the case of the kitchen stink

i came home after the show...and there was a super not-great smell to the kitchen.

now the kitchen is my domain (clearly)...i buy groceries, i cook all the food, i keep it clean. and that's why i was so puzzled. i am super weird about "freshness" and never let things expire.

what happens over the next few days is like scene out of "obsessive-compulsive disorder, the documentary"
i mopped
i cleaned out the entire refrigerator (including that gnarly space behind the vegetable drawers)
scrubbed dog bowls
bleached the baseboards (thinking maybe left over dog-ness was lurking...)

and STILL THE SMELL.

somewhere last night i started to feel like i was genuinely losing my mind. i asked everyone who came in if they smelled the funk, and of course they didn't. but it didn't matter...my ninja smelling sense was telling me something was OFF. (i really do have a freakish sense of smell-if you make kool-aid within 5 days of my entering your kitchen, i'll know. this is not the best "gift" to have, as it makes cab rides with BO drivers something out of a nightmare)

and then i found it.

oh my GOD i found it.

i was going through the pantry & saw a strange bag of potatoes. i pick up the bag, remembering something my mom had told me about how vile potatoes were when bad...

and there was a slight dampness to just one...so i lifted my fingers to my nose to see if that was the source...

and pretty much have been gagging ever since.

one slightly rotten potato. i'm not kidding. that smell is evil. actually, evil doesn't even begin to cover it. it was so bad my knees kept shaking & i felt light headed for awhile afterward. & to put things in perspective, i pick up dog crap every day. so it's not like i live in a rose-scented world. but this was bad, you guys. horror movie bad.

*ps, i have sworn off the potato for awhile. anything that smells like that when bruised is just not right.

(thank you to svacher for the magnificent drawing!)