All About Stink

After regular laundering, the stink re-activated with wear, so I tried vinegar, then baking soda, then color-safe bleach, then vodka (that's a trick for deodorizing theater costumes), then eucalyptus-based Mirazyme, specially formulated for stinky and skunked gym and camping clothes. When the stink persisted, I threw the clothes away except for two sport tops made for mastectomy ladies and therefore rare and blanch-your-face expensive.

Online I googled "stinky clothes" and read about OxyClean Odor Blaster. Last night I dissolved scoops of OxyClean in hot water and poured that brew into cool water and stirred stinky clothes in it while chanting. Instructions mandated a seven-hour soak, followed, per instructions, with a regular wash that included OxyClean. The tops are now air-drying. I will let you know if OxyClean is the one.

Perhaps not coincidentally I remembered my yoga mat -- bright pink, unrolled on floors and carpets I know are teeming with bacteria because the one time I set my chin on my mat I broke out like a teenager -- and put the mat outside in the sun, to air and purify. Later I returned to find on my pink mat a brilliant lime-green bug doing the Balasana, or Child's Pose. Looked up the type of bug so I could tell you. It's called the stinkbug.

Some days have a theme and some don't.