106 thoughts on “Babies”

  1. Jet fuel…when you’re sitting on a plane waiting for it to take off, I literally can’t breathe for a few seconds. Also, I work by an airport and my company claims they pump in “fresh air” into the office building, but on occasion we get the smell of jet fuel instead. It is atrocious…same gag reflex.
    There is also a smell when you microwave processed meals that makes me realize that I didn’t make the healthiest choice, like veggies in a bag. There is a distinct smell to that…for me anyway.

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  2. Fendi cologne is disgusting, smells just like Raid. Do they even still make it? Roses. Lysol. Any strong air freshener which has no business even being. I use DoTerra essential oils, but sparingly. I agree about all the stronger smells too. Old ladies do have a certain smell tho. Except nice grandma’s.

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  5. Perfume of any sort (my asthma can’t deal). Agree with geraniums; that Mrs. Meyer’s gives me a headache (but give me all the lemon). I assume we’re not mentioning the obvious ones (dead skunks, chicken that’s been in the garbage too long, diesel exhaust, etc.).

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    1. I didn’t realize how perfume affected people until a girl I used to work with told me she was allergic and very sensitive to the smell. I never wore much of it in the past, but I am extremely cautious about smells in an office setting since that day. I even purchase non-scented laundry detergent because of our conversation. I’ve smelled it on others and don’t want to be “that” person.

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  6. I can’t believe that no-one has said peppermint. Maybe it’s because everyone else DOES love it and I am the sole abberation. But, yuck…
    Lovely post, June.

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  7. Not sure how many people actually like these smells, but

    -canned sauerkraut. The worst.
    -Brussels sprouts.
    -Kraft grated parmesan in the green can. Fresh grated is quite different, but I didn’t find that out til I was an adult.
    My daughter hates the smell of fresh cut grass, but I like it.

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  8. Count me in on the dislike of lavender. I love purple. I really think because of my love of purple, I should love lavender…but nope. I also don’t enjoy fake vanilla–candles, body wash…ick. BUT, here is the anomaly that is ME. I had some lotion that was lavender AND vanilla that was amazing. I was dealing with some weird anxiety and it was the only thing that helped me sleep. So. Weird.

    I like the smell of roses. And REAL food. No artificial stuff though. I am super picky about shampoo and lotion and hand soap.

    Here is the question I have: Why did everything go to EXTREME smells? I used to like a scented candle burning in my house, now I can’t WALK PAST the Yankee Candle store. Same with Bath and Body Works. Good god, you walk in there and it is like getting punched in the face.

    Rawr.

    Lovely post, er, topic, lovely June!

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    2. I know what you mean with the extreme smells. The laundry detergent and fabric softener scents have become overpowering and now there are even scent beads you can add for more of a scent. It’s awful!

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  9. I do not like a lot of flowery smells, gardenia being the major offender, closely followed by citrus flowers. Luckily those syrupy sweet blooms are outside, and I can avoid them.
    I know many people like the smell of cigarettes, but I absolutely canNOT deal. To me it smells toxic and like the reason people leave burning buildings.
    I do not like the way cauliflowers smells when it’s cooking, but I love to eat it! I cannot explain that.

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  10. I wonder if I can still say lavender since so many on here hate it too! It just grosses me out and I don’t know why.
    The only smell that really bothers me and makes me feel suffocated is the incense they use in church and swing around the sanctuary in a thurifer. One time it was so bad I had to leave the area for about 15 minutes. It sounds so melodramatic but I feel I can’t breathe. But I might take not breathing over lavender!

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    1. You are not the only one with the church incense. It bothers both my cousin and my father’s asthma terribly.

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  11. Vanilla. Not the vanilla found in ice cream or French Toast but the vanilla scent. If you are ever driving with the windows down and the smell of vanilla wafts through your car… you have just passed a waste treatment plant. Vanilla is the one scent that can cover all that.

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  12. I don’t know if anyone else likes it, but the smell of eggs (particularly fried), meat and cheese makes my stomach turn. I’d rather smell fish in the house than fried eggs. Mind you, I like to eat eggs, meat and cheese.

    One smell I love that others might not is the smell of a freshly extinguished match.

