This Quiz Stinks

Answer: Benjamin Franklin

While the quote is nearly always attributed to Ben Franklin, only a rotten egghead would know that the idea was first recorded by John Lyly in his novel of 1580 "Euphues & his England". Franklin published the quote as we know it in "Poor Richard's Almanack" in 1736.

Answer: autolysis

Who cares? If you're somewhere between autolysis and dry decay, they can call it whatever they want and who are you to argue? But for the fussy, the stages are: fresh decomposition, putrefaction, black putrefaction, butyric fermentation, and dry decay.

Answer: digitigrade, plantigrade, unguligrade

While there is the potential for all three types of feet to smell just as rank, plantigrade animals stand on their whole foot, digitigrade animals go about on tippy toes and unguligrade animals just hoof it everywhere. Some burglars and teenagers past their curfew have been known to be digitigrades as well.

Answer: sodium bicarbonate and hydrogen peroxide

Granddad's old method that works best is: mix up a quart of mother's hydrogen peroxide from the medicine cabinet with a quarter cup of sodium bicarbonate (that's the baking soda she keeps in the fridge to absorb odor). Add a dash of dish detergent and shampoo your pooch immediately. Rinse thoroughly. I wouldn't let her on the bed for a day or two. Tomato juice will not remove the smell. Lemon juice is only for mother's baking and it will upset her if you use it. Perfume is far too expensive and won't work anyway. You've got to make that little bottle last until next Christmas, or maybe even the Christmas after that.

Answer: methane

Contrary to popular legend, flatus contains as much as ninety percent nitrogen, then hydrogen, carbon dioxide, oxygen, and then methane in descending quantities. Humans are very aware and concerned about how and where this flatus is expelled by the body. Rock concerts and swimming pools seem to be okay places. Churches and elevators are places that cause the body greatly increased stress.

Answer: euschistus servus

The brown stink bug, (euschistus servus) is a pest that affects fruit crops in the southern United States. After the stink bug has injured the immature peach's tissue, the surrounding, healthy fruit grows around the scar forming what resembles a cat's face. You have no reason to fear a flashback of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). Lewis Carroll was the author of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" in which the Cheshire cat appeared in the tree, grin first. Duane Allman coined the phrase "Eat a Peach" just before his tragic motorcycle death in 1972, thus providing the Allman Brothers Band with the name for their subsequent album.

Answer: Limburger

Originally the area between Aachen and the Meuse River, Limburg has now been absorbed into Germany, Holland and Belgium. Most Limburger cheese today is made in Germany and in Wisconsin, which I think speaks well of the Belgians and the Dutch.

Answer: lutefisk

Because of its acrid smell and unique taste, lutefisk is a Scandinavian-American oddity which some claim with ethnic pride and others with, well, less than pride. "Putting lutefisk under our porch sure drove the raccoons away, but now we got Norwegians under the house!"

Answer: sixteen

Sulphur joins carbon (6), phosphorous (15) and selenium (34) as the only elements which are solid, primordial and non-metal. Sulphur should have heeded the age old advice against keeping bad company, seeing as how it has attained such an unsavory, if undeserved reputation.

Answer: bad smells

All questions are related to things that stink, which ought to remind you that you really should be cleaning out the fridge and emptying the garbage instead of sitting here playing trivia.