According to Hofmann: Scents and Sensibility
After careful consideration, I decided that I have to issue a retraction for a previous column where I criticized the multiple scents and aromas that candle companies and fragrance companies have been pushing on the consumer.
Turns out, after some deep thinking and deeper breathing, I was totally wrong in my criticism because I didn鈥檛 factor in what I call 鈥渟cent corruption鈥�.
Scent corruption is basically when a scent is used to mask and eliminate another scent, but, as you grow accustomed to the scent-eliminating scent, your mind associates the scent-eliminating scent with the scent you wanted to eliminate in the first place; therefore, corrupting the scent-eliminating scent forever.
And that鈥檚 my two cents鈥r 10 scents, according to the previous paragraph.
A perfect example of scent corruption is when my dog, Oreo, goes outside and partakes in his favorite activity, which is rubbing his head on the dead bodies and/or exposed entrails of animals that have died in our yard.
Of course, I鈥檝e also noticed Oreo rubbing his head with the same amount of joy and vigor on our dirty clothes in the basement, so I couldn鈥檛 help feeling a bit self conscious after seeing that.
Anyway, needless to say, Oreo smells a bit ripe when he returns from his all-you-can-rub-animal-guts buffet.
The first time it happened, my wife went out and purchased pre-moistened doggy wipes. The wipes were vanilla and coconut scented and, normally, those two aromas are pleasant to me, but I found them repulsive after 20 minutes of scrubbing Oreo鈥檚 head with wipe after wipe.
It鈥檚 truly the monkey wrench thrown into the gears and sprockets of someone鈥檚 olfactory.
The experience also reminded me of the old saying that when you mix five pounds of ice cream with five pounds of manure, you end up with 10 pound of manure; if you add whipped cream and cherries, you end up with manure sundaes.
Of course, my example involving Oreo is pretty extreme where foul odors are concerned, but chances are mostly everyone has had a similar experience of scent corruption.
Let鈥檚 say a husband enjoys a cigar every once in a while during the course of an hour, and he enjoys said cigar at home in their wet bar because he needs a stiff drink along with his stogie.
Anyway, the wife of the house frowns upon the activity, so she plugs one of those fragranced oil cartridges into the wall, releasing the aroma of berry cotton candy.
So, you have cigar smoke with cotton candy and scotch mixing together in one area, and they鈥檙e not exactly a complementary mix of scents.
Now the husband has to throw away his box of 鈥淚t鈥檚 A Boy鈥� Montecristos because cigar smoke makes him think he鈥檚 inside a cotton-candy stand that鈥檚 on fire.
Turns out, there are two solutions to that problem.
The first happens to be designating one 鈥� and only one 鈥� scent to combat odors.
The issue with that is we鈥檇 have have an election to determine the scent, but then you get into the politics of the thing. The Lavender Loyalists will have issues with the Pine Party, and it wouldn鈥檛 be worth the effort.
The other solution is to allow the fragrance companies go wild and constantly come up with new and different scents so the consumer can move to another aroma that will eventually be corrupted and replaced and so on and so forth.
So take this retraction, which may be the longest retraction in journalism history, with my sincere apologies. If you want to read the column in question, please feel free to do so.
However, I have to warn you that reading it after reading this may bring a corruption to your senses.
According to Hofmann is written by staff reporter Mark Hofmann of Rostraver Township. His books, 鈥淕ood Mourning! A Guide to Biting the Big One鈥nd Dying, Too鈥� and 鈥淪tupid Brain,鈥� are available on Amazon.com. He co-hosts the 鈥淟ocally Yours鈥� radio show on WMBS 590 AM every Friday.