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  14. I don’t like the smell of lavender, even though I secretly dream of growing large fields of lavender on my farm. I’m logical that way.

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  15. Let’s see. I hate the smell of honey, crayons, coffee, cigarette smoke, cigar smoke (the worst!), 99.9% of candles and those wax melts and Glade Plug-ins. There’s a house around the corner from me that must have 25 different diffusers, plug-ins and candles going at the same time. I can smell the competing scents from the sidewalk and it gives me a headache. Stargazer Lilies are gorgeous but their scent gives me a horrible headache.

    What was that perfume back in the 70s/early 80s that everyone wore that was so overpowering? Giorgio? Ciara? Of course I had both because it was The Thing to have those perfumes. Today, they both make me gag.

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    1. When my husband and I were looking to buy this house they had a ton of those glade plugins. After we moved in we realized it was to cover up cat pee. Four months later we still havent moved into the master bedroom because we need to replace the flooring. Lesson learned!

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  16. My daughter-in-law works at an Aveda salon and gifts my daughter and me products that work really well but neither of us like the smell. I think it’s lavender but with no sweet notes at all. Does anybody here use Aveda?

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  17. Shalimar is the worst, but the bottle (original, not the new version) is to die for. Have loved that bottle design since I was a child.

    Petunias, Lysol, baby powder

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  18. Lavender, pine and fresh cut grass, I am allergic to all three of them. Cigarette smoke, ugh, and it hurts my lungs too. I used to think fried onions smelled like body odor but I have learned to like the smell with age. I hate the smell (and taste) of subs with oil and vinegar and raw onions. Yuck! That is a bit like body odor for me.
    I hate strong perfumes and colognes and moth balls too. I have changed seats in church many times because of strong perfumes.

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  19. Bath and Body Works. Especially anything fruity.

    Overwhelming chocolate smells like in a See’s Candy shop. This one comes from when I was planning my wedding.. I happened to be near the fancy chocolate shop and wanted to find out their prices for favors. I also happened to be coming down with a nasty virus and was already lightheaded and queasy. There were only two other customers in the shop, so how long could that take. Forever. It had to have been 15-20 minutes. By the time I finally left I really wasn’t feeling well. Also the prices were beyond my budget because fancy. I didn’t think anything of it until I was around overwhelming chocolate again and got hit with awful nausea. Then when I was pregnant and they said to use cocoa butter to prevent stretch marks? Oh HELL no. Not happening. I’ll take the stretch marks, thank you very much.

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  25. Those star-gazer lilies that all florists seem to want to put into flower arrangements. Erg – those things stink to high heaven and will give me a headache in .05 seconds!! If I’m ordering flowers, that is my first requirement – NO star-gazer lilies!!

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    1. One year, my best friend gave me the most gorgeous bouquet of star-gazer and Casablanca lilies. And I had the worst headache within 5 minutes. The scent is so overpowering it actually makes me feel sick. Plus, Lilies are extremely deadly to cats. No joke.

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      1. That’s me too. I still have the most vivid memory of my mom sending elementary-age me to the Cook’s Market to pick up a bell pepper she needed for a recipe. It was summer in the So Cal desert so the walk home was hot and the smell from the paper bag got worse and worse. Couldn’t wait to get home and never got over it.

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      1. Vitamins, yes…and maybe some stinky essential oil? Once I bought a box of healthy snack bars and brought that smell home with the box. Had to empty the bars from the box and toss it in the outside trash, but I swear I could still smell the weird smell on the bars.

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  29. The smell of coffee. I have a total physical and mental meltdown when my daughters want me to go to the drive thru window at Starbucks. I avoid all the areas where coffee is brewed at work. I hold my breath if I walk past the coffee bean isle at the store. And I avoid coworkers that walk toward me with cute little styrofoam coffee cups… I should whip out a silver cross and wear garlic around my neck.

