Can you Bake a Cherry Pie, Smelly Boy, Smelly Boy?

Here’s the question: just what is it that makes a human being resemble the aroma of a half eaten roast beef sandwich that’s been lying on a warm shelf for the past three weeks? This is precisely the sort of question that rumbles through my head as I’m walking out of Target behind a mom with her 3 children, one of which emits his aroma into the fresh winter air not unlike Pigpen from the Peanuts comic strip.

Most people would of course recoil, possibly lagging behind a bit in order for the smell to pass. Not I. I’m totally intrigued as if there’s some sort of sick pleasure out of coming up with adjectives to describe someone else’s body odor as it completely overtakes your senses. After whiff number two, I realize the sheer complexity of this smelly boy’s so-called bouquet. This is no simple smell; this kid evidently has been working hard to get just the right mixture of potent fragrances to flaunt around town. Again, I’m intrigued, and one might think by the look on my face that I’m analyzing a fine wine or possibly the brilliance of a newly perfected diamond.

The interesting part is that we’re in Woodbury, MN, my new home town. Woodbury is a suburb outside of the Twin Cities, a fairly well off suburb in fact, filled with all sorts of people driving expensive cars to their expensive houses and so on (how I got here is a completely different story, and no, I don’t fit the mold). Just from looking at them, I would have to guess that this is a well off family with no shortage of funds let alone soap. The mom is dressed very nicely, stylishly, attractive hairdo, and clearly above average in regards to income. Does she not smell her son? Is it possible that she just had a nose job or something similar and has no idea that she’s currently completely surrounded in young teenage boy “what the hell have you been doing” scent? Or, could it be possible that she’s like me and can’t stop the sick obsession with smelling him as well, and therefore never gets around to enforcing that new concept of what we call a shower?! As I follow semi-close behind them, now entering the parking lot, I’m tempted to ask but alas chicken out.

My sister claims I smell everything. I hate to admit it but I think she's right - I do. I don't do it intentionally, mind you, but it does seem to be engrained within me. For me, eating something without first smelling it seems as much a waste as swallowing without first tasting. Of course, the downside of this is that not all aromas in this world are exactly pleasant and one must learn when to turn it on and off, a skill I've evidently not yet mastered. If someone says, "Heck, this smells awful!" I can't help but sniff it first even though it's already been proven that it's an unpleasant smell, sort of like a Doubting Thomas, or in this case a Smelling Johnathon. Perhaps they'll create a support group one day for us types.

Smelly people are everywhere, in all shapes, sizes, races, etc. To clarify, I’m referencing those members of society that have the means to shower every hour if they wished to rather than those who cannot. Those unfortunate souls can’t help it and do what they can so who can blame them? Nope, it’s the ones that simply choose to be smelly that I’m interested in. What exactly makes a person choose to be smelly? Do they simply come to the conclusion one day, “Hey, you know what? I’m tired of resembling the smell of Irish Spring. I think…yes, I think I’ll become smelly!” Is there some sort of revelation that hits them, perhaps a divine intervention of sorts? Is it simply laziness or is there really some sort of complex meaning behind each and every odor that emanates from someone’s body? These days it's almost as if being smelly is hip, as in the younger generation. I've noticed some young hipsters out there that look as if they haven't washed in weeks and you can actually sort of see the caked on gunk in their hair. At some point did stinkiness become attractive? Maybe I just missed the memo.

Some people just seem to give off a natural odor unlike anyone else while others you’d barely even notice any aroma whatsoever. If I walked into a room blindfolded, I can say with a certain amount of confidence that I’d be able to tell which of my friends were in the room with me, all simply from scent. Now, I’m not suggesting that most of the people I know are smelly because they’re not, but still, quite honestly a few can be a bit, well, as we say, ripe, on occasion? Heck, I’ve done my research over the years, especially with the traveling that I’ve done with others. Some of the worst smells possible, in descending order, are: 1) 3 day old camping smell, where you’re hiking, boating, or what have you and there’s no chance of showering or even a bar of soap in sight. The plus on this one is that you also stink to high heaven so you barely notice the other person(s), 2) morning after hotel room smell, especially after a long day of driving or a night out on the town, and 3) the ultimate other person smell…the “we didn’t have money for a hotel room so we slept in the car” morning after smell. Hopefully, I don’t need to elaborate on this one. If you’re not familiar with this one, I highly suggest you try it; you’ll never forget it.

