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What IS that? |
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Written by Zach Magoon
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Monday, 22 May 2006 |
was sitting at my desk last week when I kept getting a whiff of something nasty. I know I've talked about smells before in my commuter files but this is of a slightly different nature--it involves another aspect of commuting that I feel isn't talked about as much as the riding or the equipment or the traffic violations--office etiquette. Thinking the smell was coming from my trash, I quickly emptied that before the stank wafted over to my office-mate's side of the room. As I sat back down, I caught another whiff and thought it was just lingering--perhaps it permeated my high-quality fiberboard desk? No such luck.
Let me try to describe this smell--it was kind of a combination of methane, mold and pumpkin with a hint of sweetness, like maple sugar. It was definitely an earthy smell, I know that and I had been eating yogurt earlier in the week, so I thought it was the containers in my trash. So as the day went on, it continued to smell so I cracked the window a little hoping that no one thought it was coming from me. My office mate chimed in with "what the hell is that smell?" I responded "I don't know, I've been trying to find it for a while now." SO I stuck my head under the desk and started sniffin again. Holy hell, my bike shoes! Oh it all made sense now. I've had these shoes for 5 season's now--I've raced with them, commuted with them, laughed with them and cried with them. They've been around the block, let's just say that.
But the past week has been particularly brutal with all the rain and I don't think they ever dried out--so effin nasty. So I apologized to my office buddy and placed them in the window so as not to stink up the rest of the space, but as soon as the others within ear shot heard what we were talking about they all chimed in that they smelled something nasty. Crap. So I'm the stinky guy now?--triffic. It wasn't bad enough that these nice people have to see me in spandex every day--now that have to smell my rank shoes?
Well, I was embarrassed to say the least. Which brings me to the point of office etiquette. If you're gonna ride your bike in, find a place you can stash your stuff out of sight and smell of your co-workers. I have since moved all of my stuff to a closet out of range of any desks, so that people don't have to look at drying, sweaty clothes or smelly bog-stank shoes. I'm not sure that they all minded that much, as it seemed like an isolated incident, but I was embarrassed nonetheless.
So that's it on the subject of smells, I promise--next week--I'll talk about the "cut off." You've all seen or experienced it and it's something I've been meaning to write about for a while.
See you out there.
Zm |
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