Soooooo, I finally gained a true appreciation earlier tonight of how bad a skunk could smell. I’ve smelled them before … I’ve been in Virginia for a while now, and I actually spotted my first skunk in upstate New York when I was a kid. (They’re not pretty.) But this is the first time I’ve encountered a full dose from an animal that was evidently nearby.
Dear Lord.
This was the olfactory equivalent of Dante Alighieri’s worst visions of hell. The odor was at once strangely metallic, horribly organic and chemically toxic. If one of Michael Bay’s “Transformers” were possessed by the demon from William Peter Blatty’s “The Exorcist,” and it wielded flatulence to punish the damned, this would be it. If the three Kryptonian villains from 1980’s “Superman II” had been poisoned by chili laced with spoiled pork and Ex-Lax, this would be it.
Skunks might now top my list of hated animals, were it not for my enduring abhorrence of alligators.
Earwigs are moving up on that list, too — at least since I spotted one at 7:15 tonight in my kitchen. Earwigs look like God tried to make a proper beetle while on acid.
Eric Robert Nolan, Author 
When I drove delivery in Austin, Texas, I had to go to Houston on occasion, either for delivery or a pick-up.
Once on the highway, going through one of the mid-sized little towns, there was a section covering about a mile where skunk roadkill lined the shoulder.
I’m not talking one or two, but there had to be at least a dozen; some by themselves and others double or triple. It was like someone had driven erratically to run over an entire skunk community on purpose.
Knowing the stink of just that one, you could imagine the stench of that many lining the road, as their scent is released upon violent death.
I’ve smelled vehicles that have accidentally run over one and cannot comprehend why anyone would do it intentionally. Not to mention repetitively. Beyond comprehension.
LikeLiked by 1 person
That is one bizarre story, John!!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Quite odoriferous, too, I assure you.
LikeLiked by 1 person