This post is taken from one made several years ago on /r/fragrance by /u/acleverpseudonym. It's very well written, but I've edited and added to it a bit.

The concept of a perfume house probably isn't that familiar to most of you - it's a fairly niche topic even for those who wear the stuff. Generally speaking, there are a few "great" perfume houses: Chanel, Lanvin, and Creed for example, but the greatest among them, the one considered "legendary", is Guerlain.

When approaching a history as long and a catalogue as extensive as Guerlain's, it can be intimidating. It's hard to know where to start and olfactory fatigue limits the number of fragrances you can really appreciate in a single outing. It can be hard to tell which fragrances are the important and good ones and which are the fillers and by the time you smell some of the really complex and beautiful classics, your nose might be blown out already and unable to appreciate them.

This is a guide to those important scents, and why they matter.

About Guerlain

Guerlain is one of the oldest and most respected perfume houses in the world. They first opened in a small shop in Paris in 1828 making custom fragrances for the moneyed classes (and royalty - Pierre-François Guerlain was His Majesty's Official Perfumer to Emperor Napoleon III of France). Guerlain sold the first fragrance marketed as a parfum (Jicky, 1889). This was also among the first fragrances to use synthetic ingredients. Guerlain also sold the first Oriental fragrance (Shalimar, 1925) (my personal favourite, and one I wear very often).

Guerlain fragrances are famous for sharing a common olfactory accord called "Guerlinade" that was originally created back 1800s, This accord can be found in most all of their famous fragrances. It was developed by Aimé Guerlain, the creator of Jicky, and is said to contain bergamot, rose, jasmine, tonka bean, iris, and vanilla. Once you become familiar with it, it's very easy to pick up on it in many Guerlain scents.

There have been 5 master perfumers for Guerlain over their almost 200 year life; 4 of them have been from the Guerlain family. The most recent, Theirry Wasser, is not.

The Perfumers

• Pierre-François Pascal Guerlain, active 1828-1864 - founder. So far as I can tell, only a single fragrance of his is still made, Eau de Cologne Imperiale, 1860, made for the Emperor Napoleon III's wife.

• Aimé Guerlain, active 1864-~1900. 3 of his fragrances are still around. Jicky, 1889 is by far the most famous and most important.

• Jacques Guerlain, active ~1900-1955. He made most of Guerlain's most famous women's fragrances. He hold's 40% of the slots in Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez's top 10 women's fragrances ever made, including the fragrance that is LT's favorite Mitsouko, 1919. He made the first Oriental fragrance as well. If one were trying to decide on the best perfumer to ever live, he would certainly be on the short list. His fragrances are complex, subtle and deep.

• Jean-Paul Guerlain, active 1955-current, though he hasn't been the official master perfumer for years. He made most of Guerlain's most famous men's fragrances...and some pretty famous women's fragrances as well. I think of him as one of the last old-school perfumers. He might think that "aquatic" is a bad word. His fragrances are more bold than Jacques Guerlain, but not in a bad way.

• Thierry Wasser, active 2008-current. I was skeptical, but I've been won over. He's certainly taking Guerlain in a slightly different direction, but he's also made several amazing fragrances. His are by far the most modern of Guerlains, but they still manage to keep the signature Guerlain flair. He also has done something awesome: try to fix the reformulations of the old stuff. He’s spent significant amounts of time and money on better synthetic oakmoss and on reformulating Guerlain’s classics so that they smell more like the originals. Mitsouko, in particular, has benefited from this.

Where can I smell them

If you live in the US and you only shop at Sephora and mid range department stores, you’ve probably only seen a very limited selection of Guerlains, many of which are poor examples.

The common ones are:

• La Petite Robe Noir, 2009 - a very new line, done under the direction of Theirry Wasser by Delphine Jelk. People like it, but it’s not really the classic Guerlain I’m trying to introduce to all of you. It's not something I'd personally wear.

• Shalimar, 1925 - One of the classics, but not department store sniff friendly. Shalimar is made to smell amazing on the skin 2 hours after being put on, not smell amazing on a paper strip 30 seconds after being put on. Also, It wasn’t made to be sold in EdT concentration like you find it in many stores (EdC concentration in drug stores). It was made to be smelled in parfum extrait concentration. I’ll talk more about Shalimar in a bit.

