Friday, May 23, 2008

Here, Smell This, Does It Smell Weird to You?

Reha and I have a long standing argument about body odor.

I say it stinks and she says she loves the odor!

Wait, that’s not true at all.

This is the crux of the argument:

Say you go work out very intensely for a short period of time. You sweat.

Does that “fresh” sweat stink?

To my nose, it does not. And based on my YEARS of research on this matter, I feel that fresh sweat doesn’t stink. Perspiration is essentially odorless. It doesn’t become flagrantly aromatic for a while.

My years of experience equals doing a lot of unsolicited sniffing in locker rooms. And subsequent hospital trips to repair numerous broken bones. Turns out people don’t enjoy being stealthily sniffed. The things I do for science!

See, the stench of nasty? It’s caused by bacteria breaking down and doing their thing and those byproducts give off the fetid ickiness. These bacteria are on you all the time and can’t be avoided and they tend to flourish in dark, moist and oxygen poor environments. Like your feet or underarms or any of your other nether regions.

Reha thinks you immediately stink after a hard workout and I respectfully disagree, pointing to all my research notes and field data (and my broken nose from the last “incident").

“Look, I’m just saying, it’s the bacteria that smells, not the sweat itself!”

Jonah overhears all of this and blurts out, “Of course it doesn’t stink. Bacteria don’t have noses! They can’t smell!”

Which lets me know that he knows how to construct a dangling modifier joke, so I can scratch that off my grand parental To Do List.

Next up on that list, how to make it look like you aren’t sniffing someone when in reality, you totally are!

1. Reha is right.
   You are wrong.
   I know this because my son had “fresh” perspiration when he got off the trampoline and I could smell him when he walked in the door.

   And before you talk about your sons dangling modifiers you really should consider who is reading.

   *snort*

   Posted by OMSH  on  05/23/08  at  07:01 PM

2. Reha is right.
   You are wrong.
   Fresh sweat smells different from body-odor type sweat.  It’s not just water, dude.  There are chemicals (namely sodium chloride and 2-methylphenol and 4-methylphenol) in there.  True badass funk will be produced by the bacteria doing their “thang,” yes, but fresh sweat has a smell.
   Sorry, you lose.

   Posted by Sandy  on  05/23/08  at  10:20 PM

3. I’m sure odder things than this have been discussed on the internet, but this is right up there.

   Posted by michael  on  05/24/08  at  11:19 PM

4. The entire time I read this my nasal cavities were all burny and twitchy. I’ll be the first to admit that after a nice long run, I smell like I rolled around in nasty gym socks. And that’s all I need to say about that.

   Posted by Heather B.  on  05/26/08  at  04:35 PM

5. I am going to have to agree with you.  Although, I think we may be alone.

   Posted by kristi  on  05/27/08  at  07:14 AM

6. Well, upon further “consideration, I *may* be wrong.

   Maybe.

   OK, probably.

   FINE.

   I’ve never been so wrong about anything in my entire life.

   Happy, now, collective Internet wisdom?

   Posted by Jon  on  05/27/08  at  10:40 AM

7. I love the Google ads this generates, all about “Body Odor”.

   And sorry, I agree, fresh sweat smells, it just doesn’t necessarily smell bad the way stale sweat does, unless you’ve been eating too much garlic, or drinking too much, or ...

   Posted by deb  on  05/30/08  at  06:01 AM

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