic - reminiscent of the tar-like sludge left on the coffee maker if my boyfriend neglects to wash it for a day or two. Industrial dregs, brownish muck draining into rivers. Little birds and fish dropping dead. A few minutes later a slight hint of soapy vetiver emerges, but it's too late to wash away the rank tuberculitic slop smothering my nasal caviities. Unhealthy and sweltering, like being made to tend to patients' wounds.

Lubin - Idole

I love Idole. Boozy, dusky, and dark, like the Man Ray photo of Kiki de Montparnasse caressing an African statue. Wildly sexy. Exotic starlets of the silver screen: Anna May Wong and Josephine Baker. Diaphanous and silky. Gleaming. I'd spray this on the nape of my neck, so the sillage would invite touchings and my love's mouth.
10/10.

Keiko Mecheri - Osmanthus

A rush of golden sweet blooms - like washing your face in dewdrops - then drying down to a simple vanilla cake frosting.

Laurence Dumont - Vanille Blueberry

While fooling about in Sephora, my boyfriend and I traipsed to the Gourmand section where it unleashed a flood of CARNIVOROUS CARNAL FEELINGS.
Every smell in the Laurence Dumont line made boy-of-the-household's ears perk up, his eyes brighten with joy, and his nose wiggle wildly. Kind of like a happy cat with kitty-kibble or a wee dog. Vanille Gingembre - "It's GOOD" (accompanied by much head-wagging) Tarte aux Myrtilles - "It's GOOD." Every one got an emphatic nod and tongue-lolling and exclamations of "I want to eat you!" Vanille Blueberry, however, made his pupils turn to hearts in a veritable Pepe-Le-Pew frenzy of wrist-biting and inhalation. I just offered him my wrist now and he sniffed it straight for ten seconds.
"It smells like one of those Strawberry Shortcake dolls with blue hair. It smells like what they spray on their hair before they ship them off."
Meaning: I smell like a cross between a Magic Marker and a Chinese plastic Blueberry Mufin puppet from the year 1987, but who am I to complain when I have a happy boy running and smiling all around me?
Message: sexy perfumes are not florals. FUCK FLOWERS. Smell like a candy rack Lik-M-Aid.
Says boy: "Write that you put on Vanille Blueberry which smells like Blueberry Muffin and I buttered your muffin. It'll fly off the shelves."
FINAL RATING: Me - 6/10. Boy - 9/10.

Diptyque - L'autre

One day in Baroque Art class a lady sat next to me who kept wafting rank effluvia. Les Miserables sewers and a gaping cloaca.
When I was little I got to look at my sister's sticker albums from the 80s. She had a page devoted to scratch-and-sniff stickers. A memorable one stank of dill-pickle.
This smells like I've been nestled under a hobo's armpit, snugly.
Boy-of-the-household = "You smell like B.O."
This was the most regrettable perfume-purchase of life.