• Guerlain Homme, 2008 - This is a HUGE departure for Guerlain. Not characteristic of them at all.

• Samsara, 1989 - A feminine masterpiece from Jean-Paul Guerlain and an good example of Guerlain, but it also probably smells to many like their mothers (or grandmothers) and their mother's friends

To get a good selection of Guerlain fragrances, you need to go somewhere like Neiman Marcus. The best place in the US is the Guerlain boutique in the Venetian in Las Vegas. Canadians have a distinct advantage here: we have one of the few actual Guerlain Institutes in North America, located in Toronto on Bloor Street. It's one of my "must visit" destinations whenever I'm in the area. The best place in the world is at their flagship store in Paris.

How expensive are they?

Retail is generally $100/100ml for EdTs, $125/100ml for EdPs and $330/oz for perfum extraits. (US prices)
Some special edition items are more than the standard EdT/EdP price, running from $200/bottle-$300/bottle. Many of the common ones are available on Fragrancenet and other online fragrance discounters. There isn’t a huge counterfeit market for Guerlain like there is for Creed and Chanel. I've bought a number of items in my collection on fragrancenet, and can attest to their authenticity.

What should I smell

That depends on whether you want an education, or you’re looking for something for the club. Guerlain has many, many, beautifully constructed, classic fragrances that are wearable on a daily basis, but they reflect a different aesthetic than mainstream fragrances today do. You’ll notice an almost complete lack of aquatics, for example. Guerlain fragrances are made for the dry down, not the opening like many of today’s fragrances. They show better on the skin than on test strips.

I’m going to create 2 lists for this: one for education and one for some additional modern scents.

A note on reformulations

Guerlain has been forced to reformulate most of their most famous fragrances throughout the ages due to changes in IFRA regulations limiting the amounts of certain ingredients that can be uses. Many of these are only a shadow of their former glory. Vintage bottles are often still available on ebay, and this is where most of my personal collection comes from.

Smelling the History of Guerlain

This list covers the most famous and influential of their fragrances. I’ll note if a particular fragrance is REALLY hard to find (Mouchoir de Monsieur, I’m looking at you, bud)

Also, as a note, a couple of the classic women’s fragrances have a “matching” men's fragrance that smells similar, but is named differently. It’s a quirk of Guerlain that they did it this way, possibly because it was before the “pour homme” and “pour elle” stuff caught on.

• Eau de Cologne Imperiale
• Jicky
• Apres l’Ondee
• L’Heure Bleu
• Mitsouko
• Shalimar
• Vol de Nuit
• Vetiver
• Habit Rouge
• Samsara

The list, in depth

• Eau de Cologne Imperiale, 1860 - Pierre-François Pascal Guerlain - This was the fragrance made for Napoleon III’s wife. Unisex, though it’s officially for women. Citrus, neroli and lemon verbena with rosemary and a bit of Tonka bean. If you try wearing this as a fragrance now, you will be sorely disappointed in the longevity. It was meant to only last for a few minutes as a refreshing scent or to scent handkerchiefs. It’s certainly pleasant and wearable, but it’s like the fragrance version of the Model T, not hugely complex and not very long lasting. As a side note, though, it’s become traditional for every master perfumer to make a traditional Eau De Cologne. Theirry Wasser’s is brilliant and relatively long lasting (Eau de Cologne du Parfumeur, 2010).

• Jicky, 1889 - Aimé Guerlain - Considered the first modern perfume. Before this, fragrances were used differently and constructed differently. It was considered to be a fougere back then, though it doesn’t really meet the modern definition. It’s officially for women, but it very unisex. The legend is that it was originally meant for men, but the fashion of the time didn’t call for men to wear fragrances so they sold it to women instead. It was famously worn by Sean Connery though. It smells of lavender, citrus, herbs, tonka bean, vanilla…and civet. It has a very animalic smell that is certainly out of fashion now, but was very much considered sexy back then. It was supposed to be like a summer garden party with an edge of sexuality to it. Jaques Guerlain made a something that was very clearly supposed to be a men’s version of it (even though Jicky is very unisex) in 1904 called Mouchoir de Monsieur. Good luck finding somewhere to smell in the US outside of the Guerlain boutique in Vegas.

I love this description of Jicky from /r/fragrance:

Oh my. Regardless of what you think about a man who aspired to expose (and sell!) his mistress's bottom to the general public, Aime Guerlain certainly nailed it. Yes, a revolutionary fragrance, bold, modern, enduring, etc... Jicky smells like taint.

