Admin: 6 posts

I’m back in my summer office. The bright pink color was the choice of our neighbor, who as a part-time gravedigger has a philosophical outlook on life–“have your fun now”. It’s a small room I share with spiders and a mouse. Small cracks in the ceiling send rivulets of crumbled plaster onto my notebooks. The earthen floor produces copious amounts of dust, and I’ve resigned myself to the reddish tint on my shoes.

Yet it’s the most serene place I know, especially in the mornings when the garden holds only me, birds and visiting cats. The house is built in the old-fashioned manner of wood and clay mixed with hay, and it breathes. I can smell the said cats if they have been too playful nearby, but I also notice the green sweetness of crushed milkweed and tea roses that vie for a spot in the sun and grow in a thick tangle over the fence. Breakfast is only a strawberry patch away. The water for tea is in the well. (The amenities are thankfully in a separate house close by).

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If you use Google Reader to read Bois de Jasmin through the RSS feed, you’ll have to switch to another tool–Google Reader is going to be phased out by July 1st (and that’s today). There are many other alternatives to read this and other blogs, and based on my research, Feedly seems to be one of the favorite choices. But it’s not perfect, and it doesn’t pick up the correct feed if you enter “boisdejasmin”. To subscribe for Bois de Jasmin, you have to either enter “boisdejasmin.com/feed” in the search box or follow this link. You can also migrate your feeds easily from Google Reader to Feedly.

The other two choices include Newsfire, Blog Lovin’, and Digg Reader.

Of course, you can always follow me by subscribing via email (just enter it in the box at the bottom of each post) or click here. You can unsubscribe anytime, and your personal information remains private. Facebook and Twitter are the other ways for us to keep in touch.

A few weeks ago I promised you to compare the current formulation of Guerlain Après l’Ondée to the older one. I finally had a chance to do so, and I’m happy to report that Après l’Ondée still smells fantastic. It’s different in some ways–the spicy notes are milder, the musky drydown is sweeter, but overall, it’s recognizable. It’s a watercolor of violets and carnations, with a delicious twist of anise. However, some people found that they had difficulty smelling it, and it’s probably due to the type of musk and/or violet notes. So, definitely try it on your skin first.

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I am looking for a contributing author to join Bois de Jasmin’s small team of writers. The right person should be passionate about perfume and interested in trying different fragrances. Ideally, I’m looking for someone who can contribute 2 articles a month, but it’s flexible. The articles can be perfume reviews or any other fragrance-related posts, and you can draw upon your own personal interests and experience. Besides contributing a post, an author is expected to reply to the comments under their articles (I take care of the images and formatting myself).

You should be comfortable with being edited.

You will be compensated for your work (because Bois de Jasmin is not a sponsored blog, the payment is modest). The written material has to be original, so articles published elsewhere won’t be accepted. Bois de Jasmin will hold the copyright on any articles published here.

To prevent any conflict of interest situations, please don’t apply if you work for a fragrance company, retail store or blog on perfume topics. If you’re a fellow perfume blogger, you’re welcome to participate as a guest poster.

Please note that no sponsored or advertising driven articles are accepted.

To apply: please send me a short writing sample (3 paragraphs or so) pasted in the email body and tell me a little about yourself and your interest in perfume. My email address is editor at boisdejasmin dot com.

I will try to reply to each submission individually, but please give me a couple of weeks to do so. Thank you for your interest!

Painting: A Lady Writing a Letter (fragment), Johannes Vermeer, 17th century Netherlands, National Gallery of Art.

Bois de Jasmin is taking a break till next Monday.  Meanwhile, I wanted to share a little reminder of spring–mimosas on a snowy day. Wish you a great start to your week!

Photography by Bois de Jasmin

I wish all of you a wonderful 4th of July holiday! Please eat some burgers and grilled corn for me.  Here in Belgium it will be business as usual, but I will take a little vacation of my own to get some rest. Suzanna and I will see you back at BdJ on Friday.

Meanwhile, I will leave you with this example of German ingenuity, a beer bike. It’s a solution to the perpetual dilemma of indulgence (tasty alcoholic beverage, in this case) vs virtue (active lifestyle).  For my part, I chose to stay out of the path of this careening vehicle.

Photography by Bois de Jasmin