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  30. My daughter HATES the smell of wood burning – campfires, brushfires, a fire in a fireplace…she can’t stand it. (I love it)
    I can’t stand spicy scents, like the cinnamon-scented things that come out at Christmas. My mother is a big fan of spicy scents and will have all kinds of candles, plug-ins, and room sprays going that give me a headache.
    Also, I don’t like scents that smell like food IF THEY AREN’T ACTUAL FOOD. I hate candles that smell like sugar cookies or brownies or caramels because if I smell those things I expect to be able eat them and when I find out they’re just candles it makes me cranky because now I want to eat dammit! A room should not smell like a birthday cake unless there is actual cake in the friggin room!

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    2. My sister hates cinnamon! My exhus would put cinnamon oil in the diffuser when he knew she was coming over because she wouldn’t even come inside. Those two had a hate/hate relationship.

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  31. The smell of old people. I’ve just read that it is a real thing too….scientists say it happens as the result of cell death, inflammatory disease and possibly an alkaloid secretion called 2-Nonenal that increases with age. The worst.

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    1. I thought it was just that didn’t bathe often and had trouble wiping themselves because of their creaky bones, etc. I will have to look up 2-Nonenal – interesting!

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  32. I don’t think it is the actual baby’s smell that people like. It’s got to be the Baby Magic lotion. Right? Also, eucalyptus smells like cat piss.

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  33. There aren’t many scents I don’t like. I agree with lillies. They are overpowering to me.
    Not a big fan of all of the older, wealthy woman perfumes: Chanel No. 5, White Diamonds, White Shoulders.
    I don’t like things that smell overly powderery.

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    1. I just ordered my 94-year-old mom a bottle of Chanel No 5… It’s the probably the third one since I’ve been doing her shopping for her.

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  34. This is exactly opposite of what you have asked, but I have am aunt who thinks skunks smell good. I will never let her buy me perfume!

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    1. My MIL was the same way – the skunkier the better. She would go out of her way in her car to try to find where the scent was the strongest. Weird. I’ve heard this is common though – in the same way that cilantro tastes like soap to some people, skunk smells good to others.

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    2. Back in the day you could be out driving and smell skunk and look for the dead one on the side of the road. Now you have to make sure someone in a car next to you isn’t smoking some of that skunk weed. I always wonder how they can smoke that nasty-smelling stuff.

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  35. I only like the smell of my own babies. And only when they were actual babies. Now I’m all, “Brush your teeth! Take a shower! USE DEODORANT!!”

    Other than that I can’t stand the smell of peppers cooking, especially in the morning. They foul up the whole house all day. And if you put them in my food?? Get out.

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  36. AXE body spray that middle school boys don’t know how to use judiciously. Rose scented perfumes and other products. The April Violets perfume my grandmother wore. Febreze.

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  37. I like lavender but the lavender-scented Mrs. Meyer’s products smell awful. But that scent is seemingly the most popular Mrs. Meyer’s scent judging by the fact it’s ALWAYS available at every store every day, instead of the pine scent they only bring out at Christmas and which I really do like. I also hate any kinda Yankee Candle bullshit.

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    1. The lemon verbena scent was my favorite Mrs Meyers scent until I got pregnant. Then it made me nauseous. Four years later, I still can’t smell it without feeling sick.
      I order Mrs Meyers products from Grove since they have more scents than they stores.

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    2. Mrs. Meyer’s changed their lavender recipe a few years ago. I’m still not over it. I do love the Iowa Pine at Christmas time and buy multiples to last me.

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  38. The smell of the guy sitting next to me, but his girlfriend on the other side obviously doesn’t mind. Please hurry and call my name. FML

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  40. I have an horrid coworker who is mean to everyone and she hates the smell of disinfectant spray. I was particularly delighted to spray the door handles, etc in the office yesterday after I found out someone in our office was ill. “Just trying to avoid the flu. So sorry about the smell.” Take that, you mean old bat.

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  41. Lavender
    Eucalyptus
    And weirdly, tea. If someone is making hot tea in the kitchen at work I have to leave or I start gagging. I like the idea of a nice cup of tea, but the smell of it brewing gets me every time.

