# Smells: Best, Worst, Memory Inducing **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 7, 2012, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747 "2012-01-07T18:08:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/21 "2012-01-08T03:54:02Z")
Best: Vanilla pipe tobacco that my grandfather used to smoke Worst: spoiled milk (still in the container) that has been sitting at room temperature for a couple of weeks Memory inducing: the smell of a freshly mown lawn always takes me back to my childhood–it especially makes me think of playing youth soccer and Little League baseball. ---
**Author:** ![LegsAkimbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f1d935/32.png) [@LegsAkimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LegsAkimbo)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/22 "2012-01-08T22:55:42Z")
Best: Turkey cooking Worst: Litter box after Wilson has been in there Memory: Smell an outboard motor on a small boat puts out (diesel? gas? I dunno what it is). I’m about 10 and we are going out onto Lake Sebago for a ride. I’m so happy. ---
**Author:** ![Fish\_Cheer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fish_cheer/32/17179_2.png) [@Fish\_Cheer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish_Cheer)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2012, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/23 "2012-01-08T23:13:14Z")
Best: Jet exhaust - I love to travel, and the moment when you first step out on the tarmac and smell the planes is wonderful. Stupid jetbridges spoil all the fun. Worst: Hmm, dunno, there are many smells I don’t care for, but it’s hard to single out any particularly bad one. Memories: Warm towels fresh from the dryer - that smell takes me back to days spent at my grandma’s house as a child. Whenever I took a bath, she’d put a fresh towel on the radiator, and it was incredibly snuggly and smelt awesome. ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/24 "2012-01-09T02:55:46Z")
Best: Kentucky fried chicken just when you take the lid off the bucket. OK, so I’m a lowbrow. So sue me. Worst: Salmon after it’s been in a freezer that you discovered had failed about a month ago. That’s gotta be the all time worst. Memory: A restaurant in Houston TX when they brought out some rolls just out of the oven. If I ever smell anything like that it takes me instantly back there. The thing is, this was in 1936, and I still remember it vividly, even to what the waiter looked like. Good Lord, that was 76 years ago. ---
**Author:** ![janeslogin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df788c/32.png) [@janeslogin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/janeslogin)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2012, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/25 "2012-01-09T17:38:28Z")
Best: Young woman’s vagina in college. Worst: burning something, plastics perhaps Memory: that young woman ---
**Author:** ![ducati](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/cc9497/32.png) [@ducati](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ducati)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2012, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/26 "2012-01-11T01:28:43Z")
Best: Baking cookies or bread Worst: Dead body after a week in an apartment Memory: Chapstick. Takes me back to being 9 years old, sledding & playing in the snow in Indiana - instantly! ---
**Author:** ![Scubaqueen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c0e974/32.png) [@Scubaqueen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scubaqueen)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2012, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/27 "2012-01-11T15:37:31Z")
Best smell: my favorite perfume (Joy) Worst smell: my first dead body back during my reporter days. the body wasn’t found for five days during 90-plus-degree-heat. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2012, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/28 "2012-01-11T19:30:31Z")
Best: Baking bread, good leather, vanilla, chocolate, clean cat, barbecuing meat, coffee (though I hate drinking it) Worst: Pig farm (friend in college was an ag major), paper factory (childhood field trip), cat poop, dead possum that crawled under my mom’s car and died while she was away for 2 weeks Memory inducing: Barbecuing steak (my dad used to barbecue steak nearly every weekend when I was a kid–still the best I’ve ever had), Christmas tree/pine, roasting turkey (reminds me of hanging around my house on Thanksgiving as a kid while my mom cooked), diesel (reminds me of Disneyland), violets (reminds me of my mom) ---
**Author:** ![FloatyGimpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/floatygimpy/32/7750_2.png) [@FloatyGimpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FloatyGimpy)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2012, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/29 "2012-01-11T20:03:18Z")
Best: Vicks Vaporub Worst: Boiled goats head (or what ever the bloody hell my neighbours across the hall cook) Memory: Raspberry cider that my great-grandma used to make. It smells like happy. ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2012, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/30 "2012-01-11T23:34:46Z")
Best - petrichor (the smell outside after a good rain, like earth and worms and rain) Worst - I can’t break this tie. 1a) The corny-scented air outside the ethanol plant at my old college. 1b) Musty Drakkar Noir. Every time my manager walks behind my chair, it surrounds him like Pigpen’s cloud. I won’t be surprised when that odor attains sentience. I only hope it strangles him before it gets to me. Most memorable - Lilacs. We had bushes in my backyard growing up, and I miss them. ---
**Author:** ![brachyrhynchos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brachyrhynchos/32/376_2.png) [@brachyrhynchos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brachyrhynchos)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/31 "2012-01-12T00:21:48Z")
Best - the smell of sagebrush after that first warm spring rain. Worst - a dumped rainbarrel that had several dead baby possums rotting inside…blargh! Memory - childhood house in Southern California, surrounded by orange blossoms in the spring. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/32 "2012-01-12T19:33:45Z")
I hate to do this to my husband and children, but I must add another “best” smell. I just spent a good 10 minutes with my face buried in a packet of [Penzey’s Vietnamese Cinnamon](http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-penzeysvietnamesecinnamon.html). Oh, my God, that is the best cinnamon I’ve ever smelled in my entire life. I gave it one whiff and chucked my other cinnamon. Oh, it’s wonderful. ---
**Author:** ![bubba\_jr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e95f7d/32.png) [@bubba\_jr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bubba_jr)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2012, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/33 "2012-01-13T06:41:04Z")
Best: Garlic, anything with yeast cooking and my old lady. Worst: Peaches, nasty, stinky disgusting evil fruit. Memorable: rotten fishy salty stinky seashore and 2 stroke outboard exhaust, 2 stroke exhaust smells extra good with the back ground of rotten fish and filtered through water. ---
**Author:** ![Sattua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sattua/32/11906_2.png) [@Sattua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sattua)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2012, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747/34 "2012-01-13T13:20:15Z")
Best: my husband’s cheap aftershave, which smells incredibly delicious, sort of like lilacs and salt. Also the smell of cake made with almond meal and brandy while it bakes. Worst: dissection room Memories: the buttered-popcorn-jelly-bean smell of Pampers diapers from my daughter’s newborn days; the Irish-Spring-and-cornflakes smell of my grandmother’s house; the cafe mocha and paper smell of my favorite book store. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smells-best-worst-memory-inducing/608747.md?page=1)