Particularly pungent patrons...

[GoldFinch]

It's bad enough that I absolutely can't stand my job at the grocery store but this is just one of those little things that makes it all the more unbearable.

I had two customers come by that absolutely reeked and left the terrible odor behind them as they left. The first one had such a strong smell of cigarettes coming off of her that I was surprised she wasn't coated with tar. That wasn't all though, lurking beneath said smell lurked another. I couldn't place what it was but it was just as foul as the stop layer of stink.


The second one smelled as though she had bathed herself in perfume before coming to the store. My eyes were practically watering from the stench and it was terribly hard on the sinuses. Apparently she's never heard of the saying "A dab'll do ya."


Oh, and there's one other tiny (I kid, of course.) pet peeve that I've always wanted to rant about and shall tack on the end of this.

I can't stand it when parents cram their five-eight year olds in the back of the cart while at the same buying what seems to be half the store's stocks. This is really really annoying and makes packing the cart a near impossibility. Cause heck knows if you accidentally hit the kid with the milk then the parents will raise bloody hell. If they want to avoid that then they should make their kids quit being lazy shmucks and walk!

[Kara]

Now, first off, I'm not being discriminatory or anything at all here. But some people from some countries smell really terrible. My SO's uncle spent several years as a missionary in Guyana and he said that people there reeked because they have to rub this oil all over their skin for some reason. It also helped keep parasites away because of the foul smell.

I remember this one customer at Circuit City who had this terrible stench of body odor and onions. I don't know if they don't use deodorants where he was from, but my eyes were seriously watering when I was talking to him. And of course he had a ton of questions about everything. I started to get waves of nausea and did my best to hide it. Then I knew it was going to come up and I'm standing there smiling (probably visibly turning green too) and my brain is in panic mode. Then I lucked out and he asked if we had any of a particular laptop in stock. I said I'd go check in the back (of course, we normally looked it up in the system), and I dashed to the bathroom and retched. I didn't get sick, but I let myself cry for a minute or two and did the "icky dance" before composing myself and going back out to finish up with him. I went outside for a few minutes after he left (out the back door. He was a really nice guy, I didn't want to offend him) and took some deep breaths.

[Primer]

I remember this one customer at Circuit City who had this terrible stench of body odor and onions.

I remember working (hot) fast food kitchens where I would come home reeking of sweat and onions. Sorry, but on occasion I had no choice but to swing by the store on my way home, before I'd had a chance to shower. I didn't like doing it, but working double shifts made it difficult to get to the store any other time. Perhaps they were in the same situation?

[Kara]

Doubtful. This was like, haven't bathed in...ever kind of reek. I've had friends that worked fast food, so I know what you mean. It definitely wasn't anything like that. He was well-dressed too. More so than a fast food manager.

[zzapp the witch]

This is a different kind of smell, but still its own distinctive kind of stink that people WILL talk about.

A week in August is our county fair and I'm a 4-H leader, so the kids are trying to wear skimpy clothing (against rules) and get their groove on (oh oh oh SO against the rules) during the biggest party of the season. It was the boyfriend's first fair, he was mainly acting as barn security (people will actually reach into cages and put our kids' animals, like baby rabbits and chickens, in their purses and bags). Katya* comes wafting on through (this girl wafts when she walks, I wish I could do that), but its the smell wafting after her that gets mine and the bf's attention.

Bf hisses her over and says quietly and bluntly in her ear, "You might want to catch a shower before your daddy smells that."

"Smells what?"

"You REEK of sex."

She turns bright red and dashes out of there in the direction of the dorm showers. When she got back, the bf was out, but I made it a point to sniff the air and tell her, "Much better." She honestly didn't know that you could smell sex on people! By the end of the week, she was IDing other kids' odiferous horsetrailer hijinks, and was on what she termed her "sex patrol".

Honestly, I don't remember being that bad when I was a horny teen, but maybe I was just missing out on all the fun.

*Name changed to protect the no longer biblically innocent. (Thank the good spirits she was 18, some of these 14 year olds scare me!)

[justZu]

I had a stinky pair walk by my beer stand last night. She was wearing the dirtiest pants I've ever seen and he had stringy, greasy hair and looked like he hadn't shaved in a week. They were surrounded in a cloud of stink that made me want to step back and I was sure glad they were only passing by and didn't stop for a beer.

