IN BAD ODOR
Author discovers unpleasant smell in automobile.
January/February 1990
by Alfred Meyer
OPEN ROAD
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IT STARTED LONG SPRING AFTER month of almost solid rain here in the Northeast, a rarity more typical of, say, the cloud forest of Costa Rica than the Hudson River valley. It was also frightening, apart from the storms and flash-flood warnings. I mean, it was like encountering an altogether alien environment, as though the microclimate had entered upon a diabolical new course. Since I'm a dabbler in science fiction, it even occurred to me that here were the makings of a workable plot: A long period of humidity leads to the coalescence-in the very air itselfof some evil creature. Not anything as humanoid as the yeti or Bigfoot, but, instead, something that couldpermeateits victims rather than flat out club them. You get the picture. Well, the humidity eventually returned to normal, and the excessive moisture evaporated (like my plot idea). As summer passed and fall arrived, I chided myself for ever having harbored such a ridiculous notion at all. Prematurely, as it turned out, to my great distress.
The dining room got hit first. I had been away for 10 days in mid-October and returned to find, on the walls, which had been freshly painted in May, a nearly uniform covering of smudgy florets. Far from the beautiful patterns of a frosted windowpane, this looked more like the dried residue of a wet dog who had shaken himself at the room's epicenter. Jet-lagged and feeling the first pinching signs of a head cold, I was in no mood for further-let alone, carefuldiagnosis. I scowled at Arthur, my golden retriever, and ordered him out of the house. A week of banishment ought to serve him right. As usual with this breed-essentially Roman Catholic-he was consumed by guilt and curled himself into a fetal position on an old rug, no doubt reviewing his multitudinous sins. I got out the stepladder, filled a bucket with warm soapy water, and washed the walls the rest of the day.
It wasn't until a week later, as my cold began to improve, that I noticed something strange about the dishwasher. I still couldn't smell very well, but the odor coming out of the machine hit me like a shot of ripe Gorgonzola. A dead mouse, I concluded, reaching my hand down into that dark place below the rotator spray arm. But there was nothing there, thank heaven. I then sent the empty machine through three straight cycles one normal and two "pots and pans"-trusting in household chemistry by adding more detergent each time. But to no avail; for at the conclusion of each wash, I would sidle up to the dishwasher, slowly open the door, force a whiff through my congested nostrils, and practically fall over at the odious result.
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