I've been lucky enough to try this scent in Extrait concentration (thank you, GI Toronto!), and on me it was... not that. There IS a distinct note of civet, but it was very soft and wearable.

• Apres l’Ondee, 1906 - Jacques Guerlain - For women. This is supposed to be one of Jacques Guerlain’s best fragrances, a mix of violet, orange blossom, and heliotrope. A light, easy to wear scent, perfect for a summer's afternoon.

• L’Heure Bleue, 1912 - Jacques Guerlain - For women. It’s considered a masterpiece because, well, it is. Where Apres l'Ondee is all about the violet, L'Heure Bleue is all about the iris. This is rich, decadent, while retaining a lightness that makes it approachable.

• Mitsouko, 1919 - Jacques Guerlain - This fragrance is amazing, one of the first Chypres. It’s a woman’s scent, but can be worn by a confident man - it's peach and woods and oakmoss and vetiver. I also catch a fair amount of labdanum from it. It’s gloriously complex and exotic, moody and introspective, and lingers close to the skin. This is Luca Turin’s favorite fragrance, and also one of mine. It’s also the fragrance that benefited the most from Theirry Wasser’s attempt to improve the reformulations. The most recent version is MUCH better than the one from 7 years ago. Guerlain has the best synthetic oak moss out there, and it shines in Mitsouko.

• Shalimar, 1925 - Jacques Guerlain - For women. Vanilla, incense, leather, citrus and florals. This was the first Oriental fragrance, and remains the classic example of it for a reason. Often imitated by inferior perfumeries (if you've ever smelled BPAL's Snake Oil, this is what it's trying to be), it’s shocked many a woman idly spritzing the latest from Gucci and Jessica Simpson and Marc Jacobs onto test strips. It is not meant to be smelled on test strips, it’s meant to be worn. The opening can smell a bit medicinal, but it dries down to a glorious, sexy vanilla. A sample of vintage Shalimar extrait is what started me on my Guerlain perfume obsession, and I have since amassed quite the collection. The men’s companion to this scent is Habit Rouge, 1965

• Vol de Nuit, 1933 - Jacques Guerlain - For women, but wearable by men. A lovely cool, oakmossy, green, aldehydic scent. Cool, yet warm. It name means “Night flight” and it smells like a flight on a cool, autumn night across moonlit vistas.

• Vetiver, 1961 - Jean-Paul Guerlain - For men. I fell in love the first time I sniffed this. It was so different from what I had been smelling that I was shocked. It’s not sweet at all. It’s citrus is a very dry citrus and with heavy overtones of pepper and nutmeg. It dries down to grass and pipe tobacco and vetiver with an incense smell to it. I’ve heard it described as “what a board room must have smelled like in 1950.” Very grown up. I had sprayed some on my skin and kept going back to it. If you’ve smelled Tom Ford’s Grey Vetiver, it’s an homage to Guerlain Vetiver, a modernized version of it.

• Habit Rouge, 1965 - Jean-Paul Guerlain - For men. The masculine version of Shalimar. Definitely a fall/Winter scent. It opens smelling of very dry citrus and an almost paraffin scent. It dries down to a sweet vanilla leather scent. Apparently it’s best experiences as a vintage EdC. I haven’t gotten a bottle of the vintage, but it’s readily available

• Samsara, 1989 - Jean-Paul Guerlain - For women. A gorgeous, luxurious, sandalwood jasmine and ylang-ylang fragrance. I personally love it, but it does have that 1980’s “I’m here!” boldness to it. I suspect that many folks here will associate it with older women in their lives.

BONUS

• Derby, 1985 - Jean Paul Guerlain - For men. I've never personally smelled this. I think the only source of it may be vintage stock on ebay; the reformulation isn't worth persuing. The old one made Luca Turin’s top 10 list of all time for men. An oakmossy, nutmeg and leather chypre.

Some great modern Guerlains to smell

Here’s where I’m putting the things that are a bit more modern (post 1990) that I really like.

• Eau de Cologne du Parfumeur
• Encense Mythique d'Orient
• Tonka Imperiale

The second list, in depth

• Eau de Cologne de Parfumeur, 2010 - Theirry Wasser - Unisex. This is a beautiful, traditional eau de cologne with fresh juicy citrus, neroli, lavender and just enough green notes to keep it interesting (galbanum, fresh cut grass and mint primarily). Unlike most colognes in this style though, it lasts for several hours (though it turns more into a fresh citrusy musk after 2-3 hours).

