“In consideration of those who are sensitive to the chemicals in fragrances please refrain from wearing perfumes and colognes.”
That’s only paraphrasing the notice taped on the door to the mens locker room at the medical facility where I do cardiac rehab. Guess I should have taken a look at the ladies locker room door too but let’s assume it’s taped there as well.
Sensitivity to those chemicals certainly fits, well at least since congestive heart failure became one of the facts of my life. The thing is the sensitivity is not only to fragrances people wear. No, it includes things such as scented candles, those plug in air fresheners, laundry products, bath products and the list goes on. And it ain’t limited to that kind of stuff. We walked into a discount carpet warehouse a while back and I had to get back outside in about 2 minutes because of the chemical odors from the carpeting. Talk about adding challenges to home furnishing and decorating.
Anyway, let me refocus on the locker room. You see, immediately to the right past the locker room door are the toilets and two commercial odor control mechanisms spewing the same sort of chemicals just like in perfumes, colognes etc. Guess what kind of nose blast hits you when entering the locker room (hint – hint) and it does the same thing as colognes and perfumes to my respiratory system. It seems logical that I’m neither a charter member nor the only member of that club.
Of course, I felt obligated to point out that disparity and was told ‘imagine how unpleasant it would smell in there otherwise’. ‘At least none of those odors would contain the same chemicals in the commercial fragrances and though unpleasant wouldn’t have the same respiratory effect’ summed up my view of that.
Basic response was a long “Ohhh Kaaay” as if to say ‘yeah, whatever, you nit picker’.
Another one of those things that makes me go: huh?
