How do you tell someone they STINK!!

[Lady Vavasour]

I'm feeling very clean right now ...

[Fluffy_Brit_Bunny]

One of my fiance's more interesting friends is a highly intelligent and eccentric elderly guy who has nearly been evicted from his sheltered housing because of his hoarding habits. He also smells pretty ripe most of the time, although as long as you sit downwind he's good fun to talk to. Unfortunately despite being told many many times that this is unacceptable he will only do something about it under extreme duress. I wish someone'd spoken to him properly while he was younger and less set in his ways. They'd have done us all a public service!

Thankfully I've never had to deal with a close classmate/friend/flatmate who reeks - it's just the occasional person on the underground that irritates me. I have huge sympathy for anyone trying to work out how to tell someone.

[Suze]

I've been doing this long enough (and have been a compulsive sewer long enough) that I can hold off on buying fabric until I save the money for good fabric (there's an online source for 100% linen that's cheaper than anything I've found in store in my area). Since I wont use man-made fabrics AT ALL (not a period issue, it's a safety thing. Natural fibers will smolder before they burn. So if you're standing next to the fire when a knot spits, you get a small burn mark on your skirt, you don't go up in flames- which I've seen happen. Scared me out of my wits), I tend to wait for the money to make good pieces, that'll last. But, like I said, I've got the garb built up to get away with that :}.

But, your local thrift shop can be an excellent source for swathes of cotton (they call them queen and king-sized sheets, what do they know!), and sometimes some really nice upholstery fabric (old curtains ). And surplus stores usually have wool blankets for cheeep. Lovely cloak material .

[/quote]

Yes, I like natural material as well, and I HAVE found linen (!?) on the $1.00 table (and bought it all)

You get really, really funny looks out in the parking lot doing burn tests   (after I figured out how to work the lighter I had just bought, silly child safety thingies, just about defeted a 47 year old)

you just have to learn to feel the difference (I love to go to a fabric store and "pet" material, just need better ones around here, it seems all ours have anymore is fleece)

Suze

[freakyfemme]

Didn't people bathe much less in the Medieval and Renaissance eras?  Maybe the new guy's body odor is part of his costume, lol.   But seriously, I like the idea of "This is hard for me to tell you, and I don't think anyone else has noticed, but did you forget your deodorant today?"  It's much kinder than "Everyone thinks you smell."; and it implies that he has some grasp of basic hygiene.

[fklwmn]

Does it smell like fish? Mollescum Contagiousum anyone?



(I think I spelled that right...)

I'm not going to try to correct your spelling, but I'm confused? DS2 was diagnosed with this last year... it was a skin 'rash' basically looked like little white balls just under his skin, that spread very easily. It eventually cleared up with some preventative measures, but is this the same thing that could make a woman smell like fish?

[kingsrings]

I deal with this all the time with one of my co-stars from the drama ministry I am involved in. Fortunately, I don't notice it so much when we're on-stage, but when walking off-stage, whew!! This guy just can't seem to do anything socially acceptable, so this just goes along with that.