Now, maybe this isn’t Kosher to say. And if it isn’t, then I apologize. I know that paper mills provide people with important jobs and all, but . . . how to put it? They stink more than a pig farm. It’s just so unnatural. For those of you who haven’t been near a paper mill, the smell is reminiscent of feeding a rowdy herd of cattle and cowboys nothing but beans and cheese for a month straight, then locking them in a room for a week, forcing them all to do jumping jacks until rivers of sweat ran down them (cowboys and cows alike), then booting them all out of the room and letting all that rancid smell of flatulence, body odor and filth just fester and mold for another month. Take that, bottle it, and unleash it in the great outdoors on a grand scale.
That’s the smell I had when I went out to my garage today.
It’s not every day (thankfully), but when it comes, the smell is enough to make me want to wilt and die. BAD.
In Utah, when there’s a weather inversion, it gets all smoggy. Here, it gets smelly. I think I’ll take the smog over the smell.
Okay–I’m over it now. Thanks for listening.
So, there is a paper mill near your house? How far away is it? We used to have a mink farm near us, and the stench was awful.
It’s about ten miles, I’d guess. Can’t smell it on normal days–just when the wind’s right (or wrong . . . very wrong . . . in this case.) A mink farm? That sounds furry.
good grief
OK, that was a very lousy description, I know how sweaty cattle smell, and it’s a much more fruity smell than the mill. The term you are looking for here is rotten eggs, spoiled, rotten, hard boiled eggs.
It’s the sulfur.
And while I thoroughly understand the delicate nostrils of those from “away” have a challenge in trying to get accustomed to it, I have a word of caution for you. It has recently come to my attention that in a month or two there are going to be heavy layoffs. It doesn’t affect me personally, but you never know who you will run into these days who might be particularly sensitive to the issues.
The issue of the mill itself, not the issue of what emanates from it.
Just sayin’. 😉
Tends to hang around worse when it’s foggy. I am surprised you smell it there, though. Huh.
Re: good grief
Yeah, I knew about the layoffs, which was why I apologized in advance if I were going to say something I ought not to. Still, it’s not the jobs the mill generates I object to. It’s the reek. And the smell definitely is NOT sulphur, at least not to my nose. I’ve smelled that plenty before. Besides–I know that you’ve smelled cattle before, but have you ever smelled cattle after they’ve been doing jumping jacks for hours on end? I didn’t think so. 🙂
I’ll see your cow sweat…
And raise you an entire city’s worth of sewage. Lucky me, I work just downwind from the Provo sewage plant. Every few days, I wish I had a gas mask to get from the office door to my car.
That is all.
🙂
Gretel
Re: I’ll see your cow sweat…
Yikes!