Sniff

2013 didn't start too well with me. I was in the thralls of one of the worst colds I've ever experienced. You know how sometimes when you have a cold you lose your sense of smell and your ability to taste because your nose is just so full of slime it's decided to shut down entirely? Well I remember that lasting for maybe a day or two, so when I lost all nose-related-functions a couple days before newyears I figured it would be gone by then.

As you may have guessed, no such luck. The number of days not tasting or smelling anything eventually amounted to six. I was really starting to get worried by then. Googling for people with similar occurrences and finding all sorts of horror stories (shouldn't have done that really).  I was ready to start believing something was wrong with me when I blew my nose one afternoon and suddenly tasted some of the tea I was drinking! What a relief to find that, under that layer or snot, my nose was still fine.

Those days of not tasting and smelling anything did grace me with a renewed respect for people who actually do suffer from conditions that impair their sense of taste and smell. Cause seriously people, it sucks. I even started eating sandwiches with marmite cause at least it was healthy and it's not like I tasted anything. Somehow the world seemed dull. No breath of fresh air when headed outdoors. No smells of rain or a freshly mowed lawn. Add to that the fact that everyone around you is enjoying chocolates and pastries and whatnot, while you're all like "uhh yeah the texture of this apple turnover is fantastic..!" it gets old real fast.

However, it did get me thinking. Some pros and cons:

Good stuff:

• No desire to eat fattening foods or candy anymore because... where's the point if you cant taste any of it. So it's easier to stay healthy as well as skinny.
• You can eat the healthiest foods even if they taste awful! Maybe you'll even live longer! Go cranberry juice n stuff! (though I have to admit this point kind of belongs with the previous one)
• You will no longer be bothered by other people's not so pleasant body odor. Someone farted? You had no idea!
• You could do work in places it stinks. Like the sewer. not sure this is a good thing though.
• You could remove your nail polish without choking on the fumes of the nail polish remover.
• No matter how bad his cooking skills are, it would always be good enough for you.

Not so good stuff:

• You will never enjoy the taste of good food again. This is serious stuff. (really, think about it for a minute!)
• You will never enjoy the taste of good food again. (because it's so serious it deserves two bullet points.)
• If the house were on fire you might not find out soon enough because you wouldn't notice the smoke till you saw it.
• If you accidentally left the gas on in the kitchen you wouldn't notice either.
• You wouldn't be able to work in a perfume shop, and your dreams of becoming a wine taster have also gone out the window.
• You wouldn't notice if you forgot to put on deodorant!

Overall I think the food and smell thing already weighs more heavily than any other argument I could come up with, so needless to say I'm immensely relieved that it has come back. I do find myself tentatively sniffing everything with hopes of catching a whiff of.. whatever, cause my sense of smell is slowest to come back. Yet I now no longer harbor any doubts that it will.

In other news, happy new year.