Not really a "trope" since singers used to, and probably some still use it. The sprays usually contain menthol, eucalyptus, and glycerin, to moisturize and soothe their throats.
Afaik, atomizers with breath spray used to be pretty common. I used to take care of old folks, some of whom went through the great depression as adults. A lot of them had those.
Disposable ones have been a thing since at least the 50s, if my memory isn't failing. Binaca used to have commercials back before cable was ubiquitous, and a lot of people carried some to freshen up breath.
So, somewhere along the way, the specific trope of a guy spraying once or twice before hitting on a woman crept into social awareness. I never dug too deep looking into it, but it allegedly apparently was a thing.
The culture of lots of coffee at work followed by a drink or three after at a bar wasn't exactly great for oral hygiene overall, and definitely makes breath funky.
The singer part of the trope, where you see them spritz before hitting the stage is supposedly a different thing. That was from stage actors, but that's as far as I've ever looked, that it was a thing. No idea what they used, what the reasoning was. Never piqued my curiosity enough to look deeper.
When I was a kid I found a box of detergent powder in the bathroom and on the box there was a happy guy that said "Blimey! It's lemon-limey!" So I stuck my nose in the box and took a big whiff and if I ever see that guy again
I work with preschoolers. Mainly autistic preschoolers.
It would be a huge help if the makers of slime would go back to making unscented versions. Whenever I look in stores for these things, it's like companies straight up stopped manufacturing anything without a scent.
I'm trying to discourage kids from putting toys in their mouths, especially sticky toys that tend to gather all sorts of oils and gunk through regular play. It would be so much easier if everything out there didn't smell like candy.
There are some tutorials on how to make them at home, I don't know how good they are in comparison to the store bought ones, but it could be a fun activity to do in class and they wouldn't have the good smells
Tip, ndesktop you can right-click the video at the right time and click “Copy video URL at current time”
If not on desktop, you can add &t= after a Youtube URL followed by a seconds-timestamp, for ex. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM4lJKfu5Mg&t=112 to start the video at the 112nd second (or at 1m52s)