I've been away from the blog for a while, so I'll start simple. Why do the worst smells linger the longest? Maybe only my nose/brain works like this, but I can continue to smell something gross (like dog doo-doo) for minutes (sometimes half an hour or so) after I've come in contact with the actual foul-smelling air. I would actually guess that it's my brain that somehow gets hung up and can't stop processing that smell. Not that the smell molecules are somehow still in a cloud around me and that I can actually continue to smell them because they are so terrible that even at very low concentrations my nose can detect them.
Furthermore, it's interesting that really good smells don't seem to ever linger. The most logical explanation is probably that I have a poorer idea of what a really good smell is. For example, I could rate smells on a scale of one to ten and calibrate my bad smell scale by placing the smell of human feces at 9. Now let's say I use that same scale for good smells, I actually can't think of any good smell that's a 9 on the equivalent scale. Bad smells are much worse than good smells are good.
Posted by tdupuy at July 27, 2006 4:59 PM4 good smells come to mind for me:
-onions and garlic being sauteed
-basmati rice
-lavendar
-cedar grove
Pleasant ones for me: Yankee Candles "Clean Cotton" scent, a fine Chardonnay, Dove soap, and a freshly mown lawn.
Worst? Feces(definately feces), rotten food, and the rank body odor of the long unwashed.
I wonder is there any scientific validity to the concept of a smell being so bad it "singes the nostrils"?
Posted by: Ari at July 31, 2006 1:23 PMIf bad smells really do last longer, then it may be because the bad smell receptors are activated longer. If so, those smell receptors in use cannot be activated by a new smell. They are unavailable, or "singed".
Posted by: Trent at August 7, 2006 2:57 AMMy bf could still smell my perfume lingering in the room after I had been gone for about 30 min to an hour. The pillows still smelled like me later that night. I left around 4pm. So good smells do in fact linger. Perhaps it has to do with the psychological association of the good smell.
Posted by: Rachael at September 5, 2006 9:21 PM