• Encens Mythique d’Orient, 2012 - Theirry Wasser - Unisex. Incense, rose, aldehydes and ambergris (either real ambergris or the best synthetic anyone has ever smelled). Wow. This is a stunner. Available to smell at maybe a dozen places in the US. It was originally intended only for the middle eastern market, but has since become more widely available, comparatively speaking.

• Tonka Imperiale, 2010 - Theirry Wasser - Unisex. Tonka, rosemary, spices, white honey, vanilla, almond, woody notes, amber and tobacco. This is my go-to winter scent, it's like being wrapped in a warm amber and vanilla cloud. Hard to find, but worth it.

Lots of new folks seem to be coming in these past days, so I wanted to make a post that compiles some useful things to know, commonly asked questions, and a general idea of tildes history (short though it may be). Please keep in mind that tildes is still in Alpha, and many features that are usually present such as repost detection haven't been implemented yet.

Settings

First of all, check out the settings page if you haven't yet. It's located in your user profile, on the right sidebar. There are different themes available, the account default is the 'white' theme, which you can change. I recommend setting up account recovery in case you forget your password, and toggle marking new comments to highlight new comments in a thread. There are more features available but you should go look in the settings yourself.

Posting

You can post a topic by navigating to a group and clicking on the button in the right sidebar. Tildes uses markdown, if you are not familiar with it check the text formatting doc page. Please tag your post so it is easier for other people to find, and check out the topic tagging guidelines. Some posts have a topic log in the sidebar that shows what changes were done to the post since it was posted. You can see an example here. Some people have the ability to add tags to posts, edit titles, and move posts to different groups. They were given the ability by Deimos, see this post.

Topic Tags

You can find all posts with the same tag by clicking on a tag on a post, which will take you to an url like https://tildes.net/?tag=ask, where ask is the tag you clicked on. Replace ask with whatever tag you want to search for. You can also filter tags within a group like this: https://tildes.net/~tildes?tag=discussion, and it will only show you posts within that group. Clicking on a tag while you are in a group achieves the same effect.

You can also filter out posts with specific tags by going to your settings and defining topic tag filters.

Comment Tags

Comment tags are a feature that was present in the early days of tildes, but was removed because of abuse. There were five tags you can tag on someone else's comment: joke, noise, offtopic, troll, flame. The tags have no effect on sorting or other systematic features; they were only used to inform the user on the nature of a comment. The tags would show up along with the number of people who applied them, like this: [Troll] x3, [Noise] x5

People used these tags as a downvote against comments they disliked, and because the tags appeared at the top of a comment in bright colors, they often would bias the user before they read the comment. The abuse culminated in the first person banned on the website, and the comment tags were disabled for tweaking.

As of September 07, 2018, the comment tags have been re-enabled and are experimented with. Any account over a week old will have access to this ability. The tagging button is located on the centre bottom of a comment. You cannot tag your own comment. Here are the comment tagging guidelines from the docs.

Currently, the tags are: exemplary, joke, offtopic, noise, malice. The exemplary tag can only be applied once every 8 hours, and requires you to write an anonymous message to the author thanking them for their comment. Similarly, applying the malice tag requires a message explaining why the comment is malicious. The tags have different effects on the comments, which you can read about here, and here.

Search

The search function is fairly primitive right now. It only includes the title and text of posts and their topic tags.

Default sorting

The current default sorting is activity, last 3 days in the main page, activity, all time in individual groups. Activity sort bumps a post up whenever someone replies to it. 'Last 3 days' mean that only posts posted in the past 3 days will be shown. You can change your default sort by choosing a different sort method and/or time period, and clicking the 'set as default' button that will appear on the right.

Bookmarks

You can bookmark posts and comments. The "bookmark" button is on the bottom of posts and comments. Your bookmarked posts can be viewed through the bookmark page in your user profile sidebar. Note: to unbookmark a post, you have to refresh first.

Extensions

@Emerald_Knight has compiled a list of user created extensions and CSS themes here: https://gitlab.com/Emerald_Knight/awesome-tildes

In particular, I found the browser extension Tildes Extended by @crius and @Bauke very useful. It has nifty features like jumping to new comments, markdown preview and user tagging.

