I'd start looking in the Sage/Salvia family.

you know.. the purple is usually red.. hidden by a waxy glaucous coating.. or hairiness or both ...

ken

Hmm, that's a photo of Hedeoma reverchonii (Reverchon's False Pennyroyal)? Because it does look pretty similar to what I found (although I think the leaf size may have been more like ~1/2" - 3/4" now?)...but not to other photos of it online (where it seems to have much narrower leaves)?

Hedeoma (pusilla, palmeri, nana, diffusa, etc?) or also Clinopodium do seem like good genera for it to belong to? But, I'm still not sure of the exact species?

Although yes, lemony camphor might be an even better description of its smell...which you could even smell from several feet away!

The photos are confusing because many show narrower leaves, on google photos and inaturalist. There is a lot of variabilty because it's in the drummondii complex. I can't find a key that shows the difference between drummondii and reverchonii. If the leaves are really around an inch long, then it must be something else. Clinopodium was the next genus I was going to look at. Hedeoma drummondii would smell like peppermint. The species, Hedeoma pulegoides that grows up here, has a very intense peppermint scent and it works as a bug repellent.

^ OK, I'm going to go back and get a firmer measurement on the leaves and scent...

OK, so its leaves are indeed smaller, more like just ~3/8" long.

But I forgot to recheck the scent, though!

Great! The measurements match Hedeoma reverchonii. There really is a lot of variation in the width of the leaves, enough to make one question if the narrow leaved specimens are the same species. I incorrectly gave bad information about the scent. Here's the deal. There are 2 varieties of H. reverchonii. There are Hedeoma reverchonii var. reverchonii and Hedeoma reverchonii var. serpyllifolia. One smells like lemon, and the other smells like camphor. That's the only way that I know how they can be distinguished from each other. I found a really cool article about them, see link.

http://w3.biosci.utexas.edu/prc/HEDE/dimorphism.html

^ Wow, amazing deep dive into these similar species!

But, based on the incurved hairs going up on the leaves and down on the stems...and a STRONG peppermint scent, IIRC...I think this might actually be Hedeoma drummondii (Drummond's False Pennyroyal)? And it's apparently edible and tastes like it smells...known in Mexico as Limoncillo. But I'm going to stop by yet again to double-check the smell, though!

"The essential oil glands of the H. reverchonii varieties are very weakly developed, and may even be absent on some winter leaves. This is in sharp contrast with H. drummondii, which continues to produce the expected strong peppermint scent. Distinguishing the lemon vs. camphor scents of H. reverchonii was difficult but still possible, generally requiring crushing a whole shoot (and a keen nose)."

I was going to say that H. drummondii is still a possibility. If that's what it is, you can use it as a bug repellent when you are botanizing out in the field. Weakley has Hedeoma reverchonii var serpyllifolia elevated to species rank as Hedeoma serpyllifolia. I'm assuming this was a result of more recent DNA testing? Either name is acceptable.

http://w3.biosci.utexas.edu/prc/HEDE/variation.html

OK, so I quickly sniffed it again...and this time it smelled like camphor! So, maybe it is Hedeoma reverchonii, then? Also, I just recalled finding similar plants across town a few years ago...which were also ID'd as likely Hedeoma reverchonii & Hedeoma drummondii?

It's Hedeoma reverchonii var serpyllifolia. Hedeoma reverchonii var reverchonii smells like lemon. The plants from 5 years ago smelled strongly of lemon, but you ID'd them as drummondii based on the flowers. Perhaps the flowers are variable too? Hedeoma drummondii smells like peppermint. The flowers on the pic from 5 years ago look like Hedeoma reverchonii var reverchonii to me. There's a slight difference in the petals between H r r and H. drummondii. Hedeoma plants might have leaves of different thicknesses on the same plant, but there's an extreme amount of leaf variation in that Hedeoma drummondii complex to which they all belong. 2 plants might look like 2 different species.