What's That Smell?

On Monday morning, I got into my car to go to work after it had been in the garage all weekend and I was almost knocked out by a pungent odor that oozed out like the green funk that followed Beetlejuice around. Immediately, I blamed my husband and/or daughter because I kept my car so tidy and never left anything inside overnight, let alone over the weekend. Anthony did take my car last weekend, maybe he left food in the backseat or something? (He once left an In-N-Out bag under my seat, which I found while on my way to Stagecoach). I checked all around…nothing! Maybe Meyer dropped something in the car seat that stinks? She can be messy, especially if you give her a baggie of popcorn on the ride home from Oceanside and it ends up all over the floor instead of in her mouth. I checked the car seat…nothing. Very strange. I rolled down both windows and headed to work figuring that I would buy an air freshener at CVS that afternoon and it would solve my problem…Well, an incredibly strong Yankee Candle air freshener later and my car still smells like someone left a dirty diaper in a wet cooler all day in the hot sun. What the hell was that? I checked the trunk to make sure that my pregnancy brain didn’t leave a bag of groceries in there. Negative. Then, I got my flashlight out and checked to make sure I didn’t drop any food down the side of my seat while I was driving. I admit, my pregnancy appetite is in full effect and I am constantly snacking, especially during my hour long commute home. Maybe I dropped an orange slice down there? Didn’t I eat some asparagus on the ride home the other day? Weird, I know…damn pregnancy! But from what I could see, there was nothing in the crack. Did I have a dead animal under my hood? Nope. What the hell was it and why was it not going away? Thanks to my new air freshener, my car now smells like a heavily-cologned Italian man who has been playing in a dumpster for hours. There was nothing I could do for the time being, so every night, I left my windows down to air it out, which is helping a little but I still couldn’t find the cause of the stench! I even checked under my spare tire to make sure the AAA guy didn’t leave his bologna sandwich under there when he changed my tire a few weeks ago...Well, it has been a week and the lingering odor has finally gone away. (Thankfully because I had to valet park my car at Pizzeria Mozza the other night). So, that orange slice/asparagus/dead animal/bologna sandwich must have finally disintegrated...Eww!