So is there a smell that our brain blocks out or ignores because it is always there? Or have we evolved to have lungs that don’t have a notable odor?

  • southsamurai@sh.itjust.works
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    6 days ago

    It’s the smell of mucous membranes.

    So, the same smell as the inside of your nose and sinuses.

    Which is, essentially, the smell of slightly salty water with traces of protein. Which barely smells at all

  • dohpaz42@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    My favorite is when you smell something so horrible that it seems to get stuck in your nose and you smell it for hours even after leaving the smelly place. 🤢

      • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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        6 days ago

        In my area there was a “return to nature” funeral home that started piling corpses in a warehouse. They were sending the family members concrete instead of the actual remains and there was something like 200 bodies piled up. The reason there caught was that the neighbors reported the smell and the police investigated. The FBI ended up doing a several month long cleanup.

      • 200ok@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Do dead bodies smell like a slaughter house? I used to have to drive by one of those on occasion and I’ll never forget that smell.

        • jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works
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          5 days ago

          One time I came home from work and found a deer in my front yard that had been hit by a car. It was still standing but it looked awful. I seriously thought about putting it out of its misery but before I could do anything, it limped off into the woods right behind my house where it collapsed and died.

          About three days later, I opened my front door and got hit in the face by the most horrible smell I have ever smelt. Imagine the smell from when you leave a meat package in the trash for a day or two. Dial that up to about 1000. Set it in the hot sun for three days and you’ll probably be pretty close. It’s so strong it stimulates your gag reflex. I have a pretty strong stomach but I thought I was going to be sick. I couldn’t go outside for a week after that because that’s how long it took the scavengers to clean up the carcass.

  • hihi24522@lemm.ee
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    5 days ago

    This is why you can taste/smell saline when it’s injected. Trace amounts of dissolved things (which taste like plastic and metal) in the saline are able to pass through the alveoli in the lungs and evaporate into your breath.

    Oddly, I think it’s a similar thing with my ADHD meds because about an hour or two after taking them my breath smells/tastes weird.