July 13, 2015
I've
never been very interested in science fiction. Of course there's "Star
Wars" and, oh yeah, "Firefly," oh, and can't leave out "Hunger Games,"
and then, well, you get the picture. Let's say I've never been much
interested in writing science fiction although I did dabble with it once
upon a time.
The inspiration came in a supermarket of all places. To begin with I can
not stand the odor of the universal coverup scent, Febreze. A friend
from the old days would have said it smells like a Dutch whore on a
Saturday night. However I know lots of people stand by it. It's called
an air freshener and is designed to eliminate odors. All I can see that
it does is overload the olfactory lobes with a heavy scent only slightly
less obnoxious than one might like to mask.
What happened in the supermarket was I was picking out trash bags when
one box I looked at smelled different. Sure enough, it had the Febreze
logo on the box. Somebody decided more garbage bags could be sold if
they smelled like that obnoxious spray. I quickly put that one back on
the shelf and picked out an unscented variety. But it didn't stop there;
whether that scent was stuck in my nose or whether I passed another
product I wasn't sure, but when I looked, there was some laundry
detergent with the foul stuff included. There's usually enough perfume
in laundry soap without including that crap, but there it was.
Then I saw it on toilet paper and again on wet wipes. In time I came to
peruse products to make sure Febreze wasn't in them and was surprised
how many included it.
That's when the science fiction story came along. Think about all the
super-villain plots in all the science fiction that were aimed at taking
over the world. Not one succeeded largely because of some clever
intervention or simply overwhelming force from a super hero.
Now, suppose someone mixed some odorless toxic goop with whatever the
concoction is that makes up Febreze. Worldwide as people put out the
garbage, sprayed behind a cigarette smoker, wiped their asses, washed
their clothes. used the little units in their cars, and performed any of a myriad of domestic chores they got
one good whiff of this odor eliminator and were eliminated themselves,
along with their families, pets and plants. Double your pleasure because
the widespread use of it would also mask the stench of decaying bodies.
Before long clouds of the lethal gas would be hovering everywhere (if they aren't already) spreading the deadly air freshener.
Or it could go another way. I once
discovered some mold in a tent I owned and asked a friend how you get
rid of it. She suggested Febreze. That was my introduction. I fired one
shot of the stuff at the mold, got a whiff of the perfumey junk and
thought about sleeping in a tent with that sweet smell in bear country.
No thanks. We all know the odors that can collect inside a closed tent,
so picture a tent manufacturer infusing the fabric with Febreze to cover
them up. In my fictional world over time the powers that be trying to
figure out why there were increased numbers of bear attacks in camp
grounds.
Years ago the town where I lived started
spreading a de-icer on the streets. That de-icer when splashed up on car
finishes attached itself with the tenacity and color of road tar.
Someone discovered Febreze was the only thing that would take that junk
off the paint. That ought to have been a warming for reals.
My journey into science fiction ended
with those thoughts, at least until a couple of days ago when a story
showed up on Facebook called "The Dangers of Febreze – A real
eye-opener." The article confirms the product does not remove odors, it
simply gives you a stronger odor to cover them. The article goes on to
list 16 of the chemicals in the soup, many of them carcinogens,
allergens, irritants to eyes, lungs, skin and ears among others. It
holds dangers for just about all living things. It's one of the scariest
lists of ingredients I've ever read and I am glad now that I've avoided
its use all these years.
But it sure does make the case for a good
super villain to take over the world in a cloud of sweet-smelling
carcinogenic goop. Who would notice one more lethal ingredient in that
concoction?
Here's the article. It lists those 16 ingredients and their dangers and also offers some natural alternatives. All about wellness solutions
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