December 06, 2004

• If they still smell good, they should be fine to use for scenting rooms, especially if you just put a drop or two into some warm water, either in a burner or in a pot on the stove. I don't know if I'd use them to flavour foods, though, or put them on your skin, just because they might be too strong. (I assume the aldehyde is as in formaldehyde, and have no idea what you'd do with that aside from preserving your organs.)
• The Aldehydes are sweet, with a number of diffent notes. The Aldehyde C14 has a fruity, almost creamy scent. In all truth, I have always been looking for a big ass bottle of laudanum on my junk store haunts, just never found one.
• Oh, another option if you want to use them in, say a bath is to blend a drop or two of the scented oil with a carrier (almond oil is what I use). That way, even if the oil is very concentrated, it won't hurt your skin. It looks like the ones you have are common ingredients in fruity soaps and the like. Probably not so much for food.
• All the compounds you list are used in perfumery. Indole smells, to me, like low tide/rotting shellfish in high concentration and kind of fruity/woodsy in low concentration. It's very common in nature everywhere from flowers to poop and rotting meat. It's also a component of all sorts of useful compounds like weedkillers, serotonin, psilocybin, and LSD. But, um, don't take the indole to like, get high, OK? It won't work. Both the aldehydes listed above and formaldehyde are aldehydes but otherwise really have nothing to do with each other, just as vinegar and phenol are both organic acids but I wouldn't put phenol on my salad. Many scents and flavorings of fruits, flowers, etc., are based on aldehydes, e.g. almond flavoring comes from benzoic aldehyde. C8 and C14 aldehydes and phenylacetaldehyde occur naturally in various fruits, dairy products, herbs etc. (The "C" in the names C14 and C8 indicates how many carbon atoms are in each molecule.) I don't know anything about methyl heptine carbonate beyond what you can find yourself via Google. The others are essential oils from rosewood (Boise de Rose), thyme, rosemary. They're also used in perfumery but could conceivably have been used for medical purposes, e.g. thyme oil is a pretty effective antiseptic (and is part of Listerine's distinctive odor). I wouldn't use any of them in food or on your skin. Although originally most (if not all) of them would have been safe to do so (albeit in very small quantities), they could have degraded in storage since 1940 so other compounds might have formed in them. Tracicle's idea of using them for scenting, in very small quantities, should be fine (except for the methyl heptine carbonate about which I know little). [too much information from a smelly chemical aficionado. I mean the chemicals are smelly. Not me. I don't think.]
• I second timefactor's thoughts of not using them on your skin, and that they may not be pure anymore. I doubt they would be hazardous if used for scenting a room or whatnot. Still, I would personally dispose of the contents in a sealed container full of something absorbent (kitty litter, sawdust) and use either rubbing alcohol or grain alcohol to clean the flasks thoroughly, should you want to keep them. (I work with chemical data and tend to err on the side of caution in chemical matters, so take that as you will.)
• hey, squiddy!...maybe we could drink them at the next L.A. MoFi get-together, no?
• Indole is one of the aromatics that make shit smell like, well, shit. (That, and skatole.) Strange to think of it in perfume. Must add "body" to the perfume, so to speak.
• Skatole is also used to help diffuse perfume smells. Ever notice how fast the smell of shit spreads?
• Listen, I would certainly not use them or continue to open them at all. Collectors will pay quite a lot of money for such bottles, believe it or not, & with original contents, even a small amount, they can rise exponentially in value. So if it was me, I would seal them in a non-damaging way or place them in a container that would ensure their present condition for as long as possible. I have no idea how much such things are worth, it largely depends on the collector, but I do know that they increase in price over time, and the less you alter such items physically, the more valuable they are. Glass items & old bottles are of particular interest to some collectors.
• Nostril, yours was the response I was hoping to get. I thought that I might list them on eBay, the only issue is to ship them anywhere would require the box /packaging material to stay upright.
• sexyrobot, if you want, I will pour you a shot of yummy aldehyde goodness. We will have a ambulance standing by.