Can't buy me love

The Reformed Shopaholic finds Valentine's Day to be profoundly annoying.

It's the day when men feel obligated to spend money they may not have, buying overpriced red roses that have no scent and probably won't open properly, to impress women who've been brainwashed by Tom Shane and the nice folks at DeBeers into believing that if their man really loved them he'd be shelling out the big bucks for some sort of a diamond-studded something.

Likewise it's the day when women feel obligated to don unflattering, uncomfortable, over-priced, badly-made lingerie from Victoria's Secret, to impress men who'd really much rather see them dressed in a tank top and a pair of men's boxers, or in nothing at all.

It's also one of the three days out of the year (the other two being Christmas and Mother's Day) that brings out the hidden aggression in department store perfume sprayers. It's chemical warfare all wrapped up in a pink satin bow, with shower gel and a silvertone keychain made to look like Paris Hilton in a fairy outfit thrown in as your Free! Gift! for buying.

It's not that the Reformed Shopaholic hates perfume. On the contrary, she loves the stuff even though she hardly ever gets to wear it because she works in a gym. She simply doesn't like the process of buying it. She doesn't like being pounced on by overly made-up salespeople working on commission, who invariably try to direct her attention to fruity florals and "aquatic" scents she wouldn't wear on a bet.

Thankfully, there are alternatives to the department store. If you know what you like, you can almost always find it online for less at such sites as www.beautifulperfumes.com. And if you're looking for something new you can buy samples at www.luckyscent.com and www.theperfumedcourt.com The sample vials are generally large enough to allow for at least a couple of wearings--long enough to determine in the comfort of your own home whether the fragrance is actually something you can live with.

Not only that, but if you decide you like a fragrance enough to want to wear it, but not necessarily enough to shell out >$100 that you may not have, to buy a full-sized bottle you probably won't get to use up before it turns rancid, The Perfumed Court gives you the option of buying decants. You'll pay a lot more per milliliter of fragrance if you purchase this way, but even so it beats paying megabucks for a vat of perfume you won't use. Of course if you buy a decant you won't get the pretty bottle, but if you're not into bottles so much that's no great loss.

Oh, and FYI, you actually can buy love at Luckyscent. Or rather, you can buy Love, a "soft and sugared elixir mixed with the orange delights of bergamot and neroli, warmed with caramel and vanilla." And a whole lotta jasmine, or at least that's what comes out on my skin. Basically, it's like wearing a jasmine meringue pie, and definitely it's not for me. Especially not at $225 for 50 ml. Sheesh.