28: B-oh, oh, oh

The smells on this trip were all wrong. When I first opened my suitcase there was a printed note saying the TSA had inspected my bag and everything might not have been put back in the right place. It smelled horrible, like one of the paint compounds I would smell in my dad’s hobby room where he works on his airplane models. And I thought, great, they’ve used some kind of chemical in my bag to detect traces of bombs and now all my clothes smell. But it turned out to be my Professional Firma Nail Extra Strength Base and Top Coat (a manicure kit is a must) which had leaked into its small plastic zippered bag and somehow managed to infect all of my clothes. Ugh.

My underwear were in an old ditty bag from my backpacking days, which infused them with the rather bad and strong smell of cheap plastic. In a moment of inspiration, wondering at my own excessive preparedness, I pulled out dryer sheets from my laundry supplies and stuffed one into my ditty bag and spread a few throughout my clothes. But I began to sicken at the smell of the dryer sheets, spicy and overwrought, which still didn’t cover the bad-rubber-chemical smells my clothes had acquired.

And then there was my lovely new green slip-on tennis shoes. I knew they might be a problem because they make my feet hot, and sure enough, by Tuesday evening, a foul case of foot odor was brewing. I’m not typically the foot odor type. Seriously. But I was starting to feel like the odor wafting up from the region of my ankles surrounded me in a pungent Linus-like cloud.

I felt like I was walking around with a mixture of cheap rubber, dryer-sheets, hint of “Firma Nail” and strong dose of foot odor. Very attractive, no doubt.