[infavorofnaturalselection]

Certain jobs like say a fish gutter will leave a stench on that person you will not believe. Doesn't matter if you change out of workclothes you will still smell of that job. It gets in the hair and even after leaving said smelly jobs the body will emit that odor for a while.

Also to be fair a lot of places don't have enough running water for daily bathing so people go without. They lose the sense of smell after a while. Of course they may subconsinously still smell it which would explain the foul attitudes you find among these people. Certaintly I wouldn't be friendly if I smelled like dung for weeks or was around hordes of people that did as well.

Certain foods if you eat enough of them will cause your body to reek. Onions for example or garlic.

Plus certain groups of people never picked up on what the Egyptians understood. Shave your armpits men and women. It kills a lot of the odor.

[Sharsarannon]

Stupid, over-perfuming low-class people.....

Once I was inside a small airplane waiting to be allowed to disembark (deplane, whatever) and a woman a row or two back used high acohol content scented hairspray right there in the sealed cabin.


Now, I have Asperger's Syndrome, which, short version, means I have among other things the nose of a dog and very sensitive lungs.
I immediately began hacking and gagging, coughing and choking for air the entire way out into the terminal.
I swear the only- ONLY- thing keeping me from clawing that woman's eyes out literally was my mother's kung fu grip on my upper arm dragging me away.
If I ever meet her again I still would like to cause violence upon her.
Some people should be beaten. Rar.

[AnqeiicDemise]

When I worked at Dennys, there was this brother and sister couple, both senior citizens, that absolutely REEKED.

Nice people, but they had a horrible B.O. smell that made me vomit a little in my mouth every time I walked by.

Needless to say I always sat them near the door so the constant breeze helped aleviate the stench.


I think the worst is working the Customer Service Counter and having a bad case of hallitosis. (Bad breath). We had a lady that worked the counter whose breath made my nose hair curl. I always had to smile and quickly pop some gum or something in my mouth-- I don't know how the customers handled it.

[Anakah]

The weirdest thing I see is: People cashing out like five thousand dollars yet they stink to high heaven and have no teeth. Hmm.

[JustADude]

The weirdest thing I see is: People cashing out like five thousand dollars yet they stink to high heaven and have no teeth. Hmm.

Luck and hygiene are not related, it would seem.

[draftermatt]

There was a woman who lived in my hometown we all called "Cat Lady" She had hundreds of cats (bunch of dogs too). Her house stunk, from the outisde. When she died it had to air out for 5 YEARS before the new owners would start working on it.

She drove a huge Cadillac where she carried all of her dogs with her at the same time. Every restaurant in the area kicked her out because of her smell. One place told her not to come back until she bathed. Many people would leave the restaurant with full plates if she was seated near them.

I always felt sorry for her though. Her husband was rich, and died young. And she apparently lost her mind. But man oh man did she stink.

[GoldFinch]

The other day going into work, I got onto an empty elevator, and when the doors closed, it felt like I was trapped in a frickin bottle of perfume.

Some woman stank herself up so much that her LINGERING smell was OVERPOWERING.

When I opened the doors and came out, I could hear the people coming onto the elevator muttering about how "SOMEONE is wearing too much perfume"

Like it was me!

Stupid, over-perfuming low-class people.....

Eeeew...that's even worse because it's in such a small and confined space. I seriously wonder if these women really think that dousing themselves in perfume makes them smell fantastic.

[Blisskat]

When I worked in cosmetics, I used to hate putting lipstick on women who had bad, bad smoker's breath. Trust me, it's hard to hold your breath long enough to apply lipliner and lipstick, too.
I don't know why some people seemed soooo much dirtier than others when it came to smoker's breath... is it the brand or type of cigarette they may have smoked?

[blas]

I smoke and while you can smell a faint bit of smoke in my hair or on my hands, I never reek of it. Perhaps it's because I bathe every day and use very nice smelling soaps and shampoos and perfumes?

I always have gum on me too. I'm petrified of bad breath.

I hate people who overdo the perfume/cologne though.

Once or twice, my supervisor has fumigated me out of the work area because of his cologne. Him and my ex's best friend. And my ex.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. I work at a factory, not a damn California frat house! (Hollister cologne is what they all use)