Vindication!

We re-did the bathroom and office downstairs. They looked great. I was thrilled. But....

There's always a but, right? (And in a house with a seven year old boy there's always a "butt." The word alone is enough to cause side-clutching guffaws.)

My problem was The Smell. Whenever I would walk through the doorway leading into the parts that had been updated I got a whiff of something between sawdust and body odor.

It should be noted that-- for better or worse-- I have a very good sense of smell. [SIDE NOTE: My brother-in-law literally has no sense of smell. He doesn't mind, he says, because as far as he's observed, most of the time people are complaining that things smell bad. Evidently no one is stopping to smell the roses.]

I attributed The Smell to the newness of the work that had been done.

But weeks passed. And, still, every time I went near the office I would be overcome by The Smell.

I don't know what possessed me, but one day I put my nose against the (new) door into the office. Ew. I had located the source of The Smell.

Repulsed and thrilled, I announced my discovery to my husband. As I recall, he took no notice. On the smelling spectrum, if my brother-in-law is a zero and a bloodhound is a ten, my husband is about a three. To him, The Smell was in my imagination. Or just-- gasp!-- "the way our house smells." He grudgingly sniffed the door and shrugged. Nothing.

Undaunted, I made all my friends smell the door. And good friends they are-- "this smells gross, here, smell it." And they did! And they all agreed. My contractor, on the other hand, couldn't pick up any smell. For a while, it seemed that The Smell was only perceptible to women and children. My husband insinuated that I was leading the witnesses.

The heat of this July had only served to empower The Smell. I constantly re-routed myself to avoid passing through the offending doorway. Something had to go-- me or the door. Not wanting to be too dramatic, I opted for the door. When my contractor finally surfaced, he had his partner in tow.

I restated my desire that they not leave my house without taking the offending door with them. Was that an eyeroll?

Minutes later, a call from downstairs. The partner: "I'm totally with you on the door. It stinks! It's awful! Gaah!"

The door is gone. As is The Smell. Cue the Hallelujah Chorus.