Scranton, PA – The forecast called for thunderstorms, but Butch Pickelin wasn’t looking for an umbrella, “Hon! You seen the Lysol? No I don’t want Summer Breeze® I want Garden Mist® and don’t bring me any more Glade. We need to kill the enemy, not camouflage it.” Mr. Pickelin and his family have been haunted by an unwelcome visitor since last Saturday, and it isn’t a ghost (although some members of the family have not ruled out the possibility of a supernatural origin), it’s a smell.

It started just a few days ago. Butch and long time companion Sandra Clarheart started the day as normal, by folding up the Murphy bed in the living room and waking up their respective children (Butch Jr, Kay, Dale Dale, and Santa’s Surprise the second) who were asleep on the couch in front of a still flickering TV. It wasn’t until Sandra entered the galley kitchen to make some hot chocolate and instant oatmeal for the kids that the smell revealed itself.

“That first day, it weren’t so bad, kept mostly in the kitchen, and it hadn’t gotten that cheesy edge to it yet. It kind of reminded me of when I was just a little girl and a family of mice made a nest in Gram Gram’s sauerkraut barrel.” Explained Sandra. “I told Butch to get down under and find what ever was that had died and get rid of it. Thing was, (Butch) couldn’t find anything, just bare earth.”

By the second day it became clear that the smell wasn’t going to go away on its own. The couple began the laborious task of elimination. “By Sunday it was starting to spread out of the kitchen, and worse it was changing, adapting if you will. It started smelling like that time when my Pa took me hunting and we found Uncle Joe, who everybody thought had run off with the waitress from the Pancake Troth about two months before. Turned out he tripped on a tree root and shot himself in the back. That was the day Pa told me how hunting accidents happen when fancy fellas start making eyes at other men’s women…”

The refrigerator was pulled apart and cleaned, each food item was checked for freshness, and all the cabinets opened and cleaned, but still the smell remained. On Tuesday Butch checked the plumbing for a clog, and even went so far as to check the septic field, but it smelled no worse than usual. Sandra started calling in friends and family, to see if any of them had encountered the like before, and while many had theories, none were born out. “Uncle earl told me it reminded him of when he was working at the frito-lay factory and a skunk got caught in the Cheeto® extruder, but I reckon he just wanted to tell that story again. My friend from beauty school, Bea, she thought it might be on account of this being an Indian burial ground, but Butch is a quarter Blackfoot on his mama’s side, so I don’t know why they’d go haunting us. I tell you, I’m at my wits end.”

As of press time the smell’s origin remains a mystery. Butch and Sandra intend to make one last attempt with the Lysol. If that fails, then Butch will inflate the house tires, hook it up to Ole Bessy (Butch’s 1982 Ford pickup), and head west in search of a less fetid clime.