I sort of like tire store smell too, but even better is tire store combined with a little more old oil, because as a child the mechanic we went to was also a tire vendor so the smells combined are very powerfully nostalgic. The smell of just old oil and additives is, too, because there was a gas station with a mini arcade (with 4 games, more than the 2 games max most convenience stores had) that always had that smell.
Another one crossed my mind. I remember as a kid going with my mom when she ran errands. I always liked the smell in the dry cleaners. I think it was the perc that was the source of brain killing awesomeness.
A lake’s fishy/weedy smell. Also, dried dill weed.
Tomato plants…oh, boy. I never really noticed that smell until, as an adult fighting serious, serious depression, I tried planting a summer garden. When my tomatoes starting growing and that scent first hit my nose, it floored me. My childhood hit me like a wall, and I spent a lot of time that summer just rubbing those leaves and telling myself things would be okay.
For years, gin would always make me think of weekends with my grandparents. Not that they were heavy drinkers by any stretch, but it’s the only place I ever smelled gin as a kid.
Perm solution? Oh dear. That has got to be a first 
Put me down for creosote. Reminds me of walking the boards at the shore as a kid. Also oil-based paint. My grandfather was a house painter, and he always used oil-based paints so the smell reminds me of him.
Also, transmission fluid. No associations with anything, I just like the smell.
There’s a particular combination of smells that triggers a very good childhood memory for me. It occurs when approaching a big outdoor party or festival. It’s a combination of cigarette smoke, women’s perfume, alcohol and grilling meat and/or bonfire smoke. Reminds me of when I was little and my parents took us to big outdoor parties, mostly on Memorial Day, July 4th and Labor Day.
As a kid my mom would sometimes come home late after being out with friends. I’d be half awake when she came in to check on me and kiss me goodnight. She would smell like cold, alcohol, cigarettes and perfume. I’ll never forget that combination of smells.
Bees wax for me.
Those toys from back in the '70s where you’d put goop in the metal mold and heat it up.
I guess it was one of these. I think we had the monster one. Anyway, the smell of that kind of represents childhood to me. I don’t know that we played with that any more than our other toys but that one really stands out. That and the smell of model kits. The plastic parts and the glue and the paint. Do kids even play with this kind of stuff anymore?
PLASTI-GOOP, PLASTI-GOOP, all right 
!
We had a similar toy where you would take the plastic square-wafer and put it in the heated chamber and a monster would expand from it. But wait, there’s more! After you were through horsing around with the monster, you would re-heat it in the chamber and put it in the screw-handled compression bin and squeeze it back down to the wafer-square (screaming your head off the whole time–“Ahh, don’t squish me, bro.” “Take that, you Mattel freak!”), leaving the embossed Mattel mark–from the Squisher–on the wafer.
One of these toys was called The Strange Change Machine.
Yes! We had Creepy Crawlers and Picadoos. I thought no one else would remember Plasti-Goop!
Every time I think of them I am in awe that you could buy a toy with a metal mold that got hot enough to burn you (or your brother, heh heh) if you weren’t careful. I can’t even begin to imagine that idea flying today.
The smell of an old abandoned fish smokehouse. Particularly one used to smoke chubs.
I did not expect to find a kindred spirit. Skunk is one of my absolute favorite smells, and I have NO idea why.
And after reading further, there are several of us that enjoy skunks!
Skunk is good, but just a whiff at a distance of a few miles, because it reminds me of riding in the car in the summer when I was a kid. Up close, it’s way too stinky.
I’m surprised nobody has mentioned a freshly opened pack of cigarettes. Never had the urge to smoke, but I love that tobacco-y aroma.
Of course the smell of a two-stroke outboard motor. I’m usually launching before dawn and the air is moist, dense and still. The aroma of burnt gas/oil will linger for a while around the launch.
The sweet/sour breath of an infant that has recently nursed. O.K. maybe the breath of your own babies then…
I also really enjoy the smell of L’Origan perfume. I can remember exactly when I developed my preference for the perfume. It was 1969 and winter time. I was 5 years old. As usual, I was having a hard time zippering up my coat before walking to kindergarten {yes 5 year olds actually walked to school by themselves}. My mother would come up behind me and pull my back close to her, then lean over and zip up my coat. The smell of L’Origan combined with a very faint fresh brewed coffee smell brings me back to a time almost 50 years ago. My Mother has since passed away but I kept the last bottle of her perfume. I usually open the bottle and smell it once a year… {Hey, who’s cutting onions my eyes are watering}
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Vinegar for me, too. I can’t walk by a mall food court and smell Panda Express without being drawn over to buy orange chicken. And it’s only because of the vinegar.
The smell of wet beach.
Oops, too late to edit my previous post.
Speaking of Play Doh, I love that scent, too. I just finished reading a trio of books by Gore Vidal. They were written under the pseudonym of Edgar Box – they were potboiler murder mysteries – but because they were written by Gore Vidal, they were classy potboilers. In one of them, the narrator is playing with some Play Doh. It was so new he had to explain what it was (the books were written between 1952 and 1956). It made me smile to think of Gore Vidal (or his proxy) playing with Play Doh.