Seriously, what the fuck is this smell and where is it coming from? About 2 months ago I noticed that my clothes had a strange scent to them. It slowly got worse over time so I just ended up throwing them all out about 3 weeks ago and buying brand new clothes (I had shrunk out of all of my other clothes anyway so the wardrobe needed to be replaced, smell or no smell.) Now my new clothes have this strange smell to them too! I just washed them again today and the smell is very strong. It doesn’t smell like mold or dirt or anything I can put my finger on, it just SMELLS. Not that clean smell your clothes should have when they come out of the washing machine either, but a really strange smell that I can’t quite put my finger on.
Have they recently changed the Tide formula and they just didn’t tell me? Is it possible that somehow the machines at the laundromat are making my clothes smell strange? Are there gnomes that break into my home at night and use some magical power to fuck up my clothes? Am I imagining this whole smell out of nowhere? Damn smell gnomes!
Have youy checked the vent to your dryer, and the lint trap (behind the lint filter)?
It is possible that rain or other moisture (even condensation) has gotten into your vent pipe and is growinga mould / fungal colony. (it happens)… when your dryer is not in use, air from the outside flows in through the vent hose and “pollutes” the dryer, and then it gets “baked” into your clothing.
Also, if you have an upright washer, it may not be draining completely, again allowing sitting moisture to develop an organic colony. (Note: the perforated drum that is inside your washer can be perfectly dry, but the larger chamber it rides in can still have an inch (or more) of water in it).
Couple of things to check for, anyway.
Is it the water at the laundromat? Is there a smoker in an apartment beside, below, or above you? Dead body in the next apartment? Can you describe the smell? Is it a moldy, mildewy type, decomposing flesh type, poop type?
It isn’t a smell like I have ever smelled before. It doesn’t smell like mold or mildew at all or cat piss or anything else I could imagine it to be. It kind of smells like burnt soap, but even that isn’t entirely accurate. I have never smelled anything else like it. I use a different washer and dryer every time I go to the laundromat just in case but the smell still persists. I had friends and a guy I dated for a short while tell me they couldn’t figure out what I was talking about but coworkers said they could smell something too so I can’t tell what in the world is going on. Maybe it is related to the water in the laundromat…I will try a different laundromat and see if maybe that is causing it. I switched soap brands too so I don’t think that has anything to do with it but I can always switch a third time.
You didn’t happen to leave a load of clothing in the washing machine for too long, did you? I do this occasionally and the resultant gym sock sweat odor is unbelievably foul. I’ve had to wash clothes a couple of times to get rid of it.
It wasn’t anything that got left in the washer for too long…that is the one good thing about laundromats. You are there watching for it to finish, so you pretty much immediately switch it to the dryer.
Have you ever read the Langoliers? The Stephen King story where the plane accidentally flies through a time/space vortex? In the story they land at an abandoned airport and go inside and try to find something to eat, but everything the find is tasteless, the soda is flat, etc. until they bring it back on the plane, at which point it gains flavor and such again. This is kind of the way my clothes smell…they don’t smell dirty or sweaty or moldy or anything, but they don’t smell clean either. They just smell wrong.
Maybe some chemical agent in Tide suddenly smells different to you because something odd happened to your brain? Have you noticed your flesh being a different color recently? Any dirt tracked around your house? Do you have an overwhelming desire for brains, and the desire to tell everyone this by moaning “braaaaains” whenever you see someone?
Did you say you switched detergents and your clothes still smell like that? Have you tried switching laundromats- maybe it’s their water? If you are still using Tide, does “the smell” smell like scented tampons? A couple of years ago I noticed that Tide started smelling exactly like deodorant tampons. I hate that smell.
YES! Deoderant tampons are damn near exactly what this smells like! I wonder if the other detergent I was using was a subsidiary of Tide or also made by Protcor and Gamble? I will go buy non-Tide tomorrow and see if that makes any kind of noticable difference.
Perhaps whatever is making your clothes smell is the same thing that seems to be BITING HOLES in mine. For the last year or so, various items of my clothing have gotten these little sets of holes in them. The holes are always about the size as if they were jabbed by a ballpoint pen, about three-fourths of an inch apart. They greatly resemble snakebites. They are prone to appearing anywhere on anything and decorate about half my closet’s worth of stuff. The only thing I can come up with is that they’re the product of my clothes catching on something sticking out in the washer or dryer, but a careful search has yielded nothing.
If that’s the smell, then it’s definitely the Tide. Really no need to switch laundromats. Back when it first came out, one of my coworkers smelled like deodorant tampons all the time and it was starting to freak me out. I was wondering how she could possibly be on the rag every day of the month. Then I changed from another brand back to Tide, and smelled that smell on my own clothes. It’s the Tide. Glad I could help.
As for the holes, I’m going to guess either you use bleach frequently, or my cat visits your house and does to your clothes whatever she does to my flannel sheets. Or you have moths. Have you tried mothballs? They have their own intolerable smell, too, though.
I know that when my clothes get to a certian age they do start getting pinprick sized holes in them, but if these clothes are fairly new I can’t help you there, but if it looks like snake bites you should be very careful when doing laundry and try to avoid any possible snakes.