The "Bad Smells" thread

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
81

Durians are horrid.

My lovely wife and I have been married for nine happy years. She is Indonesian, I am a white guy from Southern California. Naturally, there are cultural and other differences affecting our lives together. One of those differences is related to foods.

Early in our relationship, I told her that I am gagged by the smell of a nice, ripe, cut open durian. This I learned on my trips to Thailand years before I met my wife. She tells me no problem, I won’t bring a durian into the house if you dislike them so much.

Flash forward to last summer. I come home, walk inside the house where immediately the smell of a dead animal blooms deeply from the tip of my nose to the back of my throat. This dead animal smell threads its way between the very molecules making up the synapses in my brain. I am permeated by this rancid funk of decay.

I am alone. Walking around the house, I leave the windows closed so I can hopefully find the dead vermin that is ruining my evening. Everywhere I go, the smell is there, waiting for me, teasing me. Nothing inside the kitchen cabinets, under the couches, behind the dishwasher, anywhere. Yes, I pulled out the dishwasher. This most evil scent of death was somewhere in the kitchen or living room, but the horrible thing is hiding from me. Convinced that the rotting critter is trapped inside a wall, I give up the search and open the windows.

My wife arrives. Instantly I say, “Do you smell the dead animal?” No, she says. “You’re kidding right? Honey, something is dead in the house! It might be one of those young possums we saw a few days ago!” Nope, don’t smell dead possums, she tells me. I tell her the details of the hour or so I spent so searching for the source of my misery.

She burst out laughing. She tells me she and her friend ate half of a durian and left a paper towel on top of the other half. That other half was on the counter in a fruit bowl.

:smack:

82

While I do not have a singular instance or tale to tell, the worst smell I have ever smelled are what I call my ‘stinky farts.’

It’s to the point now that my close friends and family know that if I look them in the eye and quite sincerely say, ‘I’m so sorry,’ out of the blue and then walk away, they should do the same.

Though I do remember the first time my brother-in-law encountered the phenomenon. He and my sister had recently purchased a new car. He was very protective of it. Washed it every few days. Cleaned the interior weekly. Put down plastic to bring groceries home in the trunk.

So, on this day, we had gone for vietnamese in their car (so they could show it off). Well, Pho is the number one cause of the stinky farts (followed closely by eggs and orange juice). We are on the highway and I silently let one out. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I say. I watch my husband and sister freak out and try to open their windows. But they can’t. You see they are locked out and only the driver (my poor brother-in-law) can put them down.

Panic ensues. (Well, panic for my husband and sister, I can hold my breath for a long time.) My sister is yelling at her husband to put the windows down (which he doesn’t want to do since dirt might blow in). My husband is using his jacket as a makeshift gas mask.

Finally, the bomb hits. To this day, I have no idea how we were not dead that day. My brother-in-law veers to the side of the road and we all pile out of the car leaving the doors open.

It took days for the smell to completely go away.

Aside: so, if you see my car and all the windows are down in January, you know what happened.

83

Ohhyeah, that reminds me… An elderly mare belonging to my ex-wife developed a large abcess on her neck. The vet was called out to drain it, yrs. truely was called on to assist (why, you may ask, was I doing the dirty work when it was her bloody horse? A good question.)

…but I digress. Anyway, take the smell of cat abcess, then multiply that by the size differential between feline and equine, and you have some idea of the all-encompassing fug that enveloped us and sent me into a fit of uncontrolled gagging. The vet, who was used to such things was vastly amused…I, rather less so.
SS

84

A pressure ulcer (bedsore) on the coccyx that had tunnelled into the fat, and below that. This woman was admitted to us from hospital and the ulcer had already spread. It was probably almost an 8 by 8 inch pocket extending into each buttock. Just before the poor woman died layers of skin had separated from the underlying tissue. The drainage was dark graphite grey. The smell was horrific, it had a smell that was both rotten flesh and rancid fat. I don’t know why we kept her in our facility, except we knew she was dying, her daughter knew she was dying and the hospital had sent her to us with this ulcer.

It was the summer and I was pregnant, but that didn’t make me vomit. People worried about me breathing that in but I did the job.

To this day no wicked smell compares to the smell of someone being alive while her ass rotted off. 9 years later, I cannot remember what we were giving that poor lady for pain but I doubt in a nursing home setting it was enough. And the horrible thing was we could barely stay in there to do her care, much less offer her comfort and compassion as she died. The whole floor smelled bad and it was over a month before we could admit anyone to that room.

Runner up, some kind of infection (also drained grey, my least favourite drainage colour) that went beyond funky in the glans/urethra under a tightened up foreskin. Since I sense that every man reading this just crossed his legs in horror I will spare further details.

85

Foam Factory Funk.

My previous job was at a credit union, and we had several members who all worked at the same foam-producing factory. They made automotive seat foam among other things. I don’t know what went on in that factory but on hot days (and sometimes not so hot days) the smell that came off of those people would cause the plants in the office to wilt. And of course the whole crew of them would come in at once.

It’s hard to describe, but imagine old tuna rotting in the sun. I had a pregnant co-worker who would have to go outside when they would come in. We couldn’t even crack a window to let the stench out, none of them opened. And it was a very small branch office.

They were some of the nicest people I dealt with, but God Almighty I could hardly stand to talk to them sometimes because of the smell.