The One with Jen's Smelly Day

In case you didn't catch the reference in the title, there's an episode of Friends (the best show on earth) called "The One with Joey's Dirty Day" where Joey can't get to a shower. The title of today's blog entry is entitled appropriately Jen's Smelly Day...well because today was smelly. This blog of mine has always been brutally honest, almost to the point of embarrassment and self degradation, though I can say it has been completely genuine and truthful. Let's face it, none of us are perfect. I'm not a character in a movie or a barbie doll. Life isn't always glamorous and I'll be the first to admit it. I fully enjoy reading about other people's imperfect realities. And apparently America does too. Have you seen the weekly magazines on celebs amidst their daily ho-hum routines and stars without makeup (that's totally my guilty pleasure to look at. I can't get enough of makeup-free stars)? People like to see the less beautiful things in life. I suspect because it makes them feel better about themselves. Anyways, I figured you'd enjoy hearing, and likely relating to my very smelly day. I'm sure few people want to admit it, and less blog about it for the general public, but it happens to the best of us. Let's get real:

Typically, I wear one pair of heels every day. They are the only heels I like, so therefore, the only ones I will put on. They are very old. Five years or so. And they've gotten dirty. But today, they got wet and they are leather and suede. Neither of these materials particularly like water very much (like me!). Between the excessive wear and tear and the moisture of sweat and rain, the shoes began to stink today. They're just a strapy open toed stiletto. Not really any crevices for any rain to hide in, but apparently the stench was coming from somewhere! I wore my flip flops to lunch and left my heels in the car. When I came back 20 minutes later, the car stunk so bad, I had to drive with the windows down, even though it was raining into the car. I actually exclaimed outloud uplon entering the car, "My God! My feet reek!" Now, my feet don't typically stink. I've never had smelly shoes. And I didn't really know what to do. I fabreezed them like crazy when I got back to the hotel for my mid-afternoon break, but that didn't do much good. I contemplated calling one of my guy friends to find out how to rid the scent. I figured guys have smelly shoes all the time, surely someone would know how to clean the stilettos. In the end, I didn't call, perhaps from embarrasment. I just kept the window down and hoped for the best. But getting in and out of the car, in and out of the rain, kept making the smell worse. I'm glad there was no one else in my car; they would have gagged.

So after my smelly shoe conundrum, I decided to go to Outback for dinner. H was telling me how great the blooming onion was the other day, and I was in the mood for a delicious treat. Unfortunately, blooming onions only come in one size. I decided not to order the appetizer AND a meal because that just seemed like too much food on my table for one person, so dinner was the blooming onion. (It wasn't very good. I am not going back to Outback any time soon, for various other reasons but that's for another time) As I was driving down the road, munching on some leftovers, I realized that I smelled like onions. My hands, my breath, probably my hair. After all, my dinner didn't just have onions in it, dinner was an onion. I was 10 minutes from the fair - no time to go back to the hotel and brush my teeth. Of course, the hotel gave me mouthwash the day before. When I saw it I thought to myself, "Oh great! Always good to have a little bottle around." Well, it does not do any good sitting on the vanity at the hotel. Then I remembered that I had bought some Listerine strips the other week, just for these kind of situations. The packs weren't cheap, and I've only used one strip. I always forget I keep them in my purse. I dug through my wristlet at a red light and just to my luck, they weren't there. Nope. I took them out like three days earlier.

Worrying, I wanted to be sure that my breath actually smelled. I remembered that a long time ago I read that to test this, you can lick the inside of your wrist and let it dry. If your wrist smells in 30 seconds, so does your breath. So here, I am, soaking wet with smelly feet, licking my wrist. Classy, right? I prefer intellectual. It was research that I was working off of! So there wasn't much I could do from the car. I planned to rinse my mouth out a couple times with water when I got to the fair. I'd stay far away from people and try not to exhale. As I was unloading my car, I noticed a lone apple, rolling around in my trunk. It's been there since Monday of last week - 10 days ago. A Macintosh, in case you were curious. Those are my second favorite apples, after Empires. I read a lot of stupid research - nothing on curing brain cancer or political results. Mostly interpersonal relationship related. I couldn't tell you what my thesis statement of my 30 page paper last semester was, but I can tell you that a long long time ago, I read that eating an apple is comparable to brushing your teeth. So in the pouring rain, I stood underneath the trunk of my open hatch-back, polished my apple on my shirt, and took a big bite. I chomped away, getting the apple juices where any onion smell could be camping out. I swished, I rubbed it. I walked a few steps and took another bite. Surprisingly, it was rather crisp. No big brown spots, but that didn't matter, I was eating it anyways. Desperate times call for desperate measures. I think this actually made a difference, but I still felt smelly.

I got into the fair, set up my table and headed to "the hospitality room." Most fairs have one of these - it's basically a side room or separate corner for admissions reps to get dinner, a water, or cookies. The meal options changes. Some better than others. Sometimes non-existent. I looked around for more apples. Nothing. Just grapes and cheese. I couldn't recall grapes or cheese being in the dental hygiene article. I headed off to the bathroom. While washing my hands, I actually contemplated rinsing my mouth out with soap. Ultimately, I decided that was too far. The people could deal with my smelly breath. Maybe they wouldn't smell it over my shoes. I headed back out to the hospitality room when it occurred to me to look for a drink. Again, I recalled reading another separate article that discussed which alcoholic drinks to have on a date or at a business meeting. Ones that would make your breath smell better, not worse. Minty things mostly, but I remember cranberry and vodka being on the "good list." There certainly wouldn't be any Grey Goose in the lounge, but there might be some c-berry juice. That's what I like to call it. I actually like it too, the juice. Well the name too. The juice is second to Orange Juice in my official juice ranking. Followed by apple juice. Regardless,a t Monday's evening fair, the only dinner drinks were cranberry juice, some mango mixture, and water. It was strange, as it's more often soft drinks and coffee. Other reps were joking that they should have brought vodka. Anyways, I was hopeful that cranberry juice would be in the cooler today. Nope. Of course not. Just water. So I drank some and swished.

I went back to my booth, the fair started and I started talking to people. My feet were out of sight under the table, so I switched into less smelly flip flops and zipped my heels in my tote bag. I kept my distance in talking. Then, the rep next to me takes out a big box of mints and sets them down on the table. No clue if it was a hint or not, but I asked for one and things got significantly less smelly.