>Name That Smell

Entering my sunroom yesterday morning, I smelled it. It was the unmistakable smell of a burning house. As a former news reporter, I’d know it anywhere.

“Hubs, there’s a really weird smell in the sunroom,” I said when he came downstairs. He went in and sniffed. “Something’s burning,” he said. “A house. I’d know that smell anywhere.” We went outside and sniffed. Nothing.

“Oh my gosh, I think it’s coming from the sunroom!” I said as we came back inside. We spent the next ten minutes feeling the walls for hot spots, inspecting outlets, unplugging equipment. We came up empty. And it seemed the smell was getting better.

“Call an electrician if you want,” Hubs suggested. He was on his way to work.

“Well, nothing’s hot,” I said. “It might have just come up through the vent from outside and stayed in that room a little longer than the rest of the house. I mean, the sunroom is not very well-ventilated.”

I decided to give it a few more hours, but in the back of my mind, I worried about sizzling wires in our walls and smoldering wood in the crawlspace under the floor. That afternoon, I went back in the room.

“It still smells like something’s burning,” I announced to Hubs on the phone. “But I think it’s getting fainter.”

“Call an electrician if you want,” he said.

“No,” I said. “I think I’ll wait.” I did, however, walk around to the side of the house and sniff the AC units and the crawlspace vents. I’m sure my neighbors thought I was nuts. Still, nothing. The burning smell could only be detected in my sunroom and nowhere else.

That evening, we both went back into the sunroom. “Oh God, it’s really strong again,” I said. Hubs agreed. We turned everything off and felt again for hotspots. Nothing.

“I’ll sleep downstairs on the sofa by the sunroom,” Hubs said, “just in case. You can call an electrician tomorrow if it hasn’t gone away.”

Hubs spent a restless and uncomfortable night on the sofa and early the next morning, I made an appointment with an electrician.

“We’ll call you when we have someone available,” the receptionist promised, “and if we don’t have someone available today, we’ll send someone tomorrow.”

Excuse me, sir? I just told you it smelled like something was burning and you said you might send someone tomorrow?! I went back into the sunroom, this time to look up a document I keep on the computer in there with the names and numbers of recommended painters, electricians, housekeepers, and landscapers. The smell was stronger than ever. Worriedly, I stood with my hands on my hips and my eyes swept the room. And that’s when I saw them. Two Radio Flyer tricycles my parents brought with them when they came to visit last weekend. I hadn’t wanted to put them in the garage, because within days they’d be covered in dog fur and pee, like everything else out there is. For a few days, we let the kids ride them around the house, but eventually, the smell got to me. That’s right. The smell. The tricycles’ rubber tires gave off a stench that was a lot like a burning house.

How could I be so stupid?

I ran to the phone and canceled the electrician. Then I called Hubs and told him the news.

“Well, that’s a relief,” he said.

“Yeah, but I can’t believe it took me so long to figure it out,” I said. “I mean, really. Think about all we went through!”

“Well, you’re tired,” he said. Which was much nicer than what he probably should have said:

“You’re not exactly Mensa material.”

This post originally appeared on Parents.com.