Name the sport where you have to store shoes, jerseys and sweaty equipment and you will find a never-ending, putrid smelling bag. The offending bag in our case is from soccer, and it lasts all year long. In the hierarchy of smells, torture by soccer bag is better than smelling a dead body (so I’ve heard). However, just a sniff inside the soccer bag is much worse than moldy refrigerator broccoli, chunky vomit, and far worse than a whiff of sun-cooked dairy product hiding somewhere in the car.
Using the soccer bag as a form of torture, it turns out, is quite effective.
Imagine it is a rainy day, everything is wet, and you have multiple boys in the backseat of the car, pulling off their shoes and socks and opening their bags to put things away. Since it is rainy, no one is dry, the windows are up, and the heat is on in the car. A heated, soggy soccer bag reaches its peak stench in this environment. Couple that with sweaty pre-teen boys and you are riding in a torture chamber on wheels.
Faced with a similar form of torture? I pity you.
Following are ten solutions to this stinky problem. Try one or all options:
- Stop driving your kids everywhere
- Stick your head out the window; it will give you some fresh air. A bonus: turning left will be a breeze (pun intended).
- Have your kid leave the bag open at practice. Exposure to the elements will do it some good. Perhaps someone will take the worst pieces, then wash, dry and return them. One can hope.
- Get revenge against the stinky bag owner by loudly singing 80s music with the windows down at school pick up
- Install a vapor barrier between the front and back seats and tell your kids you now have a limo
- Chew enormous amounts of Grape Bubble Yum (a proven method from my babysitting days for changing diapers)
- Hang the offensive bag from the passenger side view mirror
- Drop an Odor Bomb in your car. Consider the multi-pack and drop one in the bag too. The latter suggestion would be a fantastic science experiment; can you say extra credit in science class?
- Remember in Silence of the Lambs when Clarice put something resembling Vicks Vapor Rub under her nose before viewing the dead body? Yeah, do that. I am sure they now make different colors so you can match your outfit.
- Use disinfecting wipes and dryer sheets. They are your new best friends (Recommended)
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