2026 – Quo vadis?

So Much Incense, So Little Time

This March we’re already starting into the fifth year of Rauchfahne. Time flies!

Basically, I could just copy-paste the first paragraph from last year’s article, as I’ve written reviews like a maniac and spent the cold months largely with translating the written reviews, the last of which are now being published in March.
It’s been a lot of fun, but I also realized that I can’t keep this up permanently.

That’s why I’ve decided to take it more easily in 2026 and not accept any new samples for the time being. My stock of unreviewed incense is enormous, and it makes no sense for me – nor would I find it fair – to keep accepting more whilst the existing things are gathering dust.
So I’ll devote the coming review season exclusively to the incenses that have been left lying so far, and additionally dial down the pacing. I no longer want to churn out reviews ‘like on an assembly line’ and risk burning out in the process.

I also sense that my incense stick phase is losing momentum and my interest is turning more again to my actual ‘great love’, the raw incense materials, loose mixtures and kneaded incense.
Especially the loudness and intensity of some Indian incense sticks is starting to become a bit too much for me, and I’m yearning for subtlety and more close-to-nature scent-experiences.

Incense Games

Steve Pereira has invited me to a small experiment: an ‘Incense Blind Taste Test’.
With the support of his wife, he has put together a package of samples labelled only with numbers for each of us. It’s quite a number of sticks, also to make identifying them harder for Steve, since they come from his collection after all.
We’ve divided the lot into 4 bundles of 20 varieties each and will go through these one after another in 3 rounds each:

• In the first round, we’ll make notes, give a simple rating purely based on our enjoyment, and we will select one of seven possible regions (Bangalore, Pondicherry, Pune, Pushkar, Vrindavan, other, and not India).
• In the second round, we’ll learn the names and manufacturers present in the bundle, but not which information belongs to which sticks. Our task will be to match the information to the correct incense.
• The third and last round is intended for giving a rating again with the knowledge of what each is, and comparing that with the notes from the first round.

Steve’s chosen goal is to work out which region the sticks come from and, possibly, which manufacturer is behind them. He finds that all those regions have a recognizable style, which he likes to prove.
I’ll definitely have difficulties with the first task, as the region of origin is a detail I haven’t paid much attention to in the past, but I’ll still do my best.
For me, this game is particularly interesting because it can reveal potential prejudices and provide clues about how strongly the knowledge about the brand and name of the fragrance influences our perception of it. Will I suddenly like Satya incense sticks if I don’t know they’re from Satya?
How good am I actually at identifying fragrances, and will I recognise incense sticks I’ve had before?

We’ll definitely publish our results of the Incense Blind Taste Test in some form, but exactly how (and when) is undecided yet.

Unexpected Changes

Whilst I was in the process of finishing this article, my PC spontaneously gave up the ghost. From one day to the next, suddenly nothing worked any more.
My data are safe, but the computer is currently sitting disassembled at Max’s and has to be completely reinstalled.
In the interim, I’m working with a Linux laptop that Max has lent me.

Actually, I’m considering turning my back on Windows and switching to Linux, since support for Windows 10 has been discontinued and I simply don’t fancy Windows 11.
I’m not a hundred per cent convinced by the idea yet, though.

Adieu, OneNote!

I started using OneNote back then (about 6 years ago) because it was already installed and seemed to me a reliable, secure option.
I hadn’t given much thought to the commitment I’d be making with it, and later I stayed with OneNote because the horror of having to move the mass of generated data was too daunting.
I had adapted my way of working to OneNote and come to terms with the programme and its limitations.

Then in 2025 came the big OneNote update, which trashed all of my internal links (cross-references between various review notes, overview pages, etc.). Yay! 💩
The new OneNote has some good features that make it better than the old version; though it also came with some bugs that I just couldn’t fix.

Now, with the collapse of my PC, I’m unexpectedly and without alternative exposed to the online version (and the not much better mobile app), which

• doesn’t display any of my individual tags and won’t let me use them, search for them nor filter by them
• and doesn’t allow me to perform a notebook-wide search

… which simply renders OneNote useless for me.
(I can’t even currently search for the notes about whom I wanted to send which samples to. 😐)

So far, I hadn’t had a real problem with it because I’d generally worked at home at my PC anyway and thus on the desktop version. The other variants were just quick alternatives for on the go to be able to make a few notes.

Under the current circumstances, however, my overwhelming frustration has quickly shown me how fed up I am with OneNote. That’s why I’ve taken the opportunity to finally say goodbye to it, whether I decide on Linux or not.

Hello, Obsidian!

I heard about Obsidian for the first time about two years ago. The possibility of not only being able to connect the intersections between my notes quite easily, but also having these connections visualised immediately thrilled me. And Obsidian has even become more powerful since then.

I’ve been extensively engaging with the app for a good week now, and I am starting to get a feel for what my future workflow could look like.

Even though I’ve been able to import everything from OneNote into Obsidian relatively problem-free, these notes are so far nothing more than points without connection, and I’ve got about 2000 of them. (Not yet counting my notes on raw ingredients.)
I estimate it’ll keep me busy for the rest of the year (realistically probably closer to 2 years) to get these notes back into decent form and properly integrate them into the Obsidian system to be able to sufficiently exploit its enormous potential.

That’s a huge mountain of work, but I’m sure that in the end it’ll be worth the effort. Now that I’ve got the hang of it to some extent, working with it is starting to be really fun. I’m absolutely thrilled with Obsidian. 😀

My feeling tells me that a closing sentence is missing at this point, something that connects the loose ends of the paragraphs above and unites them into a rounded conclusion.
The truth is: much is currently in flux, and the coming year will be different from those before. How exactly? I don’t know. But I welcome the change and am curious for what is to come.