sathari: (BPAL)
We're gonna do this. ([personal profile] sathari) wrote in [community profile] smellsgood2014-04-04 05:10 pm

The scent of imagination

Over in the welcome post, [personal profile] synecdochic  and I had a bit of a discussion about scent and imagination/synaesthesia, as a result of which I promised to post the following questions for the comm to play with!

- Do any of you have synaesthetic effects around your perfumes and other scented things? (For those who aren't feeling like clicking links, synaesthesia is when you have two or more senses that overlap or interact--- some of the most common ones are associating colors with letters or numbers, although just about any combination is possible--- the link is to a book called The Man Who Tasted Shapes, in which an MD was inspired to research synaesthesia as a result of a friend who could tell that chicken was undercooked because "it didn't have enough points on it". In this case, we'd be talking about sounds, colors, textures, etc., that your perfumes and other scents call up for you--- or other scent-related overlaps: did you buy a perfume because it smells like your favorite song, for example, or your favorite color?)

- Relatedly, do any of you associate particular scents with fictional characters (ones you follow in others' work, ones you work on yourself, ones who are both, etc.?)

I'll post my answers down below as an example, if anyone's curious.

(Suggested tags: meta; maybe something related to "things we relate to scents" or "ways we experience scents")

teaotter: (Default)

[personal profile] teaotter 2014-04-05 07:12 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm better with kitchen spices, because I'm accustomed to tasting/smelling a dish and thinking "this needs something, what does it need?" and mentally going through the spice cabinet for what fills the hole.

But then again, that started with me actually going through the spice cabinet when I was learning to cook, so I think it's training?
feldman: (trelawny)

[personal profile] feldman 2014-04-05 07:42 pm (UTC)(link)
Cooking definitely counts as training! Which explains how the cook in the house can suss recipes solely from taste.

elialshadowpine: (Default)

[personal profile] elialshadowpine 2014-04-08 12:00 pm (UTC)(link)
I do the same thing! I spice by scent. :D