# Oddball sensory pleasures **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 27, 2011, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463 "2011-05-27T18:40:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![cwthree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9de0a6/32.png) [@cwthree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cwthree)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/101 "2011-06-02T18:49:33Z")
The feeling of my funky right index finger knuckle popping back into place (the first joint un-seats ever so slightly sometimes). The smell of hay, wood shavings, and manure. Hair clippers on the back of my neck. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/102 "2011-06-02T19:14:05Z")
Plunging your hands into a large container of clean, dried beans. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/103 "2011-06-02T19:54:49Z")
Hot wax between my eyebrows…it’s almost hypnotic. (for the purpose of removing hair there) ---
**Author:** ![Imago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/85e7bf/32.png) [@Imago](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Imago)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/104 "2011-06-02T20:48:32Z")
Licking a brand new sponge straight out of the pack before it’s ever been used. ---
**Author:** ![FrancisCastle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b4bc9f/32.png) [@FrancisCastle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FrancisCastle)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/105 "2011-06-02T21:21:23Z")
A freshly lit cigarette (I don’t smoke). Fresh rain on pavement. Chlorine. Rubbing my eyes hard so that my upper lashes scratch my lower lid (I don’t recommend doing this while wearing makeup). Getting my legs waxed. I love the feel of the hot wax and also the sting when they rip it off. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/106 "2011-06-02T23:55:06Z")
> [@Maiira](#): > > This is a bit hard to explain: I pick at the skin next to my fingernails, and since the skin is slightly thicker there, it will form into a stiff point. I loooooooove the feel of this hardened skin rubbing against my fingers. Me too! I thought I was the only one! Sometimes the skin on my one finger ends up looking really horrible/picked at, though. Such is the price. ---
**Author:** ![papergirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/aca169/32.png) [@papergirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/papergirl)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2011, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/107 "2011-06-03T02:13:03Z")
I leave for work at around 3:30 in the morning, and sometimes the wind is just roaring, but not near the ground–it’s up over my head somewhere, loud, and I just want to lay on the grass and listen to it. (But I don’t, because then I’d fall asleep and who would deliver all the papers? A brand-new baby, just born, has the sweetest breath you’ll ever smell on any living thing. Once it starts nursing or formula, though, it’s not the same. My favorite, though…I have a down (maybe alternative, I don’t know) comforter that is thick but very light. When I give it a flip to straighten it, it floats down over me like a cloud settling on my body. I always have a moment where I think this is what I want it to feel like when I die. (Then reality asserts itself and I figure probably dying is not usually quite so pleasurable. But still…) ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2011, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/108 "2011-06-03T02:25:30Z")
Having my hair cut. I find it very soothing. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2011, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/109 "2011-06-03T05:34:17Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > Popping a zit that empties cleanly. > Crisp new sheets on my bed against my bare feet. > The smell of gasoline. > The smell of a just-lit match. The smell of gasoline. The smell of a just lit match. The perfect flaming arc as the match flies over towards the gasoline. The screams of that cheating bitch and her lover as the room is ungulfed in flames. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2011, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/110 "2011-06-03T14:19:27Z")
> [@Imago](#): > > Licking a brand new sponge straight out of the pack before it’s ever been used. Congratulations. Yours is the first post in the thread that made me think, “yeah…that’s oddball, all right!” 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Lionne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Lionne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lionne)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2011, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/111 "2011-06-03T19:15:17Z")
I did a search, but don’t see mine: I love the smell of a freshly opened pack of Post-its. I always flip and inhale. I do that with new school texts as well…something about the ink. ---
**Author:** ![toofs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4491bb/32.png) [@toofs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toofs)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2011, 7:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/112 "2011-06-04T07:04:01Z")
Flossing my teeth. It just hits that spot. Q-tips or paper clips in my ear. That little tickle feeling when I stare at a bright light to bring on a sneeze. I try to resist the sneeze to make the sensation build. Almost orgasmic. Popping a zit that makes that crunchy, lumpy sound as the pus blasts out. That first big, long stretch when I wake up, but don’t yet get out of bed. Just stretch out and sprawl. The desert night sky a few hundred miles from any city. My wife giving me a haircut. My wife scratching my whole body. My wife using body scrub to wash my whole body. ---
**Author:** ![salinqmind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2011, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/113 "2011-06-04T13:54:26Z")
Motor oil, I mean in the smell of it in a garage. Takes me right back to childhood, when we used to play in the empty garage in the summer, on a rainy day. Give me a few rubber tires to sniff, too, and it’s doubly good. ---
**Author:** ![Imago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/85e7bf/32.png) [@Imago](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Imago)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/114 "2011-06-08T01:52:59Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > Congratulations. Yours is the first post in the thread that made me think, “yeah…that’s oddball, all right!” 😃 _takes a bow_ Well… thank you? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 8:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/115 "2011-06-08T08:06:03Z")
Hypnagogic jerks and twitches. I love 'em. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/116 "2011-06-08T10:01:07Z")
The wall of heat you get in a hot, humid climate when you move from an air-conditioned climate to the outside world through sliding doors. I hate the heat itself but the sharpness of the transition is so visceral. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/117 "2011-06-08T12:16:31Z")
Many kinds of culinary abrupt contrast, for example, ice cream with hot fudge sauce - I contrive to get hot and cold, in the same spoonful, without mixing them up too much until they’re in my mouth. Same thing with contrasting flavours and sometimes textures. ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/118 "2011-06-08T13:51:18Z")
All the good ones are taken…the smell of the ozone shift 2 min before it rains…the smell that wafts down over the field after the last of the 4th of July fireworks are done for the night…that smell high-up in the back of your sinuses that you smell just before it snows. I know someone mentioned opening a new container of ground coffee; I just can’t find it. I also like that time in June when certain weeds bloom and for 2-3 days the air near certain unmaintained park areas smells sweet. Not just there…but for acres around. Or that odd faint scent of shampoo in a persons hair. The smell of a bar of soap just pulled from its box/wrapper. The feeling of wet sand beneath your feet as you walk knee-deep in water at the beach. And, although you can’t do this anymore by me, the smell of a pile of dry leaves burning on an October or November afternoon. ok, that was pretty plain & vanilla. sorry. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/119 "2011-06-08T14:02:04Z")
> [@salinqmind](#): > > Motor oil, I mean in the smell of it in a garage. Takes me right back to childhood, when we used to play in the empty garage in the summer, on a rainy day. Me too except it takes me back to a convenience store which had had its motor oil room converted into a video game room (but still smelled of oil). ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2011, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463/120 "2011-06-08T15:15:42Z")
Alright, here we go: -A straight razor shaving the back of my neck. -the feel of my fingernails on my gum line. -the feel of my fingernails scratching my palms. -the feeling when I steeple my fingers and let one set of nails poke the underside of the other set. -the metallic taste of drinking from the garden hose. -when the end of the handle on the chest press machine at the gym pokes me in the back between sets. It’s like a very specific massage if I let it press on a knot in my back. -popping the leftover caviar with the end of a chopstick after finishing a sushi roll. I like the little popping sensation. -huffing the leftover bag from a bunch of wintergreen Lifesavers. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oddball-sensory-pleasures/583463.md?page=7)