March 25, 2008

Last week, I stopped by Bath and Body Works to exchange a defective air freshener unit. Turns out, the device wasn’t defective, but I was defective in the way I was using it.

Note to everyone else - those wallflower things - when plugging them in, they go upright, not sideways like it alludes to on the back of the unit - otherwise they leak!

You’d think they would’ve explained their cockamamie logic on the freshener unit and not on the box. Especially since I tossed the box as soon as I plugged it into the wall. Gotta tell ya, it would’ve spared me an embarrassing exchange of conversation with the salesgirl.

Anyway…

After ranting about the bad design of the wallflower unit, I picked up some essential oils in both Vanilla coconut and Japanese cherry blossom, and a ceramic burner.

And three cans of the Vanilla coconut room spray - my current favorite scent. (Really nice - kind of reminds me of the beach.)

Later, while in a neighboring Hallmark store, I saw this really cute miniature water fountain / tart burner, and thought - hey - that’d be great for the essential oils I had just picked up next door. Relaxing and soothing to both the nose and the ears.

So I bought it, too.

Couldn’t wait to get home and light it (yeah, it doesn’t take much to make me happy). I set it up, got the water flowing, and added about 20 drops of the oil (like it said on the bottle). Within minutes, the entire house was fragrantly scented with Japanese cherry blossom. It may have been nasty cold outside, but dammit - I had the smell of wonderfully fragrant spring blossoms wafting through my home.

Ten minutes later, I had to blow out the candle because the fragrance was enough to scent all of the condos in my building. Really overpowering. No longer was it wonderful - it was odorous.  Have you ever heard the expression “smells like a French whore factory?” Yeah, that’s what my house was smelling like. I made a mental note to dilute it with water the next time.

Earlier tonight, I needed some aromatherapy and added some oil and lit the tea light underneath. Within minutes, I remembered - water. Too late, it was already overpowering. So I’m currently trying to get the smell of Japanese cherry blossoms out of my nose, eyes, and mouth.

If you decide to try these concentrated essential oils, I highly recommend diluting them.

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