One of the best places to encounter odor is at concerts. I’ve learned over the years that you can actually spot an aroma offender from across the room. I guess you could call it “fragrance profiling” or something like that. Sometimes when I’m feeling especially bored I play a little game, trying to guess who the biggest offender in the room is and then backing it up with actual evidence, making a non-chalant pass by the suspect. I’m both proud and ashamed to say that my accuracy is at about 98%. I’m actually quite the smelly person magnet at concerts, normally with a repeat offender dancing nearby, raising and waving their arms into the air like mad to the beat of the music while the rest of us start feeling faint.

So how do you know if you’re also one of the smelly ones? This thought keeps me awake at night, tossing and turning in complete agony. After all, we normally don’t smell ourselves since we’re immune to it, so what if everyone around us has put us in the smelly category and we have no idea? I’ve tried smelling myself and it simply doesn’t work. I’ve often thought of attempting to induce an out of body experience, just to have the opportunity to get a true non-biased whiff of my own body odor but I can’t seem to get that to work either. I’ve even asked others, “Do I smell?” but I fear the polite answer versus the truth. There’s just no real way to know, let’s face it.

Back outside of Target, as we begin to cross the parking lot to our cars, I see out of the corner of my eye that Smelly Boy has now gotten extremely close to his mom, perhaps whispering in her ear. She turns to face him head on as he tells her something else which I cannot hear and a whole new thought enters my brain: if his body smells like that imagine his breath!

Let’s not go there.

Blog Explained!

Why, hello there, and welcome to the "Observations of a Modern Day Idiot", or at least that's what I'm calling it at the moment. Titles can be so very difficult to come up with on short notice so don't be shocked if it changes in the future. Anyhow, consider this an explanation of what I'm hoping to accomplish with this Blog, a sort of 'mission statement', if you will. Anyone who knows me half well would agree that I take my writing very seriously and most certainly put a great deal of effort into the quality, quantity, and humor of my offerings. I hope this Blog will be no exception.

Basically, this Blog is to be a new improved extension of an older column that I used to write called "Travels of an Idiot", something that I'd email to friends and such. That column revolved around this strange obsession that I had with travelling far away, quite often out of state, to see various shows or concerts. My first love is music and composing so "Travels of an Idiot" sort of combined two of my favorite things at once. The column eventually ended even though it became quite popular amongst its' tiny audience simply because I hadn't been travelling much out of state for the past couple of years. I've been wanting to return to the column but up until now I wasn't sure how exactly to approach it. By the way, thanks to Curt for suggesting that I try this, and if you don't like this Blog then you also know who to blame (jk!).

In contrast to it's predecessor, "Observations of a Modern Day Idiot" will not be connected with any specific forum, event, etc. and instead will simply focus on the abundance of oddities encountered in everyday life. Some of it will be based on actual events while other portions will be comprised of minor rants, strange stories, and so on. I will try to protect the guilty whenever they are innocent and vice versa. Please be forewarned that if you know me personally and you just happen to do something really amusing or embarassing in front of me...well, you'll probably end up here for all the world to see!

Let's also discuss this whole "idiot" thing to avoid confusion later on. Growing up in my household, the term "idiot" was used quite often, whether right or wrong, to describe almost anyone whenever they did something, well, less than graceful or with ill judgement. It wasn't really used in a horribly negative fashion; instead, it was almost a term of endearment, more or less recognizing the absurd so-called accomplishments of someone. Oh, okay, maybe it was used a bit in a negative fashion. Anyhow, I'm not trying to use this term as a put down or to degrade anyone, including myself, but instead simply as a term to describe either some absurd behavior of which we didn't really mean to do or, if nothing else, as a term for the beyond numerous weird thoughts that run through my brain every second of the day. Let's be honest - we're all idiots on some level. Personally, I think we all need to celebrate our idiocy, learn to laugh at ourselves, and hence the purpose of this Blog. Who couldn't use more laughter in their life? Words of Wisdom: in life, you can either laugh or cry...the only real difference between the two is that one of them makes you a bit more wet than the other. Well, at least it's something like that.

With that said, let's end this here and get started. I hope you enjoy the ride!