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  42. Lilies. They are beautiful, but the smell gives me a raging headache.
    Also, vinegar on foods makes me gag. The smell of salt and vinegar potato chips and malt vinegar on French fries are particularly awful. The smell of vinegar used to dye Easter eggs doesn’t bother me one bit though.
    Strong perfumes drive me nuts. I worked someplace where my boss and a coworker wore these perfumes that were awful and they doused themselves in them. I now see old boss at work sometimes and she still wears a lot of perfume. I don’t know what kind it is. I think it’s one of those musk type perfumes.
    I could smell newborn babies all day though. The sweet smell of a newborn’s head is heavenly.

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  45. Lavender
    Vanilla
    AXE body spray – or perhaps this is just the copious amounts that young men douse themselves with – for the love gawd ration that shit out

    signed cranky old lady – shakes fist – get off my lawn

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  46. I’m very, very sensitive to smells (as in they trigger migraines). Surprisingly, I can enjoy lavender in small doses, but otherwise I’m limited to peppermint and light citrus smells. Everything else is overwhelming, so I don’t burn candles or use scented detergents and soaps.

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  47. Babies always smell like a diaper pail and responsibility to me. Not a fan of either.

    I can’t stand the smell of air fresheners of any kind. Any time I smell one I just wonder what the person who sprayed it is trying to hide.

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  48. I hate scented anything. My mother has one of those Glade plug in air fresheners in every available plug. Some rooms have five or six competing scents. The worst. But I’m assuming they sell that stuff because people like them, so does that count? I hate fake scent of any kind. That pretty much includes all perfumes and colognes, especially those worn by male teenagers.

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    1. Those plug-ins are the WORST. My ex mother-in-law had one in every room and the smell punched you in the face as soon as you walked in the door. There’s no way breathing in all those chemicals 24 hours a day can be healthy!

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      1. That’s what we try to tell her. Plus, what’s wrong with the smell of just your house? I wonder if we lose our sense of smell as we get older and she just can’t tell how overwhelming it is? And maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if she’d just pick a scent and stick to it. But she buys anything that’s on sale and plugs that sucker in. So it’s ALL THE SMELLS.

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        2. I didn’t think anything was wrong with the smell of my house until my daughter’s friend walked in and said “your house smells like farts.” Now I’m paranoid about how my house smells so I try to keep a candle going because I don’t want my house to smell like FARTS.

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        3. Yes we do. I taught an anatomy and physiology class at the community college and we totally lose our sense of smell as we get older. But those air freshener plugins are killer! I used to have a regular running route through a neighborhood down the hill, and one house I could smell their candles or plugins or whatever it was FROM THE STREET. That is a lot of stink. Didn’t matter what time of day, it was every time I went past their house. The chemicals they were breathing — just boggles the mind.

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      3. Yes we do. I taught an anatomy and physiology class at the community college and we totally lose our sense of smell as we get older. But those air freshener plugins are killer! I used to have a regular running route through a neighborhood down the hill, and one house I could smell their candles or plugins or whatever it was FROM THE STREET. That is a lot of stink. Didn’t matter what time of day, it was every time I went past their house. The chemicals they were breathing — just boggles the mind. Also just realized I unwittingly copied a lot of the same words from romcomdojo — what you said must have been in my head. So sorry.

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    2. I tried lavender when I was working night shift. When I smell it now I am automatically stressed because it reminds me of that terrible period of me life.

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  54. Most scented things. I’m with Georgia. When I am put in charge, all things scented will be mandated to be unscented. However, peppermint oil is my friend in church with the perfume and moth ball scents.

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    1. Poison perfume gave me a horrible pain like a hatchet to the forehead. Disgusting stuff. A customer with god awful purplish dyed hair (before it was a thing) and very over done make-up that matched always wore it and I cringed every time I saw her coming.

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  57. I can’t think of anything right now for me, but I was always puzzled that Uncle Leo liked the smell of sewer gas.

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      1. Oh, June. I’m so sorry. I love Chanel No. 5.

        My mother wore Shalimar, which is an acquired taste, so to speak. I worked with a woman who sprayed it in the air like room freshener if she was having a bad day. Instant migraine for Carol.

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        1. Yes! Geraniums! No one else understands what I’m talking about. My MIL has them everywhere in her house and they smell like, what I imagine licking rusty metal tastes like. I HATE the smell of geraniums!

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