2000-04-12 - 11:16 p.m.
paranoia
So,
My taxes went fine...but I'll tell y'all that story some other time.
I met Amanda back at my apartment and we inhaled some Pizza Hut pizza and nearly made ourselves sick. We hung out and watched the news, then it was time for her to go home.
We got to the apartment complex entrance and I heard a key rattle in the lock just as I was about to open the door, and since I have smacked someone before, I hesitated and when the door didn't open, I gently turned the knob.
Outside, a little ancient Asian woman doubled over and started coughing and sneezing. I apologized and pushed the door open so she could get in.
Then it hit me.
My God, the STENCH.
Let me reiterate for those of you just joining us: I can't smell. The only things I've been able to smeel for years are hydrochloric acid, strong organic solvents, and that, my friends, is just about it. I had a pair of sandals that reacted with my feet in such a manner that if I took them off in the garage and took one step in the house, my mom would call from upstairs and demand I wash my feet. One step in the house and she could smell them. That's how bad they were. They made my sister gag. I could hold them up to my nose and take a HUGE whiff, and not smell anything.
I only mention that because those sandals were considered by many to be the worst smell they had ever experienced--worse than rancid farts and skunks.
The smell outside my apartment, no joke, just about put me down.
The little old lady hurried inside and Amanda stepped out before I could warn her. She started coughing, her eyes started watering...
It was a nightmare. It was AWFUL.
But we stumbled out away from the doorway and everything was fine. It was just concentrated in that little area...but oh my God, it was putrid!
It wasn't so much a stink...it was more of a living gaseous snakelike being that crawled in your nose and shat all through your nasal passages, throat and lungs.
It didn't smell like smoke...it wasn't gas...it wasn't a skunk or a decaying animal.
I don't know what it was.
A part of me, the paranoid part I only pull out and expose during The X-Files suspects chemical or biological warfare. Some kind of sinister poison gas bomb or something, left by an eco-terrorist to harass the inhabitants of my apartment complex, of which one must be a spy or a double-agent or something.
That same part of me, the part that thinks The Lone Gunmen have some valid points, considers digging out all my ballkicking videos and tossing them in the dumpster, lest I don't wake up in the morning and my mom, while going through my possessions after I'm gone, should happen to stumble upon them.
That same part of me thinks it would be a good idea to tell you all that while Amanda and I stood there trying to discern the cause of the smell, some guy in the apartment above the doorway kept peeking out from between his blinds. The culprit? Who knows? But if suddenly there are no more entries from The Fool, it would be best if you all knew about Mr. Peepers up there.
My nose tingles.
My computer desk is in the corner of my apartment right next to where we smelled the awful odor outside. I think I can still smell it.
But maybe it's my imagination. That's the problem when you can't smell...you're never really sure you can't and you're never really sure you're smelling something.
It's got to be my imagination.
Just my imagination...once again. Running away with me.
Surely.
Right?
But if you don't hear from me for a few days, send help. :)
UPDATE: 15 minutes later. The same cheesy big-tired, tinted windowed white pick-up truck has driven by my apartment four times now. Anyone know Scully's direct line? (Ahhh, the things I'd like Scully to do... >;)