Tildes Development

Tildes is open source and if you want to contribute to tildes development, this is what you should read: https://gitlab.com/tildes/tildes/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md

For those who can't code, you might still be interested in the issue boards on Gitlab. It contains known issues, features being worked on, and plans for the future. If you have a feature in mind that you want to suggest, try looking there first to see if others have thought of it already, or are working on it.

Tildes' Design and Mechanics

In other words, how is it going to be different from reddit? Below are some summaries of future mechanics and inspiration for tildes' design. Note: most of the mechanics have not been implemented and are subject to change and debate.

1. Tildes will not have conventional moderators. Instead, the moderation duties will be spread to thousands of users by the trust system. [Trust people, but punish abusers]. More info on how it works and why it is designed that way:

   • Docs on future mechanics
   • Possible levels of trust that users can acquire
   • A long rant
   • Bubble-up mechanics: 1 , 2
   • A group is it's worst own enemy
   • If your website's full of assholes, it's your fault
   • On a technicality
   • This neat game about trust and game theory

2. Instead of subreddits, there are groups, a homage to Usenet. Groups will be organized hierarchically, the first and only subgroup right now is ~tildes.official. Groups will never be created by a single user, instead, they will be created based on group interest ^{[citation needed]}. For example, if a major portion of ~games consists of DnD posts and they are drowning out all the other topics, a ~games.dnd subgroup would be created - either by petition, algorithm, or both^{[citation needed]} - to contain the posts, and those who don't like DnD can unsubscribe from ~games.dnd. There is currently no way to filter out a subgroup from the main group.

3. Tildes is very privacy oriented. See: Haunted by data

Tildes History/Commonly answered questions

I recommend you check out this past introduction post by @Amarok before anything else, it's a bit outdated but contains many interesting discussions and notable events that have happened on tildes. @Bauke also tracks noteworthy events each month on his website https://til.bauke.xyz/. Also see the FAQ in the docs. Other than that, the best way for you to get an idea of how tildes changed over time is to go to ~tildes.official and look at all the past daily discussions.

Below are some scattered links that I found interesting, informative, or important:

• There are 2 announced bans, you can read about them here, and here. There have been more bans since, just unannounced. You can tell if a user is banned from their user page: there will be no private message button. An example. This differs from deleted accounts, which have all content removed and say "This user has deleted their account". An example. Note that when an account is deleted, whether all posts are deleted or not seems to depend on the user's choice. There is no official commentary, but there has been examples of deleted user comments left intact. Example: deleted user, intact post.

• The first group proposal, and the resulting group additions.

• You used to be able to see who invited a user on their profile, but now you can't.

• Past introduction posts: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

• The very first post on tildes: https://tildes.net/~tildes.official/2/welcome_to_tildes

• The first page of ~tildes.official, if you want to start reading from the beginning (there really should be a chronological sorting option): https://tildes.net/~tildes.official?after=5k

• What should the names of Tildes users be?

• There used to be comment tags, but they were removed because of abuse, and now they are re-enabled again.

• Some tradition that has started to develop:

  • programming challenges

  • music weekly threads

  • black mirror watch thread

  • what are you reading these days?

  • what have you been watching/reading this week? (Anime/Manga)

  • the "layperson's introduction" series

• How do we fund tildes?

• How to handle account deletion

• Anonymous posting

• Demographics survey: year 0 and results, year 0.5 and results

• How should we deal with low effort content?

• Why is the comment box at the bottom?

• How does Tildes feel about bots?

• The Tildes unofficial Minecraft servers: 1 , 2

• The Tildes unofficial wiki (now closed due to inactivity and spambots)

• How will Tildes work with bans?

• Should we have a mascot?

• Scraping Tildes/Statistics

If anyone thinks of a link that should be included here, post a comment with the link and I'll edit it in.

Markdown source for this post: https://pastebin.com/Kbbh7pYU (outdated, and probably will not be updated unless someone explicitly asks for it)

To the rest: have fun!

Whats this about?

@wanda-seldon started a thread over at ~science in hopes of generating more user created content. My plan is to post some introductions myself, in fields like mechanical engineering and automation (is anyone interested in it anyways?). But until I feel like I would do it proper, I figured I'd try something similar with a much lower barrier of entry. I'll write about some hobbies of mine, in a way that goes more indepth about the process, but still shallow enough to function as an introduction. And if folks are interested in more in-depth stuff or pointers on where to go, I'll take care of that.

