Smell Like A Man

Why do the prettiest girlfriends always end up being the worst relationships?

Years ago I was involved with a striking beauty who was half-Norwegian and half-Chinese. I met her swing dancing, and for one of our first dates we went to a retro event held on the USS Hornet, an aircraft carrier museum located in the San Francisco Bay Area. After a few upbeat numbers the orchestra cooled us down with a ballad. I pulled the girl close and shifted into slow-dance mode, whereupon she whispered in my ear, “You smell like sweat, cologne, smoke and whiskey.”

It was a combination that met her approval.

St. Johns Bay Rum can provide you with two of the ingredients in that recipe: cologne and spirits. Back in the day St Johns ran an ad campaign whose copy read that many products out there can make you smell pretty, but this one makes you smell like a man:

It’s up to you to add the optional scents of sweat and smoke. As for bay rum’s more subtle ingredients, here’s what else is in the iconic fragrance that was founded in 1947:

A four-ounce bottle of the classic blend goes for $50, while a two-ounce bottle will run you a mere $35 and will still last longer than that relationship did. — CC

14 Comments on "Smell Like A Man"

  1. I just got some (4″oz. bottle) a month or so ago from Vermont Country Store, but haven’t had any place to wear it yet!

  2. brendanborstal | March 8, 2021 at 12:09 am |

    why do i doubt this ever happened, “Chens”?

  3. Because it never happened to you.

  4. Father Brown | March 8, 2021 at 4:30 am |

    When in college, I used cheap, no-name Bay Rum from Rexall drugstore. I remember it fondly. Those were the days.

  5. Scandinavian Chinese. Sounds exotic.

    Will

  6. @Christian,

    Get with the times, man! It’s 2021 and no one wants to smell like a man anymore.

    This decade fragrances are all about androgyny, unisex style, and inclusion.

  7. Sweat and outrage at X, Y, or Z. What an aromatic combination.

    Best Regards,

    Heinz-Ulrich

  8. Jesse Livermore | March 8, 2021 at 12:02 pm |

    I recommend St. John’s Vetiver as well. Older women, especially, find it intriguing.

  9. Regarding “smell like a man,” I recall two amusing studies on women’s olofactory perception.

    In one test, they were given a man’s sweaty t-shirt. Almost all of them thought it smelled foul, like urine. Unless they were ovulating, then they found it arousing.

    In another test on pheromones and such, women could tell a high-testosterone alpha male from a lesser example of the species by the smell of his t-shirt.

  10. MacMcConnell | March 8, 2021 at 1:54 pm |

    Maybe the next article should be on deoderant. 😉

  11. Speaking of women and scents, most women will say that there is nothing more obnoxious than a man who sprays on too much cologne. They say less is more.

    Real preppies are not really interested in fragrance anyway. They use aftershave, not cologne.

  12. WelshRabbit | March 9, 2021 at 12:06 pm |

    Bay Rum is neither a cologne nor an aftershave; it is a category of its own and is unapologetically masculine. If you want to smell like 2021 I am certain the Kardashians have something you might like.

  13. Henry Contestwinner | March 10, 2021 at 12:44 am |

    I very much doubt that “brendanborstal” can dance, and if he can, I doubt he does it very well. Women love a good dancer, a fact that any man who dances well can attest to.

  14. Robert Linthicum | March 22, 2021 at 8:15 pm |

    Bay Rum is the gold standard, for sure. A number of females have told me Jovan’s “Musk for Men” is very arousing. I switched to it, natch.

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