So on todays topic, homebrewing. What is it, why would you bother, and what's actually involved in it?

What's Homebrewing?

Put simply, homebrewing is the art of making beer yourself. It's not really that complicated to be honest.

Why Homebrewing?

• It's (relatively) cheap.

If you got a few basic kitchen items (pots, ladle, cups, etc), you already have most items needed for brewing a small quantity. A few additional tools will be required, like a food grade plastic container, a water lock, etc. but if you treat them proper they can be used for years after years. Ingredient cost is neglible.

• Quality.

A common reaction many have with homebrewed beer is how thick and rich in flavour it is, compared to your average supermarket beer. Especially if your experience is with light beers (in which case I believe Monty Python said it best, it's fucking close to water). It's like comparing that sad pie you can buy in the cooler section, compared to something fresh out of the oven with the sweetest fruits and crispiest crust.

• Easy to learn, hard to master.

If your goal is to make a good beer, you only need two "skills". Good working hygiene and patience. Beyond that, any complication you want to add is up to you. You can start with a simple ale and work your way towards horribly complicated recipes that seem more like a chemistry exam than a hobby.

Whats actually involved in it?

So what do you actually do? I'll keep it short, even though I could write a book if I wanted to cover everything. Brewing is made out of three phases. The actual brewing, the fermenting and the bottling.

Brewing

You mix malts (and/or barley, wheat, oats, etc) with water, which you will draw a wort from. The wort will be the basis of your beer. A wort is a bit like a tea from a tea mix in this sense. Also it's sickly sweet (so taste test on your own risk). The sugar from the malt will be what is turned into alcohol during fermentation. In a similar way, that we use fruit sugar for wines/ciders or honey for mead.

Fun fact: In Sweden and Norway, elks drunk on rotten (fermented) fruit they eat from the ground is a rare but real phenomena.

Once you have a wort, the wort is boiled up and hops are supplied. Usually hops are divided in two categories. Bitter hops and aroma hops. Though that has more to do with when you add hops in the brewing process. The hops add flavour primarily from the oils (which give the fresh and fruity taste) and the resin (which gives the bitter taste). The resin takes a certain amount of boiling time to properly release, so hops added early in the process will contribute to bitterness.

The liquid is then cooled and stored in a container with a bit of yeast. That marks the start of the fermentation period.

Fermentation

Fermentation is fairly straight forward. Yeast loves sugar. And will keep eating it until most is gone. Alcohol, is a byproduct of this process.

Bottling

Once fermentation is (nearly) done, the beer is transferred into bottles. After a few days of waiting, a pressure should have built inside your bottles which will create the nice bubbliness we know from beers. Toss on a label if you wan't to brag and want to make sure that graphical designer education was not for naught.

Swell, how do I get into it?

How do you get into it? Technically speaking, you could start with no-mash brewing. Though I would recommend against it, as it takes out the charm of actually brewing, since you just add water and call it a day. Alternatively, there are several good sources on this. The american homebrewers association for instance have a good quick guide for some instructions. Though if you wan't to go serious about it, I recommend to read up on the specific processes, and what influences them.

Afterwords

Does it sound interesting? Bring a buddy, and make a day of it. Make your own labels too if you wan't to brag to friends and family. If you have questions, I will answer anything. Need help setting up or want a plan, I can help with that too.

Edit: Would recommend reading @piratepants comment in the comment section. It expands a lot of the things mentioned here, and goes a lot more into the actual processes while brewing. If you got this far, it's worth continueing.

Folks who are familiar with my username have likely encountered one of my many semi-humorous attempts at educating people on the nuances associated with the written word. There was a poem about homophones that went viral some time ago, for instance, and I'll frequently be spotted offering polite (if poorly received, at least some of the time) tips and corrections on Reddit.

While I would like to think that similar corrections would be appreciated here, I also think that the community's stated goals and structure combine to create an interesting opportunity. To that end, I was wondering if people here would be at all interested in brief, hopefully entertaining guides on how to improve their writing skills. (For those who are interested in writing professionally, I can also offer some insights on how to get your work read, how to find opportunities, and how to actually make money